Healing Space | Long weekends: How not to have an exhausting vacation

Research shows that time off greatly helps improve cardiovascular health, reduce stress triggers, soothe blood pressure, and can naturally enhance circadian rhythms for better sleep. (Illustration by Suneesh K.)

Note to readers: Healing Space is a weekly series that helps you dive into your mental health and take charge of your wellbeing through practical DIY self-care methods.

There’s no nice way to say this, so, sorry for ripping the Band-aid off: if being around family exhausts you, don’t spend time with them.

Sure, we all love a long weekend, a vacation, time off in any form. Yet, for some of us, vacations are simply exhausting. If you’re a woman in a traditional household, you’re probably cooking at least three extra special meals in a day and serving up endless cups of tea, coffee, and snacks. If you’re travelling to see extended family, it can mean a weekend stuck in the kitchen or being on your best behaviour instead of in your pyjamas in front of the TV eating take out, which you’d much rather do. If you’re the head of a household, it can mean a trying period of extra expenses that you may not have the budget for and having to smile through it while your mind is on the bill. If you have parents who are toxic, perennially angry and withholding, visiting them can mean you are doing all the emotional expansion and acceptance or getting teased and taunted for your failings. If you’re alone in a city, your friends may all be travelling and you may be stuck alone, feeling lonely. Let’s face it, vacations are not the ideal for everyone that IG stories make them out to be. Sometimes, vacations suck.

So, why not make a change to how you vacation? One of the primary reasons we get stuck in a vacation we don’t enjoy is tradition. You have always headed to a particular farm in Alibaug with a specific group of relatives and friends for the Diwali long weekend. In fact, you find it quite tiring because you are always stuck with splitting the bill when the other couple binges on alcohol when you don’t drink at all. You don’t like the way a friend belittles you. Just because you share a history, you are not obliged to keep sharing it. You are not obliged to keep throwing yourself into a situation that makes you uncomfortable just because you have always done so. You may fear losing the friendships if you make a change, but a friendship that relies on you staying uncomfortable may not be worth saving to begin with. It is permitted for relationships to evolve. Maybe you like the couple, but their kids are spoilt brats and constantly picking fights with your kid, making you all miserable. It is perfectly acceptable to meet them for drinks one weekend and come up with suitable excuses to keep your kids separate (gone to visit their grandmother is a good excuse). You’re also in the process teaching your kids not to put up with situations and people that are not healthy for them.

Instead, prioritise how you would like to feel at the end of the vacation. Research shows that time off greatly helps improve cardiovascular health, reduce stress triggers like headaches, migraines, and muscular pain, soothe blood pressure, and can naturally enhance circadian rhythms for better sleep. If you wanted to feel good this long weekend, what would you do? For a lot of people, the answer is ‘just sleep’. For someone else, it might be “finally exercise, swim, run, hike”. Whatever your answer is, is okay. A vacation should be what works for you, not what is a seen as appropriate or even a good time.

If you do have to visit extended family for a religious ceremony, normalize having to leave after the meal or the ceremony. It helps to inform them in advance so that you don’t get pressured into staying. Use excuses liberally. Lying is perfectly acceptable in awkward social situations, it’s even required. You wouldn’t tell your host she’s rude and nasty and her famous kheer is stodgy, would you? It’s preferable to invent a wedding, another function that you have been invited to and cut short your visit if you do some planning in advance. If you’re visiting senior relatives at home, discuss ways with your partner that you can take the load off them being stuck in the kitchen. Perhaps you visit for a day instead of the whole weekend, perhaps you roll up your sleeves and share the load in the kitchen, or you invent excursions that require them to accompany you or have a chat with a parent in advance discreetly, invent an illness like “the doctor says she can’t keep standing”. Perhaps stop praising “what wonderful chai she makes” so she doesn’t always have to make the chai! Don’t hog the TV for the cricket match when your partner wants to watch a romantic movie, or at least, set up a streaming service on the laptop so you can both watch what you want. Do whatever you need to in order to be sensitive to your partner’s needs and that enhances the quality of both your time together.

If you live alone and are feeling left out of the vacation fever, schedule yourself into hikes, treks, mingle with a group of strangers like walking or running or bird watching or movie and book club events. While you might hesitate because you don’t know anyone there, vacations like these are easier with strangers because there are few awkward expectations and it’s easier sometimes to share with people you don’t know. You could also empower yourself by doing the things you’d want to do with someone alone, like taking yourself out for a nice dinner for one, a movie, or a cycle, stroll or staycation by the sea.

Your ability to have a better experience on your vacation depends on your willingness to alter perceptions. While some of your friends or family might be upset at the changes you make, that’s often something they need to adjust to. A vacation requires all parties to have an opportunity to relax and if you’re the only one rarely getting a chance to decide on what’s for dinner, where you go, and how you enjoy your time, it’s probably time to speak up. Setting boundaries for what allows you to use your time off well depends on your prioritising what you want out of the time off first. You do you, everything else will (just have to) adjust.

How to vacation effectively 

-Don’t do what you don’t want to do

-Do what you want to do

-Sit down and have an honest conversation with your partner/friends/family about expectations

-Share the work load, which includes meal prep, and expenses if with friends, fairly

-Visualise what you would like to feel like at the end of the vacation and work backwards.