1. A letdown.

What goes up must come down. If you had a great time, returning to the normal routine is hard. Perhaps you saw loved ones who live far away, or went to a beautiful resort where you were waited on hand and foot, or you left one of the worst winters in Massachusetts for an island in the Caribbean. It's "back to reality" and it's a jolt.

REMEDY: Expect it. Ride it out. It will pass. You can't live in the highs and lows all the time.

2. Fatigue.

Typically you work harder before you leave to clear off your desk. Then when you return, it's piled high again, and you over-compensate by working very hard the day you return. There can also be jet-lag.

REMEDY: Don't try and do a week's work your first day back. Plan on getting a good night's sleep that night. Give yourself a break. If, in thinking it over, you planned too hectic a vacation,plan it differently next time!

3. Rejuvenation.

You'll have a new perspective on your life. Getting away does that for us. That's one benefit you can count on.

REMEDY: You just got one! Enjoy it!

4. Better health.

Even though you may experience fatigue and let-down, your inner wisdom, your body, knows it had relief and you'll benefit from this. This is especially important if you tend to get on adrenalin-highs where you can't relax. Hopefully your vacation achieved this, and it gives your over-worked immune system some relief.

REMEDY: Count this in when you assess the stress before and after the vacation, especially if there were travel woes. You may have that "Two minutes back here and I'm a mess" feeling, but if you were able to truly relax during your vacation, you've done your body a lot of good, at the elemental level.

5. Fantasies

Some of us, when we leave on vacation, are afraid they'll find out they can do without us, and we'll lose our job. Others, when we leave on vacation, are sure we're indispensable, they'll not be able to function without us, and think we'll get a standing ovation when we return.

REMEDY: It's likely the truth is neither of the above.

6. Having to work your way back in again.

We're all a bit xenophobic, eg, afraid of strangers. When you leave, you leave the fold and they go on without you. Then when you return you're just a tiny bit "the stranger" again.

REMEDY: You'll need to hang out in the coffee room to catch up on the news, visit around and chat, find out what went on while you were out, and let them get used to you again (and vice versa).

7. Wanting to get it back

You may find yourself wanting to eat out at a fancy restaurant "just once more," or to wear those comfortable sandals to work, or have trouble concentrating as you daydream about the great Broadway shows you saw in New York.

REMEDY: Snap out of it. Negotiating beginnings and endings is an important lifeskill.

8. Wanting to "Show and Tell."

You'll want to tell everyone about the wonders of your trip and show all your pictures.

REMEDY: Find the right person, place and time. Use a little sensitivity. If they're busy at work, that's not the time! If you and your new lover just went on a $7000 river cruise up the Volga and your colleague just filed bankruptcy and is going through a divorce ... well, what does your EQ tell you to do?

9. Focusing on what went wrong.

Just like in the newspaper, bad news makes a better story. You may find yourself telling everyone about your canceled plane flight, your lost luggage, your car-sick kid, or the big fight you had with your impossible sister, with who you plan never to travel again.

REMEDY: War stories effect everyone negatively in terms of physiological stress. When we tell them, we relive the adrenalin rush, and the same thing happens to our listeners. Why bring this back with you, and back to the folks at home? Why not focus on all the good things!

10. Processing

Your mind will be full of what went well and what didn't.

REMEDY: Do think it through and put the information to use. You may have discovered that you and your partner need a more active vacation, or that you'd feel more rested if you'd been lying in the sun somwehere instead of skiing (or vice versa), or that 10 days with your in-laws is too much of a good thing, or that finding a Snooze-You-Lose cruise on the Internet is a superb and economical solution. Make some notes, mental or on paper, to use in the future. Use your Intentionality, an EQ competency. Consider the PURPOSE of your vacation, and what fulfills that. We each have our own answer.

©Susan Dunn, MA, EQ and Life Coach, http://www.susandunn.cc . Coaching, Internet courses, and ebooks around emotional intelligence for your personal and professional success. Mailto:sdunn@susandunn.cc for FREE EQ ezine. Susan trains and certifies EQ coaches. Email her for information about this fast, affordable, comprehensive, no-residency program.

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