Does Everyone Go Through a Planning Depression?

I am about 100 days from the start of my trip. Because the EEMH announcement came out after my ADR day, now I am making adjustments of a couple of days, plus deciding there was another restaurant that I want, but hadn’t considered. I keep checking throughout the day to see if I can find a PPO Akershus, an 11 a.m. at Cape May, and a dinner at Yak and Yeti. I also can’t get the Magic Bands that I want. On Monday I had succeeded until the checkout process, then no deal. I am having weird dreams that I am in Disney wearing the wrong shoes and can’t find my family. It hit me that it isn’t feeling fun at the moment. The fact that I moved 10 days ago and am surrounded by boxes may be a part of the problem. I have hardly been even looking at the forum. Is it just me?

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Set up a TP reservation finder search for Akershus and Cape May, and get a Landry’s card for Yak & Yeti. No reservation required with the card, and someone else will be doing the work to find your other two! That’ll free up some of your time to tackle unpacking–I definitely get stressed with clutter.

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I sometimes experience a lull during the planning process between my ADR and FP days, but that usually goes away after I get my FPs, especially if it means reworking my daily touring plans. I do try to stay current on the forums so I can be up on all of the changes coming in the future. Just today we learned about Blizzard Beach for fall and that will impact our late September trip. If I didn’t have that info in advance, I would be scrambling once I got closer to the trip. If you find your interest waning, you might try to check in to the forums once or twice a week instead of every day.

I have the TP reservation search set up. But, nothing yet. For Yak and Yeti, I have hesitated on the Landry’s card in case our plans change.

I have tried to revive my interest in checking the forum. Checking less frequently than I had been is still such a great source of info. As it gets closer to FPP day, I hope my interest goes back up. Not helping that the sale of the house we left behind is contingent on the Buyers’ sale. I have a problem with not being in control.

I realize that many other people have much bigger problems, but this is the group that I knew might relate to my slump.

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I truly feel your pain and appreciate the magnitude of your bum out amiga, don’t minimize your issue! Don’t worry. Focus on what you can control. Unpack and don’t worry about keeping up with current changes. There’s a lot of things changing right now, but you can get caught up once the dust settles. Maybe the time away will revive the embers. We’re right here when you need us!

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The reservation finder has never failed me!! I am pretty sure you will get it! I kinda hit a blah on this trip too, didnt even wake up at the crack of dawn for fastpass day. We leave in a few weeks and im still working on ADRs. hope you cheer up soon!!

I hit a couple of blah periods during our planning, one before FP day and one shortly after (but when it was still too early to do much packing.) I just wanted to be there already! No good advice, unfortunately. I just tried to step away for a bit until I got excited again.

We’re going between Christmas and New Years. Have never been when it’s that crowded but it works with our schedule. We’ve been several times and last visit was 5 years ago. I initially thought we could focus on hitting the new to us stuff, enjoy the decorations and have some down/family time.

Now, it’s frustrating because there is so much uncertainty with how I may be able to plan. Still have a lot of time to see how things pan out and I know we will make the best our of our options.

I know I’m spending way too much time on TP but I’m in a slow period at work and it’s so tempting to see what the new rumor or great touring tip is! Taking a brief trip next week so I’ll probably be offline for most of the time. Maybe I can tear myself away from the TP addiction for a while and build my excitement again.

This happens to me during the planning process, too, even the dreams. You are not alone. It sounds like you have a lot pulling your mind in many directions, too. It helps me to just take a break and leave it all be for a while, regroup, and start focusing on one thing at a time. Maybe focus on something different entirely for a bit. For me, that was packing. I made packing lists and bought packing cubes, etc. It just helped me to feel like something was in control. Good luck! Trust that it will all come together in the end.

