By Anastacia Mott Austin
We know all about the usual holiday travel advice: Book your flight mid-week, fly in the morning before the flight schedule backs up, pack clothing that can be mixed and matched and doesn’t wrinkle easily. Check your flight number online before leaving for the airport, know the security guidelines so you don’t get stuck in line or forced to mail your Swiss Army knife/pack of razor blades/knitting needles back to yourself, etc.
But how many of us are truly ready emotionally to travel for the holidays? We book our flights but don’t prepare for Aunt Edna’s rude questions or Mom’s comparing us to our sisters.
We don’t sleep well in unfamiliar beds, we overeat because it’s just easier and somehow comforting, and often just end up toughing it out until we can return to our real lives.
I’m not talking about holidays in which you don’t travel far and can return to your own digs the same night. The promise of sleeping in our own beds can get us through any one day.
But if your loved ones live far enough away that it requires more than one overnight stay, this advice is for you.
Many people experience the post-holiday blues because the trip ended up not being what they’d hoped for. You wait months to see your family for Thanksgiving or Christmas, and then when you get there you can’t wait to get back home. It’s never how you remembered it. Actually, it’s never how you wanted your memory of it to be. No wonder it can be a letdown.
I know that for myself, when I enter my mother’s house I have to fight the urge to a) eat raw cookie dough without her catching me, or b) go out into the garage to have a cigarette without her catching me, or c) sneak out of my window at three o’clock in the morning to meet my high school boyfriend…without her catching me. I’ve followed a healthy diet most of my adult life, I haven’t smoked for over 15 years, and I’m happily married. Plus as I recall I never sneaked around that much, even as a teenager. So what’s the deal? How can I avoid sabotaging my healthy lifestyle or saying something I’ll regret after too much eggnog (which I don’t even like in the first place)?
Family therapists say that the very conditions that we idealize at holiday times-concentrated togetherness, heightened emotions, expectations for perfection-combined with travel fatigue and indulgences in eating and drinking-are the perfect petri dish for emotional confrontations and discontent.
Especially if family lives far away, high expectations for the limited time together can create tensions and inevitable disappointment as reality often cannot live up to our hopes.
Experts recommend a few tips to keep in mind so that traveling to see family can be an experience that does not make you want to chew off your own leg to escape.
Some of those travel tips are really valuable:
• If you’re traveling to a different time zone, try to go to bed slightly earlier or later than usual in the weeks leading up to your trip. There’s nothing quite so discombobulating as not being in sync with everyone else’s schedule. Plus, if you’re tired, you’re more likely to be emotionally sensitive.
• Plan your travel so that you’re not stressed out. Arrive in plenty of time to go through security lines and allow time for any complications that arise, double-check to make sure you have or ticket, or better yet, choose an e-ticket and check it the night before. Being stressed out at the beginning of your trip can set the stage for the entire visit.
• Try to be as comfortable as possible during your flight. Wear breathable clothing, ask for water instead of alcoholic drinks (it’s not going to help to arrive drunk), bring a favorite book. You’ve heard it before, but it makes sense. Trying to look fabulous for your arrival is a nice thought but by the time you get there, if your outfit isn’t comfortable you won’t look your best anyway.
And there are some practical tips for how to prepare yourself emotionally as well:
• Communicate with the family member who is hosting you (if you’re staying with family) well before your trip, so that you can iron out any sleeping arrangements you need, as well as plan your schedule for the visit to avoid last minute conflicts of expectations. If at all feasible, try to stay at a nearby hotel. It will give you a neutral oasis to escape to and some alone time if you need it. Plus no one at the hotel will care if you need to bang your head against the wall a few times.
• Arrange to have a contact person from home that you can call on a cell phone, to re-orient and remind yourself that you actually are 36 years old and not ten, even if your mom is telling you what you should and shouldn’t do every five minutes. Telling your friend on the phone, “I’m not ten years old anymore!” is better than shouting it at your mother after three hot toddies.
• Try to duplicate your normal routine as much as possible. If you usually work out, try to schedule a run in the mornings. If you need to have your double espresso (and who doesn’t?), find out in advance where the local Starbucks is. Changes in diet and exercise can throw off your systems, which can add to feeling out of sorts. Try to stick to your usual diet as much as possible.
• If you can, try to hold on to the big picture. Having a statement or mantra you tell yourself, even as simple as “breathe,” can help when you feel like telling your sister, “You’re not the boss of me!” Remember that as annoying as they can be, you love these people. They are your people. You waited a long time and saved your money so that your children could know Uncle Harold and Auntie Bernie, even if she does peer at you over her bifocals and ask (every single time she sees you), “Are you a lesbian?”
Remember…just breathe.
How to Survive Holiday Travel without Turning into a Ten-Year-Old
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