Approaching the Dark Season with Science & Compassion: Reflections, research, and preventative strategies from a Perinatal Trauma & EMDR Therapist

Written by: Sarah Donovan, LCPC, PMH-C

November 6, 2025

Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor in Maryland | Perinatal Mental Health Certified | Certified EMDR Therapist & Consultant | Founder of Tilted Root Counseling

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Dark mornings. 4 p.m. sunsets. Frozen windshields. By the time November settles in, many of us are already living on emotional reserves.  

Over the years, the more I’ve allowed myself to meet this season honestly—with body, mind, and spirit—the more it has evolved into a time of restoration, creativity, and quiet renewal. I don’t brace against it anymore. I am preparing for it.

I wrote as a reminder that what you’re feeling makes sense—biologically, psychologically, and seasonally.

It’s Biology, Winter, and Being Human

Less sunlight means lowered serotonin and disrupted melatonin cycles. Mood shifts. Fatigue. Irritability. That’s physiology, not personal failure. Layer on motherhood, caregiving, professional pressure, trauma history, or grief, and winter becomes a full-body experience. 

If you’re holding trauma, navigating postpartum shifts or your nervous system hasn’t felt safe in a long time, then winter doesn’t always feel like “cozy season.” It can feel heavy. Anxious. Disorienting.

This guide comes from where I sit: a maternal mental health therapist, EMDR practitioner, mother, someone recovering from burnout, and a human who knows winter presses on every tender part of the brain and body. 

There are practices and mindsets, rooted in research, compassion, and lived experience, that help the nervous system feel more supported during the darker months.

1. Compassion as Medicine: Nervous System Practices That Actually Help

“Self-care” is everywhere—but trauma-informed care asks better questions:

Questions I ask instead:

• Does it regulate?

• Does it integrate?

• Does it connect?

• Does it release?

Practice I love:  Tonglen, a Tibetan compassion practice I found from Melissa Romano’s Vagus Nerve Deck under the “Calm” category:

Try:

• Inhale: This is heavy—for me, for many.

• Exhale: May we feel even a little more hope.

Research Insight: Compassion practices improve vagal tone and decrease amygdala activation, shifting the body from survival into connection.

2. Chase the Light (On Purpose)

Research on Seasonal Affective Disorder shows 20–30 minutes of bright morning light helps reset circadian rhythm and boost serotonin.

It doesn’t have to be a sterile light box. Light can look like:

• A soft therapy lamp in the shape of a moon on your desk (see picture above)

• Lighting a candle or burning incense or steal your kids Hatch (aromatherapy + light = chef’s kiss)

• Twinkle lights, open curtains, holiday glow, or coffee by a window in silence

Light tells your brain: There is still a sun. You are still here.  

It can leave lasting impacts throughout the day.

3. Move—not to perform, but to feel alive

Movement isn’t about productivity. It’s about helping the body shift from freeze, immobilization, or shutdown.

Physiological benefits:

• Boosts endorphins

• Supports lymphatic flow

• Helps metabolize stress and trauma

Research Example: An 8-week aerobic exercise program for trauma-exposed young adults significantly reduced mood symptoms and improved emotional regulation compared to a control group.

Ideas:

• Hot yoga at 6 a.m. to sweat out anxiety

• 20-minute walk

• Lifting weights

• Stretching on the kitchen floor while coffee brews

  
  

Your body can be tired and still allowed to move gently.

4. Make Something—For No Reason at All

Creativity isn’t frivolous. It’s nervous-system regulation.

When you engage in low-stakes, repetitive creative tasks, you’re giving your brain and body a chance to unwind, process, and soften. 

These activities spark what some researchers call “creative incubation”—a gentle background processing where your hands are busy, your mind relaxes, and cortisol levels begin to shift. As a result it allows a quiet and healing process of cortisol levels dropping and creativity coming back into existence. I was introduced to this research from Brene Brown’s new book about leadership.

Try:

• Cross-stitching (mine currently says: “My favorite season is the fall of the patriarchy”)

• Knitting, pottery, watercolor

• Folding laundry while listening to a spicy audiobook

• Writing something no one will ever read

  
  

This is about rhythm, not perfection.

When you give yourself permission to make—without agenda—you’re saying: I matter. My nervous system matters. 

5. Weighted Blankets: Deep Pressure Therapy

There’s something deeply reassuring about heavy fabric draped over you—it doesn’t just feel comforting, it works on your nervous system. The technique is known as deep pressure stimulation (DPS) or deep touch pressure, and it’s exactly what a well-chosen weighted blanket offers.

Research Highlights:

• DPS shifts the body into “rest and digest.”

• A clinical trial showed improvements in sleep and mood after using weighted chain blankets for 4 weeks.

• Another study found a 32% increase in melatonin when people slept with a weighted blanket compared to a light blanket.

Tips:

• Choose one ~10% of your body weight

• Use it in therapy sessions, on your couch, or before bed

• Let it be permission—not performance—to rest

Here’s how I experience it and how I recommend it:

I bring one into my in-person EMDR sessions for a grounding tool. I keep one on our couch at home—it’s the most fought-over object in our house during movie nights (bonus when the cat curls on top).

