Not answering for Maudcat but I agree with her when she says that Christmas is an especially tough time or at least, because I've not yet had a sober Christmas since I started drinking, I suspect it is especially tough.
I think if we were only talking about the ideal then it wouldn't be tough at all but we don't always achieve the ideal. For myself, I made a BP, a decision to quit drinking for good. Having done that, whenever I experience AV I try to objectify it as far as I can. One technique that works for me is picturing myself sitting in a theatre experiencing the AV. Why a theatre I don't know and it's not really important but perhaps it represents a mental shift from observing the world to introspectively observing myself.
Practicing techniques like this separates my from my AV and brings me back to my desired mindset in which I made my decision to quit. And then I can calmly watch my AV play itself out in a detached kind of way. This usually happens without much effort on my part but sometimes I find it tough. I may fail to objectively my AV because I'm distracted by other things, or I'm feeling too lazy and this gets me caught up in drinking thoughts where it becomes harder to extricate myself from it. Harder but never impossible if I really try. I am always absolutely confident that the AVRT practice of recognition and separation will work, it's just that I sometimes finder it harder for one reason or another to put it into practice. Like now, at Christmas.