I’ll be alone this holiday — how do I get through it?

Three pages in this library speak to it. Decide now what kind of alone it will be is for the holiday you already know you will spend alone. Take yourself to the film is for the film or the meal you have not gone to because no one was free and you worried what the room would think of a person on their own. The far side of lonely is one person from inside a long stretch of loneliness. The holiday page’s safety line comes first.

If the holidays have brought you to thinking about ending your life, or someone is threatening you, the ideas on the page are not the tool. Decide now what kind of alone it will be says you deserve more than a plan for the day. Call or text 988 in the US, or call Samaritans on 116 123 in the UK and Ireland — elsewhere, your local crisis line. Both are free and answer at any hour, holidays included. If someone is threatening you, or you are in danger right now, call 911 in the US or 999 in the UK — elsewhere, your local emergency number. For the nights that are hard but not an emergency, the page points to a warmline in the US. The Resource Bank here has the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, free, confidential support from a trained counselor, any time, by call or text, where veterans press 1; and NAMI’s National Warmline Directory, a state-by-state list of free phone lines for when it is not an emergency, each line keeping its own hours.

Decide now whether you want company or a good day on your own, and plan for that one — the places that need help on the day can be full weeks ahead. In Decide now what kind of alone it will be, the usual advice — enjoy the peace, treat yourself, it is just another day — suits one kind of person alone, the page says, and may not suit you. The people there split, and were not arguing about the same thing. Some people say a holiday alone can be a relief: no family politics, no gifts to buy, nobody to perform happiness for. Others were alone and hurting, and one person put it bluntly: being told to be happy, or to enjoy your own company, is infuriating when you are genuinely lonely, and much of the advice going round fails to admit the pain at all. One side says go and find people, because isolation does harm and loneliness does not fix itself by waiting; the other says make it a good day on your own, because solitude can be restful, even preferred, and pushing yourself into company you don’t want can be draining. What decides it, in the words of people there, is your current state of mind — depression, or a healthy liking for your own company — and whether the being alone is chosen or forced. The page’s way to tell is one honest question, two minutes long: when you picture the day alone, do you feel relief or dread? If it is dread, look up one place near you that serves a holiday meal or runs a holiday event, and ask today whether they need help on the day. If it is relief, write down three things you will do with the day, and one food you will have. And if you call yourself an introvert, one person made a distinction worth having: if what you feel is a wish to be somewhere else, with someone, that is loneliness or shyness talking, not your personality.

If it is company you want, this is the part with a deadline. Some people on the page suggested helping out on the day — a free holiday meal, a shelter, an animal shelter, a care home, a programme that delivers meals to older people — for company, structure and a sense of purpose, and one person said it breaks the loop of being alone with unwanted, intrusive thoughts. One person is blunt: holiday volunteer spots at soup kitchens and shelters can be fully booked months in advance, as early as July, it says. A former shelter worker agreed that holiday slots fill months ahead, and in the US, Feeding America’s advice to volunteers points the same way without giving a date: holiday slots fill up fast, so reach out early. So call or email this week, not the week before. Ask even if it is late: one person said the search is worth doing, because there may be a local need. If the day is full, ask about the week after: the former shelter worker suggested volunteering after the holidays instead, and Feeding America says the need does not stop when the holidays end. One person warns volunteering assumes you can get there and can do the physical work, and some places need an orientation first. And if you are broke, one person said helping at a free meal can feed you too.

Some of the page’s other ways in: a group that meets anyway, where some people say a running club, a board-game night or a fan club takes the pressure off because the activity gives everyone something to do and talk about, and one person added that you need to go to several in a row before you know anybody; a message to the people near you, which one person suggested posting on a local online board, asking who else is alone for the day and arranging a plain breakfast or lunch, and which some people note takes nerve and carries a little social risk; and a local holiday programme, since one person says some towns run free holiday breakfasts or match people with a host for the day, though it varies a lot from place to place. One person said being in a room full of people does not cure loneliness if nobody there really connects with you. The patient version, from one person: don’t expect one day to fix it, and use this season to plan one or two small changes for next year. Reaching out is hard even when you know you should, one person adds; it is allowed to be hard.

If you would rather have a good day to yourself, the page says make it a day, not an absence. Some people say a day alone goes well when you choose something engaging — a hike, a meal out, an event — rather than drifting through it (one caution on Take yourself to the film says remote hiking is not a thing to do alone at all, and some people there say to tell someone where you are going and when you will be back, as you would for any outing alone); some describe making your own ritual, a particular film, a particular meal, a quirky tradition that makes the day yours rather than one you are failing at; and some describe deliberate comfort, a hot bath, skincare, soft clothes, candles, the programmes you love. Some ideas from individual people: the takeaway that stays open on the holiday, and a film you have been saving; a busy public place, dressed warmly, just to be among people without having to talk; a comedy special, or a recording of a laughing crowd, playing in the background so the room feels less empty; a walk in nature, a visit to an animal shelter, a cinema, a game with friends online; looking up the history of the town you are in and turning the day into a small project; a friendly hello to strangers, which one person said came back as warmth; and treating it as an ordinary day. One warning runs across both plans: one person planned to drink heavily through the whole season as a way of coping alone, and the page calls that a real risk. If the plan for the day is mostly a drink, it may be worth a second look, and the numbers above are there if the drinking is covering something darker. If money or a car is the limit, the page says several of these ideas cost nothing — a walk, a busy public place, a message to someone — and in the US, 211 is a free call that can tell you what is running near you. And some people on the holiday page said it outright: it isn’t just you. Others described staying home and feeling the same, and some offered to connect with others spending it alone, or to send them food.

