This past December, I took time off to join my brother’s family on a Disney cruise. We also took a couple of days in Florida to visit Universal Studios. This means I was out of office for SEVEN workdays in addition to the weekends I was traveling from my home. I was out of town ten days total which is unprecedented for me in the last few years. I returned to work for a day and a half before Christmas and then our office was closed until January (Thanks Polly!). December ended up being such a weird experience for me. I don’t think I have ever been away from work for that amount of time.
It felt like I hadn’t worked in a month by the time we reopened on January 5th. My position at the firm means that I typically speak with all new clients to review their case and calendar them with the appropriate attorney. I work very closely with all four attorneys regarding calendar management and case updates. While I don’t actively work on cases, I tend to know the little details and status. Ali supports me in this function. She did an excellent job while I was gone. My email was beautiful, all our tracking systems were up to date, we reviewed anything pressing she had questions about. The system worked. Nothing exploded or even had a minor blow up.
The problem was ultimately me. As I mentioned, I had not been on an extended vacation since moving back to Kansas City. I enjoyed my time off immensely and made so many memories with my family. Memories that I know both my nieces will look back on fondly. Taylor and I spent time lounging on deck at night, talking while watching the ocean. We learned to play shuffleboard. Ella Rae and I discovered a roller coaster that is her absolute favorite style of coaster, and we rode it twice! I did not think about work while I was gone. It was the return that caused me a lot of stress. I told Polly that it felt like I was living all of December that first two weeks of January.
I felt out of sorts and like I was missing things. I enjoy my job and I love my co-workers. I feel a high sense of ownership/responsibility and I can be very hard on myself. Since I tend to feel that way, I want to be at work. I want to be available for questions and to help clients. It was stressing me out to the point that I mentioned it at a meeting. Polly later asked me if I was having vacation depression because I was no longer on vacation. I initially said no but the more I thought about it, the more sense it made. I was feeling the slump of returning to normal. In the past, I’ve taken one or two days around the weekend. Quick snippets which ultimately meant I didn’t actually ‘getaway’. All of the staff here constantly push me to take time for myself because they know work life balance can be hard for me.
I’m working on accepting that things don’t burn to the ground if I’m not around. I have the support I need to be gone. People want me to take time because they care about me (hopefully not because I’m awful to be around). The human body is an amazing thing, but it’s also chock full of hormones. Those hormones don’t just let me go ‘it’s fine, I don’t need to worry so stop worrying!!’. I have to take it in chunks and work towards the change. I can’t control the feeling that washes over me but I can control the way I react to it.
There isn’t an unknown aspect anymore. I do know what happens if I’m gone. My support (Ali) handles everything in my absence and gives me notes about what happened while I was out. The unknown comes in the form of how I’ll handle it. What will I do differently that first week back from vacation? I think the answer to that comes in the form of some prep before leaving. I should have made a list of items which were in progress. This would allow me to track them upon return and confirm things were done. I can’t always rely on my mental note taking. I quickly learned that I need more physical note taking which should eliminate my fear of missing things.
Hopefully, all of you enjoyed your time off as well and came back feeling refreshed. If you’re also working on habits or stress management, I wish you luck as well. Feel free to send me your tips or tricks to living a stress-free life!
