Brigid Bergin: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. I'm Brigid Bergin, filling in for Brian today. Now we're going to wrap up today's show with your calls on the subject of campsickness. You probably know about homesickness, but we're talking about a very specific version that afflicts kids who come home after a particularly euphoric few weeks or maybe even months away at sleepaway camp with new friends and new rituals, and maybe even a new sense of self.

Listeners, I want to hear your stories of campsickness. Do you remember that feeling of coming home from summer camp? How many of you maybe picked up your kids from camp just recently? Maybe some of you even made that long drive to pick them up this past weekend. We want to know, is your kid feeling campsick? Give us a call at 212-433-WNYC. That's 212-433-9692.

What is it that they're missing about camp most right now? Is it their new friends, or maybe a specific activity they discovered a passion for? Maybe it's just the fresh air, mountain views, or being out in nature that's got your kids campsick. Is there anything that you're doing to help them deal with the sadness that they're experiencing? We'd love to hear from you about what your kids are missing, what they're telling you about their camp experience, and what is even camp like in 2023? Do kids still not have access to their phones or other forms of technology? Are they still coming home with wrists full of friendship bracelets? Give us a call, 212-433-WNYC. That's 212-433-9692. You can text or tweet @BrianLehrer.

Joining us around the radio campfire, so to speak, for this conversation is Sandra Fox, a visiting assistant professor of American Jewish History at New York University. Her latest essay in The New York Times this weekend was headlined Campsickness is Real and a Sign of Something Special. Sandra Fox is also director of the Archive of the American Jewish Left in the Digital Age and the author of The Jews of Summer: Summer Camp and Jewish Culture in Postwar America. Sandra, welcome back to WNYC. Thank you so much for being here.

Sandra Fox: Thanks for having me. It's great to be back.

Brigid Bergin: In your essay, you share that one of your only memories is your first day of your 14 years of camp was crying when you saw your father on the last day. Why did this sight upset you?

Sandra Fox: Yes, my poor dad getting dragged in The New York Times. I think that what upset me was the realization that it was really over. I was nine years old. I don't really remember the last night of camp from that year, but I know we did all sorts of rituals years later, paper plate awards to remember the unique things about each kid in the bunk and probably a bonfire, but it didn't feel real till I saw my dad walking towards me, and I realized I'm really going home.

I do remember that day very, very, very well. I remember getting home to my house on Long Island and just closing the door in my bedroom in a very melodramatic, almost teenager way, even though I was only nine. I don't know how long it lasted, that feeling of campsickness, of being sad that camp was over. I asked a lot of friends if they remember how long it took. It doesn't take that long, but it's very real when you're going through it.

Brigid Bergin: Oh, yes. For folks who may still be trying to wrap their head around this idea, can you do a little more to define campsickness, what it is, what it's triggered by?

Sandra Fox: Right. We talk a lot about homesickness, and certainly, a lot of kids are homesick while at camp. Camp is not for everyone. Most kids get over homesickness in a couple of days, but not all kids do. Campsickness is for usually the more passionate camp kids when they get home, and they really miss camp. It's very shocking to come from an environment where you have these very special routines and rituals, where really every aspect of the day is geared towards recreation and joy.

Even my Jewish summer camp, which was highly educational, we prayed every day and we had educational activities, it was still all meant to be recreational and fun. Life at home is not always recreational and fun. School is hard. Sometimes your friendships at home are hard. Of course, you can also have difficulties at camp with friendships, but for a certain kind of camp kid, that return to home is really shocking.

Brigid Bergin: Let's go to Julie in Bethel, Connecticut. Julie, thanks for calling WNYC.

Julie: Hi.

Brigid Bergin: Are you there, Julie? Great.

Julie: I'm here. Hi, how are you?

Brigid Bergin: Great. Thanks for calling WNYC. Sorry about that.

Julie: No, not at all. I'm calling because I've been affiliated with a camp, an institution. This is actually my 50th summer. 50 years ago, I was a camper there. It's called Camp Treetops in Lake Placid. I have to give it a plug. It's an amazing nonprofit organization. I have lived through generations now, myself being homesick, my children, my stepchildren, my children as campers, as counselors.

I can say that camp has been so transformative for so many of these kids that the pain that they feel when they come home-- I've said to many a child, what is grief if not love-persevering? That's the attachment that they have with these places. It stays in them, and it goes with them everywhere. When people dismiss it as, "Oh, just seven weeks away." It's just so much bigger than that and it's so important to let your children experience that grief, because the grief and the love lasts for a lifetime.