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I get the planning blues, too, but in my case because no one else in my party of 6 adults is interested in helping me plan and there are times I get overwhelmed with trying to predict what they’d like. My mom (part of our party and the only one willing to listen to me mull over options) tells me just make plans that I want and if others don’t like them, tough, they had their chance. Easier said than done because I want everyone to have the best time and will feel responsible if someone doesn’t get to do something they really wanted to do (even though they have ample opportunity to let me know what they want)!

Sorry for venting, can you tell I’m frustrated, too? LOL :crazy_face:

As for your situation, you really don’t need to check for the reservations you want if you have the TP res finder set up, it will truly take care of that for you so try to let that go!

I haven’t even started looking at magicbands yet because (big surprise) no one has told me if there are any special ones they want! That’s it, everyone else is getting gray bands and I’m getting Donald! SO THERE!

It is frustrating to have everything planned at 180 and then have to move stuff around for added events. I did this to accommodate DAH at MK and EMM at HS last trip. And don’t stress too much about your ADRs! I just checked and for tomorrow there’s dinner slots open for 4 at Y+Y, an 8:10 at Akershus and a 10:25 slot open at Cape May. Lots of stuff will open up even when you’re on your trip just because plans change, energy levels aren’t what you thought they’d be, etc. I had to call Disney to work through our MB selection. It was a huge pain. Sorry you’re having to deal with it too.

I had a dream (nightmare?) last night that my boys and husband spent all of TSL EMM searching for quarters at Epcot so they could play in the arcade at the resort. I’m about 140 days out right now and definitely in that weird place. I love love love the planning process, but with all of the unknowns thanks to SWGE, I’m having a hard time even looking at my plans right now. Too many question marks and too much FOMO!!

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I used to have dreams that I got pregnant before the trip and would be unable to go on most of the rides I had spent so much time scheduling. I would wake up totally freaked out in a cold sweat. For me, it was more stress than depression, but I totally understand where you’re coming from.

Thank you. After my second surgery for a serious vision problem, and having to remain face down 24/7 for 12 days, I was told by a “friend” to get over myself, that other people had worse problems. She told me this during the time that I had to be face down, after asking me how I was doing, and then again when out with a group of people, after one of them asked me how I was doing.
I try not to complain, but you have to be able to vent sometimes.

I agree. It is probably the stress of things being out of my control, and I am a bit of a control freak, but it was truly getting me down in the dumps. At least I am past the stage of worrying about being pregnant. Our first trip wen the kids were little, I worried that they would come down with chicken pox while we were there.

I’ve always thought that everyone’s pain is their own and is terrible and completely paralyzing. As are their fears. You can’t feel it and you can’t judge it. Sure, there are people in worse shape. There’s also people in better shape. Whoopee. How’s that help your problems?

Everyone has their load to carry, don’t tell me how little mine weighs unless you’ve helped me carry It.

Ah amiga I’m sorry you found a judgemental dork. You should consider yourself lucky. I hear there are few of those in the world right now! :wink:

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I have hit those lows too. This time about 100 days out I was reconsidering everything. I got such a blah during the in-between time that I would even doubt if it was worth going again. It gets better and FPP helps, also you will see people start dropping ADRs and that will get you excited again. Maybe try finding countdown pictures and post on that thread, I think that could be a fun challenge/distraction.

I am 101 days out and know what you mean. I think it’s worse for us since there is so much unknown until GE opens and we get some info on how it will impact TPs. Normally in this time frame I am obsessing over the TPs but now I find myself thinking, why bother - I need to wait for more info after GE opens. (For example, for non-HS parks, will we really need to be there for rope drop for the 7AM EMMHs? - super early mornings will impact the total day’s plan…) And now that they announced the other SW ride is opening in December, will it mean it will be less crowded for us in late October since the SW nuts might push out their trips a bit to do both rides? Or is that just wishful thinking? The uncertainty/unknown is really BUGGING ME!

I use this site and the Lines chat group to help keep me engaged. I love it when I see new topics that are applicable to my trip or my interests - but get further bummed when the topics aren’t relevant to me.

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