Leisure Sickness – Why do I always get sick when I have time off work?!

Leisure Sickness

Have you ever gotten ill just as you head into a holiday or long weekend? If so, you’re not alone. In fact, this experience is so common that it has been researched and given a name. Dutch psychologist Ad Vingerhoets and colleagues coined the term “Leisure Sickness” in the early 2000s to describe this phenomenon, following observations that a significant number of people reported feeling unwell precisely when they were supposed to relax and unwind.

Ad and his team noted that while this phenomenon in reasonably common, the symptoms that people report are varied. Generally speaking though, symptoms often resemble those of common stress-related illnesses including things like: headaches, muscle pain, fatigue, and flu-like symptoms such as nausea and a runny nose. Some people might also experience gastrointestinal disturbances, dizziness, and even mild depressive symptoms.

As noted above, symptoms typically coincide with the transition from work to leisure, and the symptoms often abate once the individual returns to their regular work routine.

Why does this happen?

People aren’t exactly sure, but there are a few theories. One prominent explanation is that some people operate under high stress and adrenaline while at work, which can suppress feelings of illness. When the body finally has the chance to relax during leisure time, the suppressed symptoms may emerge.

Another theory suggests that the abrupt change in routine from a structured, busy work schedule to a more relaxed and unstructured leisure period can be disorienting for the body and mind. This sudden shift might trigger physical symptoms as the body struggles to adjust.

There is a further view that personality traits and behavioural patterns have a role in play in Leisure Sickness. It seems that individuals with a high degree of conscientiousness, those who are highly dedicated to their work, perfectionists and people with a high sense of duty can have difficulty “switching off”. Rather than actually switching off, they can stay focused on their work challenges and concerns, which then simply manifest as illness related symptoms. This can all be compounded by the pressure to “have a great holiday” and “make the most of your time off”, which just increases their levels of stress.

How do we mitigate and copy with this?

It seems that reducing stress can help. In additon, we can adopt some physical and psychological strategies to mitigate both the probability and impact of this experience, if we are prone to it. Here are some things you might consider doing:

1. Gradual Transition: Try to transition slowly to a break, instead of taking a big-bang approach. Can you do some handover work earlier and gradually ease into your time off? Can you take a half day in the week before a holiday? Are there other things you could do to make the transition more gradual?

2. Stress Management: Regular stress management techniques, such as mindfulness, meditation, and deep-breathing exercises, can help you lower your background levels of stress, which might reduce the chances of Leisure Sickness happening. Yes yes yes, we know this can be pretty hard to actually implement. And, let’s not forget, that feeling of being in a high pressure, fast-paced and high performance environment can be fun, making it even harder to try and reduce our stress.

3. Physical Activity: Engaging in regular physical exercise can help maintain a balanced state of well-being. Exercise is known to reduce stress and can serve as a healthy transition from work to leisure. As we’ve noted elsewhere, we are a combined body and mind and remembering this and taking action like this accordingly can really help with our stress and wellbeing, as well as with things like Leisure Sickness.

4. Setting Boundaries: Establishing clear boundaries between work and leisure time is crucial. This might include setting specific times for checking work emails and ensuring that work-related tasks are not carried over into personal time. Of course, then you need to actually stick to them. And that can be hard when work is rewarding and fun, or if you’re a bit addicted to the variable rewards of your emails etc.

5. Seeking Professional Help: As ever, if you find leisure sickness severely impacts your quality of life, you might consider consulting a psychologist or counsellor.

We love this piece of work and finding! Perhaps that is because we have experiences of this too. Less now, but certainly in the past, James used to get sick pretty much every time he went on holiday. He always thought it was stress related – like his body was too keyed up before holiday, so it decided to cash in and take a real break when a chance actually allowed. Interestingly, this is very much in line with some of the views as to what is actually going on. 

As we learn more about concepts like embodiment, we’re increasingly interested in the interplay between mind and body and find subjects like this really interesting. Being aware of these interconnections, and breaking some of that Cartesian dualism type thinking can help us find better ways to manage some of the challenges we face in the world, at least in our humble opinion.

Vingerhoets, A. J. J. M., van Huijgevoort, M., & Van Heck, G. L. (2002). Leisure sickness: A pilot study on its prevalence, phenomenology, and background. Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, 71(5), 311-317. https://doi.org/10.1159/000064809

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