Only The Strong Survive

Surviving home for the holidays might not be as easy as it sounds. Extended family, shopping on a tight budget, and living under your parent's house under “their rules” for a whole month will be challenging. Please heed our tips for surviving it, made more palatable by adorable Christmas movie gifs, and try and have some fun-- you're still in college after all ;)!

1. Have an adult conversation with your parents

I think it’s mega-important to establish some ground rules when you’re home for Christmas break in order to avoid conflict. Try your best to compromise! What are points you will want to discuss? Curfew? Enjoying the occasional adult beverage? Grades? Try and approach them in a mature fashion and hopefully, they’ll start to see you in a new light.

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2. Take care of yourself

Take time out to take care of #1, YOURSELF. It was a long semester and your brain probably feels like mush. I’m all about face masking while binge-watching an entire series. Bonus points if you can get everyone in your family to wear one, and double bonus points if you can snap a family selfie.

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3. Hide your parent's favorite Christmas album

If I have to listen to Kenny G’s Christmas album one more time, I’m going to snap.

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4. Avoid controversial conversation topics

Honestly, it was enough at Thanksgiving this year. Tell everyone you’re taking a political hiatus but that you’ll be back to argue in 2019.

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5. Catch up with friends you never see

This is the perfect time to catch up with your friends from High School! You’ve got plenty of time to grab a coffee, go for drinks at your hometown haunt, hit the mall, and just drive around in your beat-up car like the good old days. Enjoy it while you can.

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6. Stick with your exercise routine

This might be the hardest thing to accomplish on the list (besides compromising with your parents) but it’s also the most important if you’re looking to get right back at it for Spring semester. Yes, you’re probably eating way more than you normally would, but it’s really all about keeping up that motivation. Summer bodies are made in winter, as they say.

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7. Offer to help around the house

Being in college is kind of a weird place to be, age-wise. You’re not really a kid anymore, or at least that’s what they tell me. The holidays are super stressful for your parents, especially if your family is hosting, so this is a really great chance to show how much you’ve grown this year. Offer to clean, cook, pick-up/drop-off, whatever. You have no idea how much your Mom will appreciate it, and it’ll make you feel good knowing you are one of the reasons Christmas was such a success.

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8. Work work work work work

I know you want to be lazy, but there’s a good chance Mom and Dad won’t appreciate that very much and that’ll lead to arguments. There are tons of ways to make money over Christmas break, and if you’re lucky-- they’ll get you out of the house. Once you make some work friends, you'll be itching to stay at work even on your days off.

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9.) Stock up on #TBT’s

You might appreciate your family more if you go around the house taking pictures of old family photos! Not only are you bound to find some golden baby pictures to show off on social media, but once the nostalgia kicks in, you won’t even feel like fighting with your little sister over the fact that she's wearing that brand new sweater you haven’t even taken the tags off of yet.

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10. Beer

Beer has been helping college kids survive being home for the holidays since the dawn of time. This Winter break, grab a cold one and join the club.

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