The Emotional & Psychological Toll of the Family Vacation
After recently watching the 2014 film Force Majeure by Ruben Östlund, it reminded me of the hard-earned wisdom that comes from age and experience. Specifically, the wisdom of understanding the paradox of the family vacation. It can be an emotional and psychological roller coaster, even if you’re not visiting an amusement park.
Most people look forward to a family vacation. Whether you’re traveling as a couple in a committed relationship or with your spouse and children, a family vacation is a chance to get away, put aside your worries, and focus on what’s really important in life — your loved ones.
At least that’s the fairy tale we’ve all been sold since we were children. We were tempted by well-meaning parents with images of amusement parks, nature walks, and “doing things together.” We were told (and often cajoled) into coming along to “spend time with your family,” even when we often secretly hated our siblings or our parents in our everyday life.
A family vacation isn’t all joy, sparkles, and flowers. It’s a test of everything that defines a family and couplehood. It strips away all pretension and shiny social veneer from your relationship with your partner (and your kids, if you have them), laying bare what kind of relationship you really have with them.
Family time is fun time?
Naively, even after the myriad of mixed experiences I had in my own childhood, I somehow believed that as an adult, “vacation” would be different. After all, what could possibly go wrong with spending an intense amount of time with the one you love?
At first, nothing goes horribly wrong and all seems well. But by day 3, you realize that you and your partner likely have divergent ideas of what constitutes “fun” or “relaxing.” It’s not something you likely talked all that much about beforehand, especially if it’s the first vacation.
If kids are involved, you likely planned the whole trip around some primary activity that they will enjoy. This could be skiing (as in the movie), visiting a national park, exploring the wonders of a museum or two, or enjoying a few days at a large amusement park. You think to yourself, “Well, we’ll be busy all day and the kids will be tired by day’s end.”
Mostly, it goes to plan. The day is well taken care of. But it’s all the other time you assumed would be like home that you didn’t count on. So out of 24 hours, you really only thought about one-third of the time. After accounting for sleep, you still have a third of each and every day you’re going to be spending with your significant other and/or kids you didn’t really think about.
Downtime or time to get down?
At home, this isn’t a problem. You all have your rooms to go to, endless distractions, screens, and even friends to hang out with. On vacation, you have nothing but your screens and often a single, shared room and bathroom that is your home for days on end. The first night, it’s fun! It’s a new place, you stake out your bathroom space on the counter, decide what chair will be used to drape clothes over, and see what the old-fashioned TV has to offer.
But after awhile, the lack of your own personal space starts to wear you down. Most people on vacation never think much about this — that the need for your own personal time doesn’t magically disappear just because you’re away from home. It doesn’t. And if you don’t take this into account in your vacation planning, you may find people get psychologically and emotionally worn down as the vacation progresses.
Even kids need their own space and time. We often take for granted that they will function no matter what is throw at them, but that doesn’t mean they’re functioning well. After a few days, they may need some space for themselves too.
Just like in real life, when you’re on vacation there’s a time to get down and do all the things you planned to do. But there’s also a need for scheduled downtime, space for each of you to do your own thing (even if that thing is to go for a walk on your own).
It can stress your relationship
Focusing just on your significant other, it’s easy to believe that a vacation will allow you both to just relax, put aside the daily worries of life, and enjoy each other’s company. The reality is that humans can’t just turn off their worries or disconnect from social media or the rest of their life. We’re all connected nowadays all the time. Traveling some place else really isn’t going to change that.
I may sound negative, but with so much time spent together, a vacation is going to expose not only the joys of your love and appreciation for one another, but also the tiny cracks in your relationship. Especially if it’s the first or second time you’ve done this.
You have to go into your first few vacations together eyes wide open to this probability. This will not be all fun and good times with each other. It’s best to come prepared to understand that all of this time spent together can temporarily increase relationship stress.
What I wish I had known as a young adult going on vacation with my girlfriend or boyfriend the first time
Plan ahead of time. Lots of people believe vacations should largely be spontaneous. You pick a place, make the reservations, get the tickets, and just go with only an outline of a plan. Maybe that works for some people, but what I’ve learned is the more planning and scheduling you put into a vacation ahead of time, the better it can be. Why? Because expectations are set up-front about what the vacation will entail. Downtime and alone time can be built into the schedule from the start. There’s much less room for misunderstandings about what you’re going to be doing and what each of you expect from the time together. I found a simple spreadsheet of each general day’s activities and lunch/dinner plans to be helpful.
Talk ahead of time. As much as you should plan ahead of time, before you go on vacation is the time to talk about what you want to do on the vacation. Coming up with ideas on the fly is always possible of course, but knowing all of the things the place has to offer you and what interests you the most is so much less stressful. Communicating with your partner about those interests and deciding what you can and can’t do means there’s less room for disappointment or “running out of time.”
Respect boundaries. Vacations can be a great time to explore your limits or even experiment with things both you and your partner want to try but never had the opportunity to do so. Talk about those things ahead of time, long before you go on vacation. But you also need to understand that vacation doesn’t mean all the old rules of your relationship no longer apply. Good, healthy boundaries need to come with you. If your girlfriend or boyfriend says, “I don’t feel comfortable doing that,” a vacation’s not the time to try and cajole them into changing their mind.
Try new things. I like to try new things, but sometimes on vacation I would stick to what I knew rather than being open to a new experience. I now better appreciate that while the known things are good to feel grounded while in a new place, it’s also beneficial to your life experience to stretch your wings and do things you might not ordinarily consider. It doesn’t have to be all the time (“I’ll eat something different for each meal”) or wild (“I wonder what skydiving is like?”) — just whatever fits your curiosity.
Be spontaneous. Just because you put together a schedule of where you’ll be and generally what you’ll be doing each day doesn’t mean there isn’t room for spontaneity. Eat ice cream in the middle of the morning. Decide to swap out one evening activity for a show or band you wanted to see is in town. Walk instead of Ubering. Whatever you feel like in the moment, try and keep yourself open to changing things up as needed.
Say Yes more. After years of going on vacation with different girlfriends, I found one psychological trick that often seemed to work for me. Like many, my default response to doing something (versus doing whatever it is I was doing or nothing at all) is to be skeptical, questioning, or even just plain pragmatic. This usually comes across as negativity, even if that’s not what’s intended. So my default answer on vacation is now, “Yes.” “Let’s go check out parasailing!” “Yes!” (If that’s something you genuinely feel comfortable doing.) “Do you think we’ll still have time to shower if we stop and do a little shopping?” “Yes!” (You’re on vacation, you can always move the schedule around a little). “Can you give me an hour in the room alone?” “Yes!” (We all need some alone time, there’s no need to question it.)
Communicate & check-in daily. It’s easy to say, “Communicate regularly,” but how exactly? Have a daily check-in with your significant other. Whether it’s first thing in the morning over coffee and tea, or the last thing you do while lying in bed at night. Say something like, “How was the day for you? What did you like best? Is there anything that’s bugging you?” It’s not meant to be argumentative, it’s meant to open the lines of communication and give your partner a chance to voice their wins, joys, and annoyances with someone they trust and love. This is not the time to be defensive. Instead, take it as feedback and think about how you can make tomorrow better for both of you. And your boyfriend, girlfriend, or partner can do the same. (You can also do this with your kids at a daily meal time.)
Vacations are supposed to be fun — carefree even. The reality is often different, leading to one or more family members becoming disappointed. It doesn’t have to be that way. Understanding that a vacation can be as stressful as any other social activity in your life can help you better enjoy future vacations.