 6. Nature Still Counts—Even When Everything Looks Dead

Even in winter, nature regulates the nervous system.

Micro-moments of nature:

• Sun on your face in the car

• Hand on a tree trunk

• Watering your plants

• Breathing in cold air for 60 seconds

  
  

Research:

• 20+ minutes in nature significantly reduces cortisol levels

• Exposure to green space improves emotional regulation, blood pressure, and mood

Your body remembers the wild—even when the wild looks still (and dead).

Rest Isn’t Giving Up—It’s Seasonal Wisdom

You’re not broken. You’re responding to winter, to life, to being human.

Author Katherine May of Wintering writes:

“if happiness is a skill, then sadness is too—wintering asks us to feel what hurts and still choose to tend to it.”

And later, she reminds us that:

“rest—letting time expand, sleeping, slowing down—is a radical act, but essential.”

Rest isn’t laziness—it’s biology. It’s resistance, as Tricia Hersey reminds us in her book and amazing work. It is needed to thrive.

When you’re ready for support, whether through trauma-informed therapy, EMDR, or simply a place to land for referrals—I’m here.

Wintering Resource List

Books & Tools:

• The Vagus Nerve Deck by Melissa Cook Romano, LCSW – Trauma-informed practices to support vagal tone, emotional regulation, and nervous system repair.

• Rest Is Resistance by Tricia Hersey – Explores rest as a spiritual, political, and restorative practice.

• Wintering by Katherine May – Offers guidance on seasonal rest, acceptance, and emotional renewal.

• The Book of Delights by Ross Gay – Daily reflections that spark joy and awareness of small wonders.

• May, K. (2020). Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times. Riverhead Books.

• Strong Ground: The lessons of daring leadership, the tenacity of paradox and the wisdom of the human spirit By: Brene Brown

• Hersey, T. (2022). Rest is Resistance: A Manifesto. Little, Brown Spark.

• Poetry by Andrea Gibson – Encouraging, wise, and emotionally resonant works.

• Poetry by Mary Oliver – Evokes nature through sensory-rich language.

• Poetry by L.E. Bowman – Activist and resistance-themed poems that inspire reflective rest.

  
  

Additional Tools:

• Light therapy lamps (10,000 lux)

• Weighted blankets, layered textures, cozy environments

• Local therapy directories: Postpartum Support International, EMDRIA, Psychology Today, Inclusive Providers & Pro-choice Therapist Network

• Mindfulness, breath, and sleep apps: Insight Timer, Headspace, 10 Percent Happier, Waking Up or Calm

The Research 

• An, H., Lee, S. H., Kim, J. Y., Kim, K. U., & Kim, J. H. (2020). Effects of deep pressure using a weighted blanket on anxiety and physiological parameters in adults. Journal of Clinical Nursing, 29(21–22), 4020–4028.

• Axsom, D., & Cooper, J. (2021). The effects of deep pressure stimulation on melatonin and sleep quality: Findings from weighted blanket use in adults. Journal of Sleep Research, 30(4), e13211.

• Berman, M. G., Kross, E., Krpan, K. M., et al. (2019). A 20-minute nature experience reduces cortisol levels in adults. Frontiers in Psychology, 10, 722.

• Bryant, R. A., Felmingham, K., Malhi, G., et al. (2022). Aerobic exercise for trauma-exposed young adults: A pilot randomized controlled trial. Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, 16, 829571.

• Mogenhan, R., & Nilsson, L. (2024). The effects of weighted chain blankets on insomnia and mood disorders in psychiatric patients: A 4-week clinical trial. Nordic Journal of Psychiatry, 78(3), 145–154.

• Ocampo, A. C., & Wang, X. (2021). Deep pressure stimulation as a therapeutic modality for sensory regulation: A systematic review. Journal of Occupational Therapy & Rehabilitation, 39(2), 67–79.

• Qiu, L., & Li, Y. (2021). Nature exposure and mental health: A systematic review of green space and emotional regulation. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 18(8), 4113.

• Thagard, P. (2016). Creative cognition and honing theory: Reorganizing mental representations through creativity. Cognitive Systems Research, 40, 1–12.

Sarah Donovan, LCPC, PMH-C is a licensed therapist, Certified EMDR practitioner and consultant, and founder of Tilted Root, a trauma-informed counseling practice for women, parents, and couples across all seasons of life. She specializes in maternal mental health, perinatal trauma, anxiety, and burnout. Sarah is deeply passionate about helping clients feel seen, supported, and safe enough to heal and about teaching other professionals how trauma, the nervous system, and attachment intersect in the perinatal period and beyond.

Her clinical approach integrates EMDR, DBT, somatic and attachment-based therapy, and walk-and-talk sessions in nature, combining research, compassion, and real-world practice to help clients move beyond survival and into meaningful healing.

Photography By: Luke O’Brien