Today, I am back home to see my family. My sister is graduating from college and my girlfriend and myself have made a trip to visit for a week before taking a family vacation altogether.
After living in Seattle for some time, returning home often gives me the sense of a weight lifting off my shoulders. I have the privilege of a very comfortable and stable family, which is something I took for granted when I was younger, but see the value of today. My mom’s cooking, my sister’s pestering, my dad’s talk about the newest cars and investments. My girlfriend has called being at my home “serene” and that she finally gets to live in her thoughts instead of her next task.
This is all to say, it’s incredible how your environment impacts your body…
How releasing stress expresses itself on you
My girlfriend and I have found a very common pattern when we leave our regular life behind. Oftentimes when we travel, either home or away on vacation, we get sick. Almost like clockwork.
Nearly every time we have come home for the holidays or have taken a vacation, we near immediately notice a lot of stressors relieve themselves. Regular things like what to eat next or will we get enough sleep go out the window when embraced by the return home. Now that may sound minute in the grand scheme of things, but when you are overridden with decisions day-to-day, it’s nice to have a semblance of the simple life.
In my opinion, I think this feeling of “return” is our body’s recognition that the stressors of daily life are now relieved.
As I write this, my sister has gotten a cold after her graduation, my girlfriend is sick with a sore throat, and (likely unrelated to the major topic) my mom just tested positive for COVID. And yet, unusually I am sitting here un-unwell. Maybe because I am still working remotely and feel the stress of an impending deadline before our true vacation. If this pattern means anything, I’ll likely get sick the moment we land in France next week on my time off. Maybe some citizen science here but that’s my hypothesis lol.
Feeling bored
I often find myself feeling bored again when I return home. No constant plans, none of the usual social commitments…just existing for a bit. The boredom lead me to create this digital garden. I got to explore my interests in open-source, bought a domain, published this site, and started writing my thoughts. The hell? I never do that.
But maybe that’s the point.
Being home is a reset. I see myself in this pattern pretty often when work has waned in the cycles of my life. Being back from college was much the same. I rediscover my interests. For my girlfriend this trip, her stress has come crashing from its high way up all the way back to earth. She just finished her performance reviews and is a step removed from her regular dopamine train of activity back in Seattle. Now she just is, and is unfortunately sick.
Closing
Maybe you have felt similarly, or maybe your home life differs. Regardless, I think that some environments can trigger this feeling I hope I was able to describe. I cherish it as it really is introspective to who we are and the way the world can beat us and we dont even know it. It’s like a learned helplessness of stress that you only realize was there once you step away. So jump out from the boiling pot of frogs. Experience the burns. Relearn how to be.