Salivating over your college roommate’s travels abroad? Jealous your coworker is going to the convention in Miami while you’re staying home? Vacation photos are ubiquitous this time of year, as are the tropic-tans and relaxed glows of the well-rested. Sure, time off or a change of work environment can be restorative and increase your happiness or productivity. But vacations and traveling for work can also take a toll on a woman.
No one talks about it, but there’s also a hidden stressful underbelly to travel.
According to a new doctoral thesis from the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, women experience more guilt than men when traveling for work. Due to traditional gender roles and norms about "proper" motherhood, women feel guilty about not being available at home. Women also tend to associate lonely nights at a hotel with feelings of uneasiness and vulnerability.
Former Group Vice President of Kenneth Cole, Victoria Staten, kept an office in New York and a home and family in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She says, “I spent 15 years traveling back and forth MSP/NYC/MSP every week Tues – Thursday.” She says that as she grew older and more experienced traveling, she learned not to sweat the delays. “Traveling as much as I do, there are bound to be times when flights are late, luggage is lost, meetings are missed. It just plain happens. All you can do is look at it as a process, and try to make the right decisions along the way to make the situation as good as it can be,” Staten says.
For frequent travelers, Staten also recommends buying outfits in groups of three. She says, “Most people won’t travel more than 3 days in a given week. If it was a ‘brown week,’ I only needed to pack one pair of shoes, one set of jewelry, one handbag, one pair of sunglasses, etc. Dresses require much less thought than outfits. I also had one set of all my toiletries that lived in my suitcase, and another set for home.”
Fantasizing about your Tahitian travels is always a blast, and in fact, a new study in Springer's journal, Applied Research in Quality of Life, shows that it may be the best part of vacation. The study shows that vacationers tend to be happier than non-vacationers in the lead up to their break, but once they are back, there is very little difference between the two groups' levels of happiness.
Study author Jeroen from Erasmus University in Rotterdam suggests that this may be due to vacationers’ rushed schedules: they anticipate the break for months, but return to the daily grind immediately. He suggests that people are likely to derive more happiness from two or more short vacations spread throughout the year, rather than a single longer vacation once a year.
Women traveling with their families, friends, or even co-workers can feel guilty about asking their companions for time alone. But women shouldn’t feel guilty, says frequent traveler Jane Stanfield, author of Where Is She Heading and Mapping Your Volunteer Vacation, although she suggests “negotiate your alone time up front so that there are no hard feelings. You may only need an hour, half-day or full day to recharge your batteries. What ever you decide you need – take it.”
Another pitfall women face when traveling is a desire to eschew their usual comforts for local experiences. While it’s important that you try new things, Stanfield says “Don’t be afraid to do the things you do at home while you are away. If you are stressed out or miss your Frappuccino, then get it.”
Cindy Walzel, an infrequent traveler, says, “I can’t book a trip and then immediately go back to work when I get home. I need at least a day of recovery time to get settled back into my routine.” She’s found what works for her, and consequently made her travels stress-free. Assessing your travel needs and making sure they are met—before the trip, during the trip, and after the trip—will ensure that your vacation memories will never go belly-up.
Lyssa Myska Allen is editorial director at EndlessBeauty.com and a frequent business and pleasure traveler.
