HOW TO COMBAT PTD
We all want our holidays to last forever, but Abi Jackson discovers we can avoid post-travel depression by focusing on the good things in everyday life…
On the way home from the airport recently, tired from the journey after a blissful week in the French countryside gorging on bread and cheese, something rather interesting happened.
It started with the grin plastered on my face. Then I noticed my fiancé was smiling, too. “I can’t wait to get home to the cat,” I said. “Me too,” he replied, adding a little later, “I’ve missed Josh and Chuck too.” They’re the guys behind the
Stuff You Should Know podcasts he listens to every morning.
“We’re very lucky,” I said, as I paid the cab driver, “to be so happy about coming home from holiday.”
But until a few years ago, things were very different. Going on holiday meant coming home with a severe case of post-holiday blues, or, to use the technical term, PTD – post-travel depression. I’d be sobbing at the thought of getting back to reality, suffering sleepless dread-filled nights about returning to work.
Now, getting back to reality felt like pure joy. I realise this may sound monumentally smug, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. Our lives are far from perfect, but my fiancé and I have a lot to be grateful for – the lovely weather here in Dubai, the beaches and the fact it’s a safe and clean city.
I have a comfortable little apartment in a quiet, leafy part of Dubai, my beloved cat, we both have jobs we enjoy and our health. Simple everyday things that are easy to take for granted.
A few years ago, life was stressful and somewhat chaotic. I’d quit my job with no clear sense of where I was headed, my health was under strain and, as a result, things needed to change. It was a rocky patch. This is normal in life, we all encounter problems in some form or other. Navigating through them isn’t always easy, and it took me a long time to make the changes I needed to make.
But now, warm with the joy of giving my cat a cuddle, and looking forward to getting back into my ‘normal’ routine and all its little highlights – the morning walk to the metro, weekends by the pool and ambles around the mall – I realise I’m reaping the rewards. One of the biggest of which is an amplified appreciation of all these little blessings.
And we all owe it to ourselves to bask in our contentment, and make the most of the good things while we can. So what do you most look forward to coming home to? Here, well-being experts reveal their post-holiday joys…