Coping with airport anger: Experts offer ways to beat stress during flight delays

It’s no secret traveling is stressful. From baggage claim to TSA, airports see many anxious, angry and frustrated passengers.

One specific frustration more travelers face nowadays is “delay rage” — the anger and overwhelming emotion travelers experience when their flights get delayed.

McClatchy News spoke with experts on ways to help manage the stressors that may trigger “delay rage.”

TIPS

For starters, you may want to look at how you’re picking your flights.

“Don’t get on a plane where everything is time sensitive and all the stars have to align,” clinical social worker, Kimberly Perlin, told McClatchy News. “The best kind of plan for anything takes into account barriers and has plans for those barriers. A tight schedule doesn’t allow room for a barrier.”

But when things do go wrong, Perlin said this is all about “riding the wave of emotion and not letting things get too hot.”

She suggests bringing something you’re looking forward to, like a podcast or a book you’ve been wanting to read for any potential wait at your gate.

“Make sure you eat,” Perlin said. “Take care of yourself.”

Psychologist Dr. Liz Slonena told McClatchy News in an interview it might be helpful to “reframe the situation” when faced with an unexpected delay.

“Radically accept the situation, the flight has been delayed and you can’t change that. You don’t have the power to change it. Now ask yourself, what’s in my power to change and what do I need to release and let go of because it’s not in my control?” Slonena said.

Slonena recommends adopting the “name to tame” mindset.

“If you name the emotion, such as ‘hello rage’ or ‘hello anger’ you can give yourself some grace and say ‘yeah, this is inconvenient,’” she said. “Now that you’ve named what emotion you’re feeling in a nonjudgmental way, you can find what will make you 5% better.”

Getting that 5% could be something small like “getting a fancy drink from Starbucks,” anything you believe will sooth the emotion you’re experiencing, Slonena said.

“If you’re traveling with someone like a friend or a family member, let them know you’re prone to delay rage even before the flight,” Slonena said. “This can be really helpful when naming, claiming and taming. If you own it and are aware of it, it shifts the blame of the explosive anger and maybe they can even lighten your load during that time.”

Therapist Sivan Perdue told McClatchy News “if in the worst case scenario the flight is delayed, ask yourself ‘what can I do?’ You can speak to the flight managers, you can grab food or water. You have to take into account what you can control.”

Perdue recommends breathing exercises when you find yourself getting to the point of anger but not once you’re already there — once you’ve already reached a certain level of anger, the breathing and meditation isn’t going to help you.

If you slowly let the pressure out, little by little, it won’t build up and come out all at once like in an airport when your flight is delayed, Perdue said.

HOW TO OVERCOME THE RAGE

Experts do admit the “delay rage” can sometimes be unavoidable, but it’s about how you manage it.

“It’s never going to go away,” Slonena said. “Essentially, awareness is key; being aware that you are prone to delay rage so you can use your coping skills before, during and after.”

Travelers need to treat themselves with grace, Slonena said. For most, traveling was something they weren’t able to do as much during the pandemic and it’s easy to forget how stressful it can be, she said.

“A lot of people are putting all their eggs in one basket, when you put all your high bars into this one vacation it becomes even more difficult and disappointing if things don’t go exactly as planned,” Slonena said.

Perdue suggests working on your anger outside of the airport, practicing guided meditation and breath work while you’re in situations where you aren’t angry because if you haven’t practiced these tools “they aren’t going to be beneficial and you’re going to start to think it’s a tool that’ll never help you.”

The anger you’re feeling isn’t actually anger, it’s disappointment and frustration, or loneliness and shame, Perdue said. These other emotions we aren’t attending to show up as anger because it’s just a basic emotion we’re all familiar with.

So, if you practice methods of dealing with the stress before you’re in thick of it, you’ll have a better chance at coping with it more effectively while at the airport.

“We want to start pulling out the tools when we’re at a 3 not a 10,” Slonena said.

This story was originally published August 31, 2023 at 1:36 PM with the headline "Coping with airport anger: Experts offer ways to beat stress during flight delays."