Book the one seat and go, at a weekday afternoon or first showing the first time, because no one in the room is looking at you and the film is better undisturbed. The holiday page lists a cinema among its ideas for a good day alone. Take yourself to the film is built from many people’s experience. Many people say the other people in the room are watching the screen, or living their own evening, and are not counting who came alone; some say the awkwardness is real for a little while, and then it is not, and after a few times it is not at all. One person who works at a cinema sees people alone every day and has not once thought about it. Many people say the film is better this way — no whispering, no phone, no one to catch up on the plot — and many say the logistics fall away: no negotiating the date, the showing, the seat, the snacks. For the first time, some people say go off-peak, when the room is nearly empty, and one person chooses a seat two in from the aisle. Some people say to tell someone where you are going and when you will be back, as you would for any outing alone; one person warns a bar late at night carries a safety question that has nothing to do with awkwardness, and the page warns that remote hiking is not a thing to do alone at all.

The film page says plainly that it is for the person held back by the room, not the person held back by loneliness, and it carries the split rather than resolving it. Some say that for some people the spark of an outing is the sharing, and people argue over whether going alone frees you or leaves you lonelier. The people on the isolating side describe it exactly: walking out of a film with a head full of it and no one to tell is the part one of them hates; one says the fun of doing things alone wore off after a while and turned into sulking; one person warns the loneliness stays even when you fully believe no one is judging. The people on the other side do not deny it; they say the outing is still better than the sofa, and that having no one to discuss it with is a separate problem from whether to go. How to handle the after-film silence is a gap the page names and does not fill. If what you are missing is company rather than courage, it points to the page on aiming yourself at people, and one person says the same solo outings are where they started meeting people, because being alone in public makes you easier to approach than a pair.

You can live through this. Not gracefully, and not every day — but through it. The holiday page says that if the loneliness is not really about the holiday and has been going on for a long time, the season is only where it shows, and it names a page written from the far side of it. The far side of lonely is one person. Two good friendships, given everything: turning up, being fun, being supportive, supplying whatever was needed. Then something happened that they needed help with, and they asked, once. Nothing came back, and both friendships went. Out of that they took two things: a rule about arithmetic, that it can’t only ever be one person doing the giving; and that this is survivable. The account ends on two words, and the page says they are the reason the rest is worth reading: most days. The rest of that discussion is not triumphant. Somebody worked out mid-sentence that it had been three years; somebody else had spent three years talking daily to one person, until that person reconciled with an old best friend. Nobody there was finished, and several were kind to each other anyway. The page says plainly that nothing in it is a plan for getting out; it describes endurance rather than repair. Its step for today is nothing social: write down the smallest thing you would ask somebody for if asking were free — the loan of a drill, a recommendation, ten minutes on the phone — just the sentence, not the asking, because the account turned on somebody who gave for years and asked only once, when it was enormous. If tonight is worse than lonely, it points to the warmline directory: a directory rather than a single line, so it takes one more step than it should, each warmline keeping its own hours; you do not have to be in crisis to use one, and it is US-only. If it is worse than that, 988 in the US is answered around the clock, by call or by text, and in the UK 116 123 is. Outside the US, findahelpline.com will name the line for your country; the Resource Bank here has it, for finding a free, confidential helpline where you are.

Who these pages are not for. The holiday page is about the ordinary, hard kind of holiday alone. It is not for anyone in crisis, and it does not cover grieving a death at the holidays, long-term loneliness that outlasts the season, or managing depression; if what you are dreading is the first holiday after someone died, it says it is not built for that grief. What helps varies a great deal between people, and a good day for one person is a miserable one for another. Its volunteering point was checked against Feeding America’s guidance in the United States; local rules and dates differ, and many countries do not keep the same holidays. The film page is for the room, not the loneliness. The far-side page is one report from inside a long stretch, not a plan. And if the dread has become something heavier than a hard day — thoughts of not wanting to be here, or someone threatening you — then planning activities is the wrong tool, and one warning on the holiday page says so plainly. Call or text 988 in the US, or call Samaritans on 116 123 in the UK and Ireland — both answer on holidays too — and if someone is threatening you, or you are in danger right now, call 911 in the US or 999 in the UK; elsewhere, your local emergency number.