There are some benefits of air travel. This was my view of sunset on today’s flight to Seattle.

As the holidays approach, I’ve been thinking a lot about travel.  Anyone with chronic illness can tell you that the thought of travel is as exhausting as it is exciting.  The change to routine, the long flights, the additional medications, the stress of being away from doctors and the comforts of home — they don’t even begin to cover it.  And like everything else we face with chronic illness, the amount of planning required to travel successfully can be overwhelming.  Add that to the stress of the holiday season itself, and it can be a recipe for major flares, serious illness, or worse.  It was just after the holidays two years ago when my run down body caught back-to-back bugs, and I ended up septic and in the ICU.

This is the first year since that incident that I’m traveling at the holidays, so this topic has been on my mind.  My life looks eerily similar — I am back to working full-time, still dealing with uncontrolled RA, and traveling for both Thanksgiving and Christmas.  I’m smarter about my illness now, and less likely to keep pushing (I think). But, I can use some crowdsourcing too. 🙂 So, I’d like to find out what you’re up to this year, and collect wisdom from the group for a holiday post on managing travel with chronic illness.  To kick it off, here’s a short poll.  If you can spare a minute, I’d love to hear about your plans.  Please leave comments too!

I’ll compile our collective thoughts into a post, and we’ll try to learn from each other.  This is my favorite time of year, and though I will make sure I take care of myself, I refuse to do anything other than enjoy the season to the fullest!