I went on a big family vacation to Disney World this summer, and it gave me a great practical reminder about the power of recovery tools to help maintain resilience and support our ability to do more of what we want to do.

The trip involved a large family gathering: 15 of us, eight days, early mornings, late nights, 100-degree heat, four parks, rides, shows and more than 80 miles of walking. By this point, I have a well-honed recovery and resilience practice of my own that serves me well. But with my seven-year-old daughter, the youngest in the group by a long way, my husband and I found ourselves deploying some ThriveNinety tools to help her have a great trip, too.

This wasn’t a career-changing project or a high-end sporting event. It was an ordinary vacation, surrounded by thousands of people doing the same thing as us. That said, it was a big deal for us and a trip we really wanted to be able to enjoy together and make the most of.

Before we went, we were already conscious of making sure we all stayed hydrated and got a good night’s sleep. But when our daughter started to crash on the second day despite those things, we knew they weren’t going to be enough on their own. She didn’t complain, but she had a fraction of the energy she’d had on the first day and clearly wasn’t having as much fun. The Disney afternoon kid crash people talk about was real – and it was intense. Given the heat, the scale of the sensory stimulation and the amount of time we were spending on our feet, it was also completely understandable.

My husband and I were fully prepared to spend some time by the pool with our daughter, but the family also had another six days of park hopping plans ahead. Our daughter was clearly feeling it, but she also didn’t want to head back to the hotel for rest and recovery and miss out on what the group was doing. Something had to change. My husband and I stepped up the recovery support. It wasn’t a magical solution, but it was a deeply practical one, and our family couldn’t believe how effectively it transformed our daughter’s energy level and overall resilience.

In practice, we used a blend of different tools during the windows of down time. They helped my daughter get the most out of the rest and recovery time we had and feel fresh and ready to go when we were heading back out. The benefit of a blended approach is that it introduces some variety, while also giving her brain and body systems support from a few different angles. The specific things we focused on were:

Nutrition. The food at Disney wasn’t bad, but we ate out for almost every meal and my daughter was having a much higher volume of fries, burgers and chicken tenders than she normally would. Happily, on the way from the airport to the hotel, we had picked up a load of fresh fruit and vegetables to snack on. This helped her have access to a good dose of colorful healthy food alongside typical kid menu items. We brought some with us when we were out and about, and whenever we were back in the room, we made sure she had an apple, cucumber or carrots to munch on. It was a simple way to round out her diet for the week.

Rest. Bedtimes ran later than normal, but we were disciplined about getting to bed quickly so she could get as much rest as possible.

Pacing (getting the right blend of activity and rest): When we saw our daughter's mini-crash on day 2, the group moved our start time the next morning back one hour. This wasn’t a massive shift, but it made a real difference. Instead of pushing through, it gave her the space she needed to feel rested and to still have a full day of fun. Those of us with more energy worked in the background to shift around tickets for things that were pre-booked, everyone had a great day and it set us up to enjoy the rest of the week. In fact, the only changes to the schedule after that day were to add more time in the parks - all at our daughter’s request.  

Nervous system regulation. This included some gentle breathing and one small movement-based activity.

Hydration. This was critical in the heat, especially for those of us who are used to summers in the northeastern US, where things are a little cooler.

Reducing avoidable stress. When you’re not in your own home, it can be difficult to control all of the things that your body and brain are exposed to. But it’s always interesting to see just how much you can influence. Where you can remove small stressors on your body and brain systems, you create capacity and energy for the other things you want to do. For us, this principle worked really well. We used lower-toxicity sunscreen and toiletries, and had already laundered all of her clothing at home with a lower-toxicity detergent.

Individually, each of these actions may have helped a little, but even rest, hydration and low-toxicity sunscreen weren’t enough to give my daughter the energy she wanted or allow her to enjoy the full experience of the family trip. Putting them together, with nervous system support and more attention to nutrition, offered an impactful blend of simple actions that transformed her experience. She went on to put in more than 10 miles of walking each day, moving from rides to meals to shows, while taking everything in and having a great time with her cousins, aunts, grandparents and parents.

In fact, she was still going strong on day 8. We had a few hours between check-out and heading to the airport. We had planned to finish with a few low-key hours by the pool, and I had packed bathing suits at the top of the suitcases so they would be ready to go. But my daughter surprised us by asking to head back to one of the parks instead so she could fit in a few more rides and shows. It was so much fun to see her able to make the most of every minute, and even encouraging us to keep the pace going right to the end. 

What struck me most was that this approach wasn’t about asking more of my daughter or her systems, or pushing her to her limits. Instead, it was about listening to what her systems were telling us early on in the trip, giving them more deliberate support, and then seeing her thrive because of it.  

It was a small change that I’m sure the thousands of other people at the parks wouldn’t have noticed. But it made a huge difference to my daughter: to what she was able to do, to how she felt while doing it, and to the memories she will take away from the trip. It also made a difference to the experience of the whole family. 

Sometimes resilience is about doing extraordinary things—accomplishing what others are not able to do. More often, I think resilience is about being the best version of yourself: consistently capable, energetic and engaged. It’s about being able to push yourself when you want to, while also having the tools to recover well during your rest periods and keep showing up for work, family and fun in the way you want to.

That’s resilience for life. 

Warmly,
Katie 

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