A Polyvagal-informed approach to the seasonal energies for trauma, AuDHD and ADHD
Feeling the weight of the darkest days? In this episode of the Feel Better Every Day Podcast,
I’m sharing gentle, nervous system-friendly rituals to help you honour the seasonal energies of Yule (Winter Solstice) while healing your trauma and befriending your AuDHD or ADHD brain.
Listen or watch wherever you get your podcasts
Discover how to:
✨ Use a Yule log tradition for releasing and renewal
✨ Navigate seasonal overwhelm with polyvagal-informed practices
✨ Honour both the darkness and the returning light
✨ Set intentions that actually feel good for your nervous system
✨ Create community connection on your own terms
Whether you’re struggling with the season or finding joy in it, this episode welcomes all your feelings and offers practical ways to thrive through winter’s longest night.
🔗 Free resources and show notes
📖 Get the book: 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing
💌 Join the Sole to Soul Circle for deeper dives, exclusive content and instant access to the whole archive
🎙️ New episodes every Tuesday – listen on Spotify, Apple or wherever you get your podcasts
#WinterSolstice #Yule #TraumaHealing #AuDHD #ADHD #PolyvagalTheory #NervousSystemHealing #SelfCare #NeurodivergentSupport
Wishing you the coolest of Yules! 🕯️
LINKS
Listen to Purr! Hiss! Freeze! Episode 48 of the Feel Better Every Day Podcast wherever you get your podcasts. Watch and read full transcript here
Find out more about how embodied journalling can help you here
CHAPTERS
(0:00) Honouring the darkness and welcoming renewal
(0:57) Trusting your nervous system and honouring your needs
(2:05) Introducing Episode 89
(3:38) Yule log ritual
(5:38) Embodied journalling and self-acceptance
(7:03) Collective care and community intentions
(8:39) Free newsletter and polyvagal-informed gratitude practice
(10:31) Book, coaching and other resources
(11:04) Closing message and thanks
FULL TRANSCRIPT
How do you feel about the dark nights and long [I meant SHORTER 😊] days? You may be loving it, you may be feeling a bit hopeless, and this week we’re looking at ways in which you can celebrate your winter solstice here in the Northern Hemisphere by honouring the darkness, the cold, potentially the hopelessness, and also remembering the renewal, the hope, the deep roots growing underground even when it feels like there’s nothing happening on the surface.
Trusting your nervous system, giving yourself permission to go to events that feel good for you and avoid potential sensory overload or make up for it by having quiet days after, just really honouring how you feel, whether it’s through trauma, through ADHD, through autism, honouring what you need.
With it being the longest night in terms of darkness in this part of the world, it can feel a bit hopeless. If it feels good for you, I encourage you to connect with that, dipping the toe into that dorsal vagal, that Freeze! Only dipping a toe in.
We’re focusing on Ventral Vagal (Purr!) the feeling good, the renewal, the hope, the letting go of what no longer serves, and setting intentions around what you want to bring into your life.
It can be a wonderful time of year to connect with the worry, the anxiety, the fear, the fear of the darkness, fear of the cold. I’m going to introduce this episode, episode 89 of the Feel Better Every Day Podcast. Thank you for listening.
I’m sharing a couple of my favourite rituals for this time of year in this episode, and I’m your host and producer, Eve Menezes Cunningham. I’m an author, columnist, trauma therapist, self-care coach, senior accredited supervisor specialising in AuDHD, ADHD-friendly therapies, trauma-informed, neuro-affirming and transpersonal approaches, and I help people heal through somatic self-care practices that honour how your brain and nervous system work, as well as your Self, that uppercase S for that highest, wisest, truest, wildest, most joyful, brilliant and miraculous part of yourself. With new episodes each Tuesday, you can subscribe or follow to make it less likely that you’ll miss new episodes.
And if you’re new here, you may want to check out other episodes, access deeper dives, free resources and more information at the Feel Better Every Day Podcast. As you listen to today’s episode, ask yourself, how are you feeling about Yule? How are you feeling about Christmas? It can be very dark, very cold, very joyful, very light. Welcome all the feelings, as always and just honour however it is you’re feeling.
For the feel part of the Feel. Love. Heal. framework this week, you may want to take a Yule log for yourself. So this is a log that I’m going to be burning, and the chocolate cake dessert comes from this ancient tradition where people would carve or write things that they were ready to banish into the flame, and also intentions, letting go of, ready to welcome. I encourage you between now and Yule, the 21st of December, to write you might want to carve.
Me, I’m quite impatient. I use normally a permanent marker, sometimes biro. It depends on the log. I don’t have the patience for lots of struggle with it. I want it to be as easy as possible, but it’s really joyful to then burn the log and meditate on what you’re releasing and what you’re welcoming in, that sense of letting go, renewal, thinking about the warmth, the light to come, the joy.
