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For most people, January is the pinnacle of ease: long days at the beach, lazy lunches, candlelit evenings, families gathered, boats launched, laughter echoing across campsites and verandas. The cultural script dictates the vision. This is what we strive for: images of light, love and gratitude; the month we exhale, marvel at what we’ve created and bask in its glory.

But for many, January brings something else entirely – a deep ache – part longing for what was, part dread of the year ahead.

Sadly, I know this terrain all too well. For three years, the month everyone else looked forward to with gusto filled me with dread. I’m a resilience researcher, so I’m well equipped to handle tough times, but I’m also a mother who lost her daughter and friends in a senseless car accident – and none of my work prepared me for how brutal the summers following their deaths would be. While people played happy families around me, my only ambition was to get through the days, sitting alone on the beach, willing the blasted holidays to end.

The contrast between the brightness and lightness of my old world, and this new darkness, was almost unbearable.

Maybe you can relate. Maybe you’re living through your own kind of holiday hell, wondering how life ended up here, never imagining it could look or feel like this.

There are good reasons for this. In January, the routines that keep us upright – school drop-offs, commutes, meetings, even the minor irritations of daily life – fall away. Without them, we lose the busyness we use to hide from our grief. The distractions that can hold us together dissolve, and what’s left can be raw and confronting.

Add to that the contrast effect: when everyone else seems to be thriving, your loss feels sharper. When social media feeds are a blur of golden hours and gratitude posts, and it’s supposed to be the season of abundance, for those who’ve lost someone, something or simply the life they once knew, it can feel like we’ve been........

© The Age