Brigid Bergin: Julie, thank you so much for that call. I want to give Sandra a chance to respond, but first, let's talk to Laura and Sabine, who I think is Laura's daughter. Welcome to WNYC.

Laura: Hi.

Sabine: Hi. I am in this camp, and I'm going to miss all my friends, and I'm not going to be there next year. Thank you.

Brigid Bergin: Where did you go to camp, Sabine?

Sabine: I go to [unintelligible 00:06:55]

Brigid Bergin: That's lovely.

Sabine: It's a really fun camp.

Brigid Bergin: I'm glad you had such a good time at camp. It's hard to come home from camp.

Sabine: Yes.

Brigid Bergin: Laura, are you still there?

Laura: We are here.

Brigid Bergin: Laura, what are you doing as a family to help Sabine with her campsickness?

Laura: Well, every year is the same. She has such a great time, and it's really kind of a process to return back. It's a day camp, but still, it's quite fun. We went to the beach this weekend in New Jersey. That was great, but now we have two weeks before school starts, and it's just trying to find projects around the house and getting time outdoors before school starts. She has two working parents, so it's always a challenge.

Brigid Bergin: Absolutely. Laura and Sabine, thank you so much for your call. Sandra, we have folks who've been at camp for a long time that are with you in acknowledging the realness of campsickness, and then we heard it right there from Sabine.

Sandra Fox: Yes, it really brings me back to hear her voice and to hear the sadness in her voice. I think that it's true that the last couple of weeks of summer are really strange for kids who were away for the whole summer. You're not used to this being home every day, the way that kids who don't go to camp might be used to going to the beach or spending time with their parents. It can feel quite strange.

I think that campsickness usually does end once school starts because you're put back into routine, but because camp is so routined, it's so totalizing, it has this 24/7 presence if it's a sleepaway camp. Your life, until you start school and you reset, it is a strange time. I think that it's great to do things with your kids that make them appreciate home, but at the same time, just giving them the space to mourn that ending. Especially for campers who maybe aren't going back the next summer. Either that's because they've aged out or because they're doing something else.

Brigid Bergin: I think that Laura said her daughter Sabine was at a day camp, but it was still really fun, really powerful. I would imagine that when you're at a sleepaway camp, that connection is even stronger. What is it to you about sleepaway camp that sort of freezes time and ramps up the emotions, and maybe makes that homesickness that much more powerful, more poignant?

Sandra Fox: If it's your first summer or even your second or third, you're sent away for the first time, you're away from your family, and you're given a new life, a new opportunity to be a different version of yourself, perhaps to be more yourself than you are at home, actually, in some cases. Camps are built to have that effect on kids. Sleepaway camps are 24/7. It gives an opportunity for whoever runs the camp to basically control the lives of children from morning till dusk. That is going to create a very powerful mixture of emotions.

Like I said, because camp is inherently about recreation and joy in a way that everyday life at home isn't always about recreation and joy, that's going to have an impact when you go home and you have to go back to school and deal with homework and all of those issues. For me, as a kid growing up, I had a lot of issues at home that I had to return to when I got home in August. Camp was a respite, an opportunity to not have those issues heavy on my shoulders.

Brigid Bergin: We know that these memories of camp are things that a lot of adults still can recall and still take with them. Let's go to Sam in Park Slope. Sam, thanks for calling WNYC.

Sam: Hey, guys. First-time caller, longtime listener. As a 41-year-old male, I can tell you I wholeheartedly get campsickness every damn year. I went to Beckett and Chimney Coroner's, Berkshires. Camp is a place where young boys and girls go to become men and women. It's a place that teaches those intangibles just as you guys are talking about where you learn all of the important things you might not learn in school or in the core family unit.

I really wouldn't be who I am today without camp. It's more than a special place. I feel sadness in my heart every summer that goes by that I don't go to Beckett. I think one of my concerns I'd like you guys to toss around is how tech is now infiltrating that original old-school camp experience. When I went in the '90s, which operated a lot more like the '80s, we didn't have electricity. We didn't make phone calls We couldn't text home. We had camp mail and we got our candy once a day. I'm just hoping camps can hold on to that because I think that's important.

Brigid Bergin: Sam, thanks so much for that-- [crosstalk]

Sam: [unintelligible 00:11:56] stop there.

