Travel Blog
The 5 Anxiety-Reducing Carry-On Items I Can’t Live Without
Traveling with anxiety is no picnic
It’s a good thing I don’t have to fit my anxiety in my carry-on or I wouldn’t have room for anything else. I have no choice; it comes along with me whether I invite it or not. And yet, I have found peace in locomotion. It is a recent development based on a cracking combination of carry-on must-haves.
A substantial “blanket” scarf
When I was a child, I didn’t have a stuffed animal that was my favorite; I had a “blankie”. I carried it around everywhere my parents would allow. The comfort that I felt beneath it was just as full and as glorious as the comfort I felt dragging it along behind me, sitting on it, sitting with it, and pulling the soft fabric repeatedly through my little fingers.
Not much has changed.
A blanket scarf is both calming and practical. I can wear it and look effortlessly fabulous, cover myself with it when I’m cold, trace it with my fingers or squeeze it tightly when I’m anxious, sit on it as a cushion, or roll it up into a lumbar support pillow on rigid plane seating.
Noise-canceling headphones
My partner introduced me to noise-canceling headphones on one plane ride and I was hooked. Noise. Canceled. It’s amazing.
My pharmacy clutch
This sounds like a pill service, but it’s not. It is a coin purse in which I keep one very important travel accessory: motion-sickness medication. My travel life has improved immensely since finding and normalizing the ingestion of motion-sickness medicine before movement.
Large bottle of water
Every pre-flight prelude is the same: go to the bathroom and get a big water. Flying is dehydrating. It can be uncomfortable, noisy, bumpy, and long or short can be made better by an expression of self-determination that says, “I can service my thirst on my own.”
No waiting for drink service or ringing airplane personnel for sips at what I think could be inopportune moments. No seatbelt signs or questioning glances. No doubting. No justification necessary. Just quenching my thirst because I can.
Pre-downloaded podcasts or audiobooks
When I pack my suitcase, I spend a bit of time creating a small library of options for my listening pleasure. Some people like watching movies, reading, playing games, or working on their laptops. I am not that person.
Having my eyes open is just another input for stimulation. I love to get on a plane, get buckled in, set my entertaining voices to “go,” and relax. It’s a practice in mindfulness for me to focus so intently on one sense instead of all of them at once as I tend to do.
The prep is worth it. A flight spent hearing the voices that I’ve vetted for tone, tamber, subject, and length is pretty close to enjoyable. My current favorites are The Harry Potter Series read by Jim Dale and the early episodes of the podcast Women Who Travel by Conde Nast.
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