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Planning for Vacations & Other Special Events
(Third in a four-part series on the use of planning to manage ME/CFS and FM.)
Many situations we face can be anticipated and the negative consequences reduced or eliminated if we give them some advance thought. In this and three companion articles, we look at different ways that planning can diminish suffering and increase quality of life if you have ME/CFS or FM.
This article focuses on what we call special events.
Special Events
Early on in our program, we realized that travel was very demanding and often triggered relapses. Next, we saw that the end of year holidays, which can involve travel, entertaining and other non-routine events, had a similar effect.
Then people in our program mentioned other events that triggered relapses. These included family events like birthdays and weddings; family crises like serious illness and deaths; and other events such as moving and remodeling, having surgery, having people over for dinner or as houseguests, and, for some people, something as simple as going to a restaurant or a doctor’s appointment.
What all these events share in common is being non-routine times that often cause relapses.
Knowing that so many different events could trigger relapses showed us that they aren’t rare but rather a frequent occurrence in the lives of people with ME/CFS and fibro. The term Special Events became a way to draw attention to the need to treat non-routine events differently than everyday life.
Planning offers the possibility to enjoy a special event while minimizing the cost.
Planning for Special Events
1) Take Extra Rest Before, During and After
You may be familiar with rest as a way of recovering from overdoing, but there is a second use of rest: to prevent increase of symptoms. We recommend that the first strategy you use to minimize the cost of special events is to take more rest than usual: before, during and after the event.
For the majority of people, the most effective form of rest is lying down with eyes closed in a quiet place, but taking a break to recharge your batteries is the main idea. Store up energy by taking extra rest before the event; limit symptoms by taking extra rest during; and take whatever extra rest is needed afterwards. The amount of extra rest will vary from person to person and event to event; twice as much as usual is common.
For example, if you were going on a vacation, you might double your normal daily rest time for a week before leaving, spend more than your usual amounts of time resting while on vacation (adjusting the amount upward if you’re feeling particularly symptomatic) and not scheduling any big events for the first week or more after the trip, but instead taking extra rest.
2) Do Detailed Planning
The second strategy is to plan in detail.
If you are traveling, you might plan your activities for each day of the trip, including rest breaks and alternate activities you can do if your energy level is not what you expect and activities others can do without you.
Depending on the severity of your ME/CFS or FM, you might also arrange for a wheelchair or motorized cart in airports. If you are going to a family event, it might mean finding out the schedule ahead of time and deciding how much you will participate. 3) Discuss Plans with Others
After deciding on your level of participation, discuss your plans with the other people involved in the event, so they know what to expect from you. You might also alert them to the possibility that you may need to cancel out or reduce your level of participation in some events. Also, you can elicit their cooperation.
Special Events Success Story
The planner was a woman named Rose, a person bedbound with ME/CFS. She was motivated to use the three strategies outlined above because previous visits from her daughter and seven year old granddaughter had triggered relapses that lasted up six months.
She prepared for the visit by reducing her usual activities prior to the visit, using the time for extra rest. Also, she created a plan to alternate days of socializing with days of quiet rest, and explained her plan to her daughter, who accepted it and explained it to her daughter.
Rose spent time with her granddaughter every other day, but in a quiet way that did not overwhelm her. After her visitors left, she spent two days resting then resumed her normal activities. Instead of a family visit leading to a long relapse, it was an experience of control through pacing. She wrote about the visit, "I had never even come close to surviving a visit from my granddaughter since developing ME/CFS. It absolutely thrilled me that we were able to make some special memories together without it being damaging for me."
And the experience was no fluke. She has used the same strategies for managing family visits for three years now, with the same success.
Planning Tool: The Special Event Worksheet
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