Brigid Bergin: Thanks for that call. Sandra, he raised a couple different interesting things there. One, this idea of the intangibles that you can learn at camp and this concern about tech maybe encroaching on the camp experience. I wonder if you want to untangle those a little bit.

Sandra Fox: I'll start with the tech one because I actually went back to my camp yesterday for the first time in many years. It's celebrating its 75th anniversary. It's called Camp Tel Yehudah. I was really excited. As I got closer to the camp, I lost service and I said, "I'm not going to be on the internet today, the day that my essay comes out in The New York Times. How wonderful to be able to just shut it off."

I got into the camp office to grab something that I needed to use for a program and they said, "Sandy, here's the Wi-Fi password." Now there's Wi-Fi all around the camp. Now, to my understanding though, kids don't actually have access to it, but a lot of parents know that the camps take away their cell phones, the kids' cell phones, and send them with another phone. I think a lot of camps are trying to maintain the magic of not having access to technology, and some parents are making that very difficult.

Brigid Bergin: Wow.

Sandra Fox: That is sad. I do think what probably helps with campsickness is the fact that you can talk to your friends so easily. I went to camp in the '90s and early 2000s and before AOL and after AOL [chuckles]. I can't even imagine how different it would be to be able to go home and FaceTime my friends immediately. It was long-distance calls that felt very intimidating to make because my parents didn't want me to make them, and so campsickness was a lot harder. There are pros and cons, but I think camps work really hard to keep tech out as much as possible.

Brigid Bergin: The other part of the question is he talked about the intangibles, the things that you learn about maybe who you are and how to become who you are. Particularly, when you don't have the intrusion of tech and home, you might be able to discover in a different way. That's certainly some of the theme in your essay, this idea of becoming, and how maybe it hits a little bit of a pause when you have to return home. How could a parent acknowledge and give space to that for a kid who's returning home and maybe give them the opportunity to continue in that process?

Sandra Fox: I think it's tough because you really can't recreate camp at home. Some advice columns about campsickness say, "Create a bonfire in your backyard." I think that's a sweet idea, but I also think it's laughable. I think it's about helping kids accept that life at home is not camp, and also just letting them talk about it if they want to talk about it. Let them talk about what they learned about their friends.

If they want to engage in camp rituals, let's say there's a song they learned at camp that they want to teach around the dinner table, go for it. Those are ways to acknowledge that the kid has gone through some transformation, but also accepting that it's just going to take some time and maybe your kid is going to go back to school and also just talk about camp for a while and isolate their school friends a little bit. That's definitely a thing.

Brigid Bergin: Let's go to Michelle in Manhattan. Michelle, welcome to WNYC.

Michelle: Hi. I have two grade-school-age kids who just got back from sleepaway camp a couple weeks ago. They didn't have tech there, which I think was a relief for them. It's amazing to watch them learn a level of independence where they have to learn to take care of themselves. They'll decide themselves whether they're going to shower that week [chuckles] or not.

The biggest thing too is I think what was so hard for them going for the first time last year was they didn't have their parents' rules while they were there. They had camp rules, but it's so different than their parents' rules and their parents getting on them, us getting on them about things. Last year, I felt like my older one, when she came home, she was so very sad to be leaving camp and she was like a shell of herself. [chuckles]

Also, if I mentioned, "Do you need a sweatshirt?" She was like, "Is this how it's going to be?" I was like, "Wow." This year we learned to back way off when it was time to come home. It's like we go for visiting weekend and we're on their territory and they show us around. We go by their rules and their camp rules. Then when we came home, we really, really tried to back off and not hover over them, not tell them how to do things and just try to instead find ways to encourage them to bring ways that they've learned to take care of themselves and the responsibilities that they've learned at camp without us to bring that home instead of immediately getting all over them again.

Brigid Bergin: Sure. Michelle, thank you so much for that call. In just about 15 seconds, Sandra, I saw you nodding along with Michelle a lot there.

Sandra Fox: Yes, I was silently snapping my fingers because that's exactly right. Your kids went to camp and the people in charge of them were teenagers, basically, teenagers and early 20-somethings. They had to figure out to take care of themselves in a lot of different ways. It's wonderful to let them continue doing that when they get home.

Brigid Bergin: We will have to leave it there. My guest has been Sandra Fox, visiting assistant professor of American Jewish History at New York University and the author of The Jews of Summer: Summer Camp and Jewish Culture in Postwar America. Thank you so, so much for coming on today.

Sandra Fox: Thank you.

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