Holiday FOMO….it’s a thing!

So I have just discovered that holiday FOMO (fear of missing out) is a thing…and a serious one at that. Now before you think, hang on how can you have holiday FOMO when you’re on holiday, that’s the thing! Holiday FOMO is not about missing a holiday….no it’s about missing out while on holiday!

This only occurred to me at around 2.30am this morning when I was struggling to get back to sleep after spending 10 minutes searching desperately in the dark for my sons dummy, only to discover it was in his twin brothers mouth! Needless to say, then slightly awake, I started thinking about the fact that we are on the downhill slope of our vacation and a wave of sadness came over me. In my slightly emotionally, tired state, I began to wonder if we had spent our holiday the best way possible? What happens if I discover that I have wasted days of my holiday?? And that my friends is where holiday FOMO comes from.

It’s that problem you never want to face when you get home and you run into those peeps that have done the similar holiday to you and the first thing they say is “oh…did you go to such and such”. Suddenly a wave of fear overcomes you….no you didn’t! “Oh it was the best thing we did….such a shame you missed it!” And BANG there it is hitting you smack in the face like a wet salmon….holiday FOMO!

Clearly there is only one way to combat holiday FOMO…well possibly 2or 3! Be organised! That means doing your research not only before you get here but when you are here! Work out what your aim is for your holiday, if you are a family, clearly the expectations of hitting the clubs and ticking off a list of Michelin hat restaurants are probably not on the agenda…but missing out on a water park, great swimming spot or family restaurant just might be the holiday killer.

Stop, revive and survive! In other words when you reach the half way point, stop and have a down day and look at what you haven’t done that you really want to. Or in my case, make that decision at 3 in the morning! For example, I was totally stressed we hadn’t been capitalising on our vacation plans so we had a complete change of routine today! Instead of staying in the hotel until the babies had their 10am feed we took them out for an early morning walk, this meant we got a new kinda coffee and discovered the price of entry to the zoo was actually reasonable and only 5 mins from where we were staying! Just after 10 we cruised on into the zoo and had a fab morning…..FOMO combated!

What ever your plans are make sure you mix up your relaxing and enjoying with a few crazy fun things you didn’t expect to do, that way you will knock the FOMO out of the park! And when your old mates say hey did you do this…you can say no I did this instead, and it rocked!

Just remember if you ever get hit by a bad case of the FOMO’s or things don’t quite go to plan, well then you have just left yourself a reason to come back!

Have you ever missed out on something while on holidays?