How to: Vacation

Hi there,

As you know, I recently got married. Along with having our beautiful wedding, we also had the opportunity to have a week long honeymoon. Yes, one whole week of vacation! I thought it fit to continue my "How to" series with sharing my first experience with a long vacation since I have gotten diagnosed. 

We decided to honeymoon at Disneyland. And let me tell you, we absolutely loved it! Sounds silly, but we found it to be more practical to get annual passes so we could continue to enjoy it all year long (considering if we flew somewhere, an annual pass was the same price as a plane ticket to most places). We decided to stay a Best Western across the street from the entrance and I believe we both would stay there again in a heartbeat. There were so many great food options both at the park as well as near the hotel. I couldn't be more happy with our honeymoon. It was perfect for us.

Now being that we had annual passes, we felt able to really relax. We didn't feel like we had to see everything. We didn't need to race from ride to ride. We were able to just take a stroll around the park or look in a shop for an hour and not feel stressed out. It was nice to be in a hotel so close to the parks because we were able to go and veg out for a bit if we were getting tired of walking. And we defiantly didn't feel guilty for leaving the park because if we didn't see it on this trip we have an entire year to go back. 

Thats what vacations are all about: relaxing. If you are on such an agenda during your vacation, then you will wear yourself down so quick that you will have to sleep for two days straight. Ryan really understands that. He was encouraging me to make sure I would sit for a while. Or that we take it easy instead of racing from one place to the next. I actually was able to forget I was sick for a lot of our vacation. I found it easy to enjoy myself and not worry about much. I think a major thing too is to know that you need to let go of stress. If you are stressed out about an agenda or just about anything else, then you are not able to relax. If you aren't able to relax then you are not making the most of your vacation. 

Some of the stress that people experience happens when packing. It's hard to be sure what you will need, especially when you have an illness. There are a few items that came in handy on our vacation. Number one: sunscreen. Being that I am on Remicade and that I don't generally spend a ton of time out in the sun, a sunburn (accompanied by fevers) was last on our list. Even if it was the dead of winter, I still would have brought sunscreen. Number two: water bottles. We literally brought a case of water. Some places you stay, the tap water is not the most pleasant tasting, and we certainly didn't want to pay three or more dollars for a single bottle of water. So we purchased a case for five dollars and brought that along. Number three: hand sanitizer. Because I am blocking part of my immune system with Remicade, hand sanitizer tends to be a good buddy of mine. Especially when you are going somewhere like a theme park with tons of other humans (and germs). Number four: sweater/sweatshirt. Okay so I get cold easy, and when I get cold I shiver, and when I shiver I get sore. So, yes for my vacation in the middle of summer, I brought a jacket or sweater practically everywhere. But, lets be honest. Everywhere you go that is indoor will have the ac on so cold it feels like winter (okay maybe not quite). Not only did it help not make me not cold, but it was nice to sit on. Whether it be sitting on that instead of straight concrete while watching the parade, or protecting my legs from burning metal seats, it definitely came in handy. And lastly, number five: a bucket list. This was probably one of the best and most fun items that we brought on our vacation. We created a list of things that we would love to do on our vacation. We were able to start most days by looking at it and deciding what items to knock out (if any) based on my energy for the day. We had fun creating it and getting hyped about our vacation, and had even more fun checking off different items from the list.     

Lastly, we made memories and took pictures. Sure, you don't always feel the best but in the end I was so happy we took pictures. It doesn't matter how you look in the pictures or in the moment. We have plenty of pictures where I look horrendous, but they turned out to be some of my favorite pictures! Never forget to live it to the best of your ability. Pictures, be them good or bad, will always remind you of those fun times and memories you made on your vacation. And they come in handy when you get brain frog from the medication (something I frequently experience). I love to go back through our photos from our honeymoon and think back on how much fun we had being kids and enjoying our first real vacation together. I often times find myself looking at photos when I'm not feeling the best, just to remind myself that its a day to day battle. Today may not be great, but tomorrow could be better. I cling on to the memories we made during this trip and find myself thinking of them instead of my IV when I get treatment. 

I am truly looking forward to our next vacation, weather it be long or short. The happy memories we make helps me to survive every flare. If you have hesitations about your illness keeping you back from fully enjoying a trip, just think of what you will miss by not going at all. Sure we can't always do everything we wish we could, but it's the things we do that keep us going. 

-Nikki De

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