Traveling with Anxious Kids

 Traveling with children can be a fantastic experience for families. There are opportunities to explore new locations, play travel games together, try new foods, and embrace new experiences. For some kids, they may find traveling to be anxiety provoking, which also affects the level of parental anxiety. Managing travel anxiety is a workable situation to improve.

There are a variety of concerns that can contribute to child travel anxiety.  Individual needs such as food allergies and motion sickness require specific preparation that can reduce stress for kids. Calling ahead to restaurants to learn about allergens on the menu and how they manage food allergies with kids is helpful and often necessary. Having your child present for this call or even staying with them while they make the call themselves (for older children and adolescents) can empower them with self-advocacy skills and reduce anxiety. Discussing a plan with your child's pediatrician and allergist and being clear with your child about proactive and reactive motion sickness and allergic reaction strategies can also help reduce anxiety.

For parents, it is important to remember that children will likely respond to your level of stress to gauge their own response to stress while traveling. Depending on your reasons for travel, there may be time commitments, such as a report time to a field or stage for your child athletes and performers, and specific attire requirements such as uniforms and costumes, that require additional considerations beyond recreational travel. Parents and kids may worry that playing time or their ability to participate may be negatively affected if they forget a certain uniform part or get lost and show up late to the destination. This may increase the mental load on adults which can increase anxious feelings, which is often also felt by the kids. Be mindful to allow sufficient travel time and involve the kids with list making, packing, and organizing so that they are empowered to be part of this important part of traveling, which also in turn can reduce travel anxiety. 

Planning ahead, considering possible barriers, showing yourself and others grace when mistakes or unexpected stressors occur can go a long way while traveling successfully. There are many more strategies and coping skills to manage anxiety with kids while traveling. Stay tuned for future posts to manage this lovely life experience and truly enjoy traveling with kids!