TIP Trip Prep
If you’re like me and get super overwhelmed with all things TIP and travel, here are a few things that help me prep for our trips. I hope they help you too!
- Appointment foods– Double (& triple) check you have all the foods that you need to take with. Egg and milk cycles typically require taking frozen patties, baked egg or different milks to the appointment.
- Appointment locations– SoCal is growing fast and they are opening different offices in the same area so know which office you need to be at for blood tests versus challenge appointments. You can find this information in the portal.
- Flight/ Hotel/Car reservations– Reconfirm any flight, hotel and car reservations. I typically book everything right after I come back from the previous appointment so going over the details again helps calm my nerves.
- Food & Snacks– I make a list of meals I need to take for Musa. He is so restricted that I don’t trust eating out. We are also usually in and out in 48 hours so it doesn’t make sense to me to try new foods and risk jeopardizing an appointment. Musa can have Chipotle so I have that as a back up if we end up staying longer. We also have a kitchen in the hotel as another backup.
- Entertainment– Musa is good about packing things for the airplane ride, but I just make sure he has enough for the ride back. Coloring and videos usually get him through a 4 hour flight so I pack an extra coloring book or crayons for the flight back to keep his interest. I love to read so I make sure I download a new book on my Kindle. Reading helps to calm my nerves, so definitely find something that helps you!
- Questions– I feel like I always come up with a question I have for the provider at the most random times. So, I like to keep a list of them in my phone when they come to me. Basically, if I sat down before the trip to think of questions I have I would come up with nothing. So, as I think of something I type it so I don’t forget. TIP Help is a great way to answers to questions too but there are some that aren’t as pressing so I hold off until we are at the office.
- Dosing & Maintenance Foods– We are all too familiar with the exhaustion that comes with traveling for these appointments. So to make things easier for me when we get back, I make sure to have our dosing and maintenance foods on hand. For dosing foods, I email TIP Help a few days before the appointment to get an idea of what our doses look like or what brands I need. I also try to prep the doses if I can so it’s one less thing for me to do as soon as we get back. For maintenance foods, I just double check I have everything on hand. I like to grind and measure our maintenance foods into little cups to add into pancake or oatmeal in the morning.
If you have any other tips that you find useful, feel free to share in the comments below!