Symptoms of Travel Anxiety: Thoughts

Intrusive Thoughts

Intrusive thoughts – anxiety’s calling card – make up the majority of all travel anxiety symptoms.

While on the face of it thoughts sound harmless, in reality, intrusive thoughts can be incredibly distressing. They also trigger a physical response in us, as we tend to react to them with fear and anxiety. This causes our brain to panic further, and it reacts by dumping adrenaline and cortisol into our bloodstream. 

This is because our brain doesn’t know the difference between imagining something (i.e. a thought) and actually doing it. This is why even the thought of flying can make you feel sweaty and queasy. 

Intrusive thoughts feel both real and threatening. They are very common for those with OCD, depression or anxiety, and often include frightening, violent or socially unacceptable images. For example, suddenly picturing yourself jumping in front of a train when it passes by, or vividly seeing yourself falling down the stairs when holding your baby (a fun part of early motherhood for me).

The key indicators that the thoughts you are experiencing are intrusive in nature are: 

• They can arrive seemingly out of nowhere
• You feel you have no control over them
• They trigger an anxiety response e.g. clammy hands, racing heart
• You spend hours trying to reason or ‘expel’ them, only to find they get worse 
• You’ll never feel that you’ve found a clear solution to the thought

These thoughts – these little mental bullies – are a very common symptom of travel anxiety and can be incredibly distressing, particularly prior to a trip.

What If? Thoughts

Often joining forces with intrusive thoughts are the endlessly panicked and future-orientated ‘what if’ thoughts’ (or  ‘banana thoughts’). 

These are also often intrusive in nature, and always begin with that famous, anxiety-inducing phrase: ‘what if?’ Anxiety loves a ‘what if’ thought as it ultimately feeds on the unknown – something that travel tends to entail. 

• “What if I have a panic attack on the plane and embarrass myself?”
• “What if I feel so anxious in the airport, I can’t board the plane?”
• “What if I get unwell while I’m away and can’t get home?”
•  What if I’m stuck in a hospital without my family or friends?”
• “What if I can’t manage my anxiety while I’m away and it’s all a disaster?”
• “What if my travel companions don’t understand how I feel and we fall out? What if they think I’m weird for having these feelings?”
• “What if my plane is delayed and I get stuck somewhere far from home?”
• “What if my anxiety is so bad I can’t leave my hotel room?”

I cannot tell you how much time we’ve spent (read: wasted) ruminating over these sorts of thoughts. Of course, on one level, they are entirely normal. Human beings have a built in threat scanner, which is always straining to look ahead, trying to identify any threats and avoid them. However, for those with anxiety, this threat detector can go a little haywire and prove difficult to turn off. 

It’s then that these ‘what if’ thoughts really begin to multiply; playing over and over in our minds – especially if we react to them with fear (more on this later).