My husband and I were excited to take a trip to Europe after becoming empty nesters. But I struggled to let go of work.

30.03.2024 - 13:47 / insider.com

Last fall, my husband and I booked a two-week vacation to Greece and Italy. We aptly coined this our "empty-nester moon" as we had just sent our only 18-year-old daughter, Hailey, off to college. Many people take honeymoons, and some take babymoons, so we figured, why not take an empty-nester moon?

I'd dreaded Hailey leaving home since she started discussing her graduation a year ago. While sending Hailey to college was inevitably sad, our vacation gave us something to look forward to. Having a child-free home was also perfect timing for this trip, as we no longer had to worry about getting Hailey home from school, ensuring she had done her homework, or not throwing any parties while we were away.

But it was surprisingly hard to enjoy the lead-up to the trip as a business owner.

I knew that to enjoy my time abroad truly, I needed to unplug fully. But, this was my first time taking two full weeks away from my business, and I was terrified that — as an entrepreneur — everything would fall apart the minute I stepped away.

I was plagued with questions like: "Who will answer my emails?" and "What if unplugging for two weeks makes me lose the income that funds trips like this?"

I started planning the trip five months ago to address these concerns. I hired a part-time online business manager, and a key goal in her onboarding was to include her in my business operations. This meant she could handle customer inquiries while I was away, answer any timely requests, and set up the appropriate out-of-office channels.

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I also communicated my leave dates to clients in advance. When I told my clients that I would be disconnected for two weeks, they were supportive and proactively planned our engagements around my vacation.

I finally pulled the trigger and booked the trip. However, the night before we left, I couldn't sleep. My mind was racing, thinking of things that could go wrong. What if this was a giant mistake? This work anxiety stuck around for the first two days of the trip, and I found myself wanting to check the email inbox app I had conveniently deleted on my phone. But I kept reminding myself that I'd told all of my clients I'd be offline and had adequate support processes in place. By day three of our time in Italy, I was able to fully unplug.

Visiting Venice, a city with no traffic, felt like I was seeing the world from a completely different perspective. The city is quiet, with narrow alleyways and bridges in all shapes and sizes and lovely Venetian Gothic architecture with intricately designed arched windows and painted shutters. Venice felt like a welcome reminder that the world can operate very differently from what I know in the US, yet work extremely well.

My favorite part of the