TURBULENCE!!!!

"Getting paid to travel the world"...familiar sounding words to many established cabin crew who are seen by many outside the industry as part of the glamourous international 'jet set'.

But what happens when the glamour turns to grief and the travel to trauma? For behind the 'plastic' smile, the groomed fascade and the creasless uniform lies a conflicting and complicated balance of home and work life, professional and personal relationships and a confusing, complex mis of both inner and outer dialogue.

So how do crew manage the 'two' marriages: the requirement to be at the behest of the airline's flight schedules versus the investment in personal relationships with friends/family and partners on the ground? How do they deal with the often hidden and unseen mental challenges of flying at 35,000 feet whilst trying to keep their feet 'firmly on the ground'? These emotional dichotomies can become greater when you also factor in the physical realities of the job such as sleep deprivation, jet lag and dehydration. As we secure the passengers in during bad weather how do we also ensire our own emotional security during the 'turbulence' of the flying lifestyle?

Working as a crew member for over 20 years i have noticed several main personality types are drawn to the flying role. Many crew fall into the category of 'rescuer'. The job requires us to be caring, so individuals who gain self-worth and self-esteem by helping others are naturally drawn to the role.
This can often lead to the 'swan' mentality, meaning that aboce the surface we appear natural,calm and graceful but underneath the water our legs are going like crazy.

As we are constantly flying with different teams of people there is an expectation to show one's 'happy/polished' face, the mask we wear to cover any underlying problems or issues. It's often hard to reveal all of oneself early on with people whom you don't really know so the sharing of meaningful deel emotions or problems becomes a challenge.
Being away for Christmas,birthdays and concern for loved ones back home are often things we are expected to ' deal with' and we're not supposed to let it get in the way of doing a professional job. This is exacerbated when the family/people back home assume we are away 'living it up' and always having a better time than they are.

Crew are also very good at bonding quickly and supporting each other, which are just some of the qualities for which we are recruited. But how do we make often brief, fleeting work relationships hold more meaning? Again crew tend to disclose a lot of personal detail very quickly in order to cement a foundation for working together well as a team. However working with different crews all the time can sometimes lead to a tendency to repeat the same life problems to new people on every trip and therefore never really moving forward with psychological issues and effectively being stuck in a ' holding pattern' and never quite having to 'come into land'.

A common coping mechanism for the dilemmas that the role of flying can bring is what we call the 'box' mentality. Crew can often put each issue in a seperate mind 'box',close the lid and then deal with each thing one at a time depending on whether they are in the air dealing with domestic things or down route when both domestic and work issues can overlap.However when flying around the world all the time, it can become all too easy to feel that you are never in one place long enough to look seriously at any one 'mind box' and that's when eventually the lumps and bumps of life's turbulence can come along and shake everything up.

There are many differing ways that crew use to deal with these kind of 'internal' or hidden stressors inherent in our jobs. For example some have different personal life and work life 'personas' where they may use the uniform as a fascade. This is in many respects a necessary prerequisite but can sometimes lead to a sense of ' i don't know who the real me is anymore'.

Some crew can use the job as a form of 'escapism' from problems or issues on the ground and the fact that working with different people all the time allows them to remain psychologically 'static' constantly going around the same, often limiting, thought patterns.

Other crew attempt to anaesthetise any hidden pain or stresses with alcohol, which has become an accepted and often ' expected' social element of the job, particularly downroute. Of course it is vital to monitor one's drinking habits and to always question what is actually motivating you to pour the next drink?

Whilst we are trained to deal with and recognise the mid flight ' turbulence' in our jobs it is often too easy to overlook the more subtle, often hidden, but nevertheless still significant turbulence that occurs on our personal 'life journeys'. Never feel ashamed of afraid to reach out for support for yourself if you need a hand to 'fasten your own seatbelt' from time to time.