And we have a little visit here from Meadbh. So I’m just going to welcome Meadbh to Episode 89/
And notice how that feels for you. If you don’t have an open fire, if you don’t have a log, you can write on a piece of paper. You can burn it safely with a candle in somewhere safe outside or safe inside. The intention is around really reflecting on renewal, and in order to renew, we release as well.
The more we let go with faith that we are clearing the way for more light, more warmth, more joy, more ease, more healing, more freedom, whatever it is you’re wanting, let yourself ponder, let yourself reflect, let yourself release and welcome.
As we move into the Love part of the Feel. Love. Heal. framework this week, you might want to grab your journal. You might want to do some embodied journaling and reflect on any pain, any imperfections, any feelings of being at odds with the season.
It may be around social awkwardness, it may be around sensory issues, it may be around family dynamics, friendships, anything like that. Journal in a friendly way for yourself, and it might be something that you choose to burn on the 21st with your log or instead of. Do your best to love your whole self, to welcome all of it and know that part of feeling and accepting the pain is shining a light on it.
The days are going to begin to get longer again. Sunlight is the best disinfectant, giving yourself that gift of letting yourself feel it all so that it can come up for healing. You’re feeling it at some level anyway, you might as well make it conscious and actually heal it!
Obviously if you need more support and find yourself a good therapist, coach and talk to a loved one, if that’s part of the despair, the darkness, the pain of this type of year, time of year.
As we move into the Heal, collective care element of the Feel. Love. Heal. framework, think about either celebrating the community you already have around you, celebrating and honouring ancestors that may have passed or contemporaries that may have passed. Give yourself time, maybe light a candle, remember them and just really being gentle with yourself as you recognise those losses and think about the kind of community you’d like to create. It might be part of your intention setting and giving yourself permission, even if it feels impossible based on your current friendships or relationships.
Imagine light, imagine warmth, imagining feeling safe, welcome and loved wherever you go, allowing your nervous system to thrive. Really giving yourself permission to dream big.
This week in the Sole to Soul Circle, I’m inviting members to burn the Yule Log with me again.
We did it, I think it was last year and I will send an invitation by Zoom for that. You can join the Sole to Soul Circle as a free or as a paid member. Each Wednesday if you join, you’ll receive your deeper dive into each podcast episode and free subscribers get journal prompts and paid members, which is from just 8 euros a month, get exclusive video and audio recordings.
You might also like to sign up for my free weekly newsletter, Míle Buíochas Mondays. And each week it’s polyvagal-informed journal prompts really, while I also share some of the things I’m grateful for. I’m supporting you in building a gratitude practice that honours your nervous system by welcoming all the feelings and part of that involves not just the gratitude, but thinking about the things that have had you stressed out potentially in sympathetic survival (what I call Hiss!) We have ventral vagal Purr! when we go with the Polyvagal Purrs approach to Polyvagal Theory, using rescue cats to make it friendlier, helping you understand it better and you can kind of apply it to dogs, whatever you choose, lizards, anything you love.
We tend to be more compassionate with creatures than ourselves.
With the journal prompts each Monday, I’m encouraging you to connect with what’s been stressing you out, what’s had you in sympathetic survival mode, what’s had you in Hiss! as well as the ventral vagal Purrs, the glimmers, the good stuff. And also dipping a toe into the dorsal vagal, the Freeze! The sense of hopelessness and especially at this time of year, there is so much darkness, there is so much pressure, there’s a lot of advertising, which seems to make everyone feel like everyone else on the planet is having amazing times, apart from them, forgetting that these are films, these are advertisements, they’re not real, families are complex, friendship groups are complex, individuals are complex, we know this.
If you want to heal your trauma and befriend your AuADHD or ADHD brain, you can find out more about the book, 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing, and you can also explore Self care coaching and other ways in which we might work together at selfcarecoaching.net. And you can access full show notes, including links and the full transcript at thefeelbettereverydaypodcast.com
Wishing you the coolest of Yules!
Thank you for listening or watching the Feel Better Every Day Podcast. This episode, like all of them, was produced by me, your host, Eve Menezes Cunningham. You can find full transcripts, links, and more information in the show notes, and also at selfcarecoaching.net, as well as more information about the book, 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing, and if you’re interested in those deeper dives, joining the Sole to Soul Circle, as well as lots of other free resources and information about other offerings.
If this episode was helpful, please leave a five-star review. In a world in which so much is coming up for healing, and so many people are feeling unsafe, I want to do whatever I can to help as many people as possible heal from trauma, helping create a world in which everyone is safe, welcome, and loved physiologically, emotionally, spiritually, and mentally able to thrive. Your subscribing or liking or sharing feedback and other support helps me help as many people of all genders with trauma histories and AuDHD or ADHD.
And your learning to take better care of yourself isn’t just good for you, it creates a ripple effect helping others heal too. Keep looking after yourself, do what feels good, let yourself honour your nervous system, let yourself honour your charge, your life force, and míle buíochas! A thousand thank yous!