Needing more time 're holiday anxiety

[Neron]

I'll try to summarise for a full picture. I suffer anxiety attacks when I feel trapped. I've had successful treatment but certain things like holidays will trigger them so for years I've gradually reduced going away because of them. The last holiday for DH and I was 5 years ago for our honeymoon. I had such a bad attack that I feel I ruined it and I have felt guilty ever since.
DH understands and never pushes me. He'll go away with friends instead which I am happy he does because it's not fair he should completely miss out.

Anyway, dinner with friends and they were discussing Vegas and wanting to return. We've been many years ago but it's somewhere DH wants to go to again. I generally would just sit and listen, but this time I was actively joining in and got excited at the prospect of going. So much so, we're booking the hol later on this week! I've been off the pill a few months and it's made a massive difference to my mental health. DH and so excited right now and now I'm starting to panic a bit. Our friends know my story, they have planned things to keep me busy and to be honest it sounds flipping amazing but I'm getting flustered at the thought of it and don't know what to do! My friend works for the airline and can get us business class seats but only for indirect flights. I want to say I need more time, but in my heart I know I'll keep putting it off until we don't go. I'm going to let my friends down but most importantly my DH. He deserves this, he is a wonderful man, I adore him and I want to do this for him but I'm at a loss of what to do. I've got clammy hands just from writing this out!

I have sympathy - I have suffered anxiety attacks myself and know that they’re awful. But I don’t think the answer to dealing with them successfully is to withdraw from the situations that possibly trigger them. It isn’t helpful in the long run and it’s very, very unfair on your DH. Do you really think he’s been completely happy with the set up for the last few years when he’s never been able to take a holiday with his DW?

If it were me I would a) refer myself for some sort of therapy such as CBT quick as possible in order to start learning some coping strategies and b) book a weekend away with your DH. Somewhere close to home so you can get back easily if you really, really need to and see how that goes. It’s better to build up gradually then go from no holidays for years to long haul trip to Vegas in one go!

I second booking yourself in for some CBT.
What is it that's making you anxious specifically?

I absolutely hate flying so much so I did not fly for 15 years!
I realised same as you I needed to address it and just booked and paid for a short break and forced myself to do it - nausea panic and everything!
I’ve flown twice now in 2 years only 1 hour flights mind you (so 4 plane journeys) and I’m so glad I did do it. The feelings might not always go away but i/you can fight them and use distraction as a great way of coping (books/music/trips out)

CBT is good I have learnt a lot from that and recommend

You can do it

Your GP should be able to help with medication. A good friend of mine gets very anxious in crowds, and she has something to take before she goes anywhere that's likely to be v busy.

Is it the flight specifically that you are worried about? If so, think you'd be better off flying direct, even though you won't get the treat of business class.

DH is very honest and will say he misses our holidays and wishes I could go, but will also say as a master diver sometimes our set up does work for him because he's able to scuba all day every day and not have to worry about leaving me on my own.

My triggers will be if I feel stuck, so on the plane it'll be because I can't get off. I am 'stuck' until we land. On holiday it'll be because I can't just go home. My best day of all holiday is always going home day, it's truly when I'm the most care free.

CBT doesn't work, but EMDR does and I have my coping mechanisms in place. I've done a few 1 night over stays in the past year, with my last 1 in January. That was the first stay when off the pill and apart from a mini nauseous moment at dinner I was actually ok

Have you tried hypnosis OP? Very powerful treatment I've found.

Genuine question, wouldn't it be easier to start with shorter flights and closer holidays?
If you go to mainland Europe, you'd know you could also come home in a plane, on a train, a coach, a ferry or in a car, so you would absolutely not be trapped.

The good thing with Vegas is the location in a huge country, so you're not really trapped there either.

Not even of hypnosis, I don't feel it was helpful. Always felt I'd wasted my money and didn't particularly like the practitioner either but appreciate I can go elsewhere. EMDR got to the root of the problem, the others haven't.

I'm not interested in going away normally, have no desire to go anywhere and would quite happily not go on holiday for the rest of my life IYSWIM. It's all the activities we would do in Vegas is what got me excited. They sound great, would be fun with our friends and DH has always wanted to go back there. We did some cool stuff when there previously so trying to reason with myself that we had a goodish time last time and we could do the things we missed etc

Meant not a fan of hypnosis