well i did feel a bit like a traitor dashing outta nyc the day before hurricane irene was scheduled to attack – but in all fairness, we had the trip back to 0-town booked for a few weeks. so we weren’t really cheating  🙂 besides, being a florida girl i feel a bit like a hurricane pro! and i needed to get into the orlando office to catch up a few things and seriously wanted to see my baby girl and her baby bump! 3 weeks is a long time in pregnancy!

anyway, our scheduled flight on thursday night was cancelled last minute, so we took an early morning flight on friday. and i mean very early. we had a 4:30am lobby call. and u know, i’m not exactly an early bird by nature – so i was prying my eyelids open!

we got to the airport and onboard w/ no problems at all. i settled into my seat and promptly feel asleep. (can never thank my sexy husband enough for ALWAYS offering my the window seat – and i’ve got snuggling in for a snooze down to an art!).

i don’t really remember much – i was zonked. but i did wake up somewhere around the carolinas to hear the captain’s voice asking everyone  to fasten their seat-belts and the flight attendants to take a seat because we were heading for a very rough ride. then he went on to say, “and for those of you interested, you can look out the left hand side of the plane and say ‘hi’ to irene.”

well of course i looked! it really just looked stormy to me… i don’t think i would have thought much about it if he hadn’t told us it was a cat two hurricane! and then? after witnessing the destructive force of nature? i curled back into my seat and slept till we landed. no big deal.

now i won’t tell you i have every been a ‘nervous’ flyer. certainly not the kind that needs a doc’s scrip before a flight, but for years i was a “tense” flyer. when i first began flying often i would use this trick to keep myself calm:  watch the flight attendants. if they seemed calm about it, i latched onto that and chose to believe nothing serious was going on. that worked ok, and got me thru a couple of years but i didn’t sleep much on planes – and was always on the lookout.

but what changed  my life, was my husband sharing with me an article he had found regarding in flight turbulence. the jest of it was this: turbulence is NOT dangerous. planes are flown into hurricanes. bumpy air travel is no cause for concern whatsoever (assuming loose items aren’t bouncing around!).

written by an aeronautic specialist – it all just made sense to me. so truly, from that point on, i am so laid back about flying! i even think it’s kinda fun to get bounced around a bit! (i know – i’m weird!).

after we landed and i was thinking about seeing the storm up close and falling back asleep – it made me think about fear. what makes us afraid and how do we conquer that?

being ‘skittish’ by nature, i have been diligent about not allowing fear to make choices for me. it is most certainly a choice for me. mostly easier over time – but i hit the wall regularly and have to ‘have a little talk’ with myself.

how did i get over my nervousness flying? by getting information. solid, proven, logical information. then choosing to believe it – and then forcing myself to act like i knew it was true – even when my sweaty palms begged to differ.

i’ve found this formula works in a lot of situations. finding out the facts about things, helps me feel a lot more comfortable.

i’m sure far from ‘fearless’ but i’m getting better! hey – i slept thru a hurricane 🙂