Hi, this is MPR's Life Kit and I'm Julia Farlan.

This episode, we're talking about a very acute kind of stress.

One of those where you just gotta get out.

You don't need like a red button that you press like under a table that like

ejects you into the into the stratosphere.

That would be so beautiful. I could start a kickstarter for that.

We're talking about that pit in your stomach, what's going to happen feeling that can come

up before meeting with family for the holidays.

You know that kind of thing where you find yourself putting on an outfit that you hate

just so that nobody says anything weird about how you're presenting yourself.

Or maybe you scroll through some news articles to see what kind of wild thing good old uncle

ding dong might say. Or maybe you just kind of sulk for a few hours.

Holidays can represent a lot of lovely beautiful joyful things.

They can also be exhausting, fraught with tension, and make you relive past trauma.

Plus, there's sometimes that thing where you fall into your old familial roles.

Like if you were the baby of the family, nobody takes you seriously,

or everybody just rolls their eyes when you suggest something because they think you're the zany one.

Hello, I'm a zany one.

So for this episode we asked you our listeners and you answered with your holiday stress questions.

And I called up Dr. Andrea Bonnier, whose title I definitely know how to spell.

So license clinical psychologist.

I can't spell the word license to save my life.

...