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Travel anxieties

Christmas

Hi. I’m new here and I’m autistic.

I don't know if it's an autism thing but I get extreme anxiety when it comes to travelling. I’ve always hated travelling; when I was younger it would cause me to meltdown, and the motion of travel always made me sick. I don’t have meltdowns anymore but I do still get car sick not long after travelling in a car.

When I was little not knowing where we were exactly going made me anxious, I think that was some of the problem then. So to prevent this I try to travel short distance, five minutes into the village is long enough, and I study where I’m going first if it’s a longer journey. Thanks to GMaps I can virtually see the location and this helps. But I try not to travel too far because being away from home makes me anxious and the travel sickness remains an ever present problem.

But now there’s a major problem. My sister is getting married and has invited all the family, including me. This is a complete nightmare for me because of the distance. The wedding is 355 miles away, it would have been 500 but my sister and her fiancée have decided on a venue that is closer to everybody else to make it easier for guests to attend.

I’ve always been close with my sister, we’re still close now and chat on WhatsApp nearly every day, and I know she will be so disappointed if I don’t go. The wedding is in February and I would love to go but honestly don’t know if I can bring myself to do it. It will mean a lot of travelling, a strange place, at least a night away from home and a lot of people.

I considered taking the train instead of car but it’s only an hour less travel time (7 hours est.) and I get sick on the train as well so it’s not much of an improvement.

Really anxious about all of this and have no idea what to do about this predicament.

Parents
  • Christmas said:
    I considered taking the train instead of car but it’s only an hour less travel time (7 hours est.) and I get sick on the train as well so it’s not much of an improvement.

    How about any of the following:

    1 - if someone is driving you, how about getting something to make you drowsy so you sleep on the trip, that way you skip all the anxiety of travelling.

    2 - If you are driving, then research the route and take control of the journey. Have someone with you as a backup in case there are GPS issues or changes and they can work out a re-route to get around road closures etc. The AA website has a route planner that points out roadworks and things to help with the planning.

    3 - Travel sickness I found tends to happen when you are reading or not looking out the window - it is a bit like seasickness in that seeing the motion and relation to the horizon can help the brain cope with the movement much better. There are also effective drugs for this that are worth trying.

    4 - instead of the journey seeming like a chore it can be made to be an adventure - find something near the destination that fits with your special interests and make time to go there after the wedding (next day) so you have something to look forward to.

    I always found that switch up of mindset to making it something to look forward to helped me cope the best - focus on the good ahead, the excitement for your sister, maybe meeting someone at the wedding for some fun, the special interest day out afterwards or whatever.

    Headology is a powerful tool to help over come anxiety this way. I've been using it for around 40 years now and it makes such a difference.

Reply
  • Christmas said:
    I considered taking the train instead of car but it’s only an hour less travel time (7 hours est.) and I get sick on the train as well so it’s not much of an improvement.

    How about any of the following:

    1 - if someone is driving you, how about getting something to make you drowsy so you sleep on the trip, that way you skip all the anxiety of travelling.

    2 - If you are driving, then research the route and take control of the journey. Have someone with you as a backup in case there are GPS issues or changes and they can work out a re-route to get around road closures etc. The AA website has a route planner that points out roadworks and things to help with the planning.

    3 - Travel sickness I found tends to happen when you are reading or not looking out the window - it is a bit like seasickness in that seeing the motion and relation to the horizon can help the brain cope with the movement much better. There are also effective drugs for this that are worth trying.

    4 - instead of the journey seeming like a chore it can be made to be an adventure - find something near the destination that fits with your special interests and make time to go there after the wedding (next day) so you have something to look forward to.

    I always found that switch up of mindset to making it something to look forward to helped me cope the best - focus on the good ahead, the excitement for your sister, maybe meeting someone at the wedding for some fun, the special interest day out afterwards or whatever.

    Headology is a powerful tool to help over come anxiety this way. I've been using it for around 40 years now and it makes such a difference.

Children
  • in reply to Iain

    Hi Iain, thank you for taking time to reply to my post. I really appreciate all your suggestions here and I'll try to remember to put them in action. I've added them to my action plan for the trip. I know I'm anxious but I know I'll enjoy it when I'm there, and it's a nice way to get to see family I rarely get to see.

    Next time I'm in the chemists I'm going to ask the woman what travel medicine will work best for me. Last year she was helpful in helping me find a sleeping medicine for me as I was struggling with sleeping at the time.

    Iain said:
    Headology is a powerful tool to help over come anxiety this way. I've been using it for around 40 years now and it makes such a difference.

    I'm glad this has been working for you! Thanks for sharing some of the positivity my way. I try to remember to think positive and use thinking nicer calmer things to my advantage but a lot of the time the anxiety can be overwhelming. Fingers crossed I can bat it away.

    Thanks for your help with this.