SOMEONE ELSE TAKE THE WHEEL

How Releasing Control Has Helped My Anxiety

When I went to Italy this past month for my honeymoon, it was the first time in about a decade that I’d left North America. Growing up, my parents had taken me and my sister on a variety of international trips, but as an adult the idea felt daunting. It was one thing to let my parents book and plan and pay for everything as I just followed along with a King’s Guard teddy bear backpack. It was quite another for me to have to make sure I survived a 13-hour flight and didn’t die on the way to the wrong hotel. Or, even worse, lose my luggage.

So, in the months leading up to our big trip, I made a decision. I was going to let my new husband plan everything. From the flights to the rental car to the daily activities. Instead of becoming a part of the process and opening the door for my anxiety to panic about the logistics of driving from Florence to a villa in the countryside or endlessly worry about having enough time to make our connecting flight once we landed in Rome, I did my best to turn my brain off. It simply wasn’t my problem if those things went wrong because I was not the one in charge.