I’m having a lot of thoughts. They’re too long for Twitter, too personal for Facebook, too much to be contained in my brain, too much of a cry for help to stay in a diary. I don’t really need help, I don’t know how anyone could help if I asked them but I need someone to listen even if it’s the faceless emptiness of the internet.
I’m tired all the time. I’ve been having a Fatigue Event that seems to have started during our Christmas trip to Perth, after pushing myself too hard for too long. It’s lasted all of 2019 so far and doesn’t show any signs of stopping. I drink coffee after coffee, take medication to make me feel more alert.
Every time I leave my house, my energy is sucked out of me and there doesn’t seem to be a way to recharge. I’m left adapting to a new baseline of exhaustion, thinking, “I can’t ever feel worse than this,” until the next time I leave my house. Then it is worse.
It’s an exaggeration to say that I never recharge. I do, eventually. But it takes weeks. Weeks in which I have to do nothing. I travelled into the city to socialise on Sunday, it’s Thursday afternoon and I’m still exhausted. But I’m going out again this Saturday. You can see how it eats into reserves I don’t have.
I try so hard not to let it get the better of me. I won’t let it control me. I won’t let it stop me from living my life.
I push myself into doing things that I love, that I should love, knowing that it will make me feel physically terrible.
But the exhaustion has a further, hidden cost. It sounds so easy to sit on the couch all day and watch TV in the name of “self-care”. I do it because I can’t do anything else, some days. But by the end of the day, I’m depressed, anxious, sometimes in a terror spiral that only medication can stop turning. Every day I sit around and do nothing to try and recharge my spent batteries is a day that ends with me hating myself. Eating badly in an attempt to elicit a positive emotion. Tears streaming in parking lots.
I’ve realised socialising is what makes me feel happy, so 2019’s goal was to do more of it, make more friends, push myself outside of my comfort zone, further and more often.
The highs come with deep lows though. I’m so tired, all of the time.
I want so badly to love everyone, to tell and show everyone that they are special and good and I want to be loved in return. I want to foster relationships and grow in new and unexpected ways. I want to thrive.
I’m so tired. All of the time.
My sympathies. I’ve dealt with chronic tiredness before, and it’s positively miserable.
If it helps, though, these are the things I’d investigate:
*Allergies. I’m allergic to corn, and I got a lot better when I went off of it – chronic sinus infection cleared up, I slept a lot better, it was easier to remember stuff, the works.
*Sleep apnea. For some reason this seems easier to get investigated than allergies in general, even though I’m pretty sure I only have it when my allergies are acting up.
*Vitamins/related nutrients. Sometimes I’ll be craving something like nutritional yeast or beef – I might not notice unless I think about it, but it’ll taste really good to me – and when I eat it I get a lot more active.
*Calories in general. I tend to do worse whenever it’s hard to cook or to snack regularly, especially if I’m low on energy.
*Face-to-face conversation with peers who share your interests and respect your boundaries. It sounds like you might have a reliable source for this already, but I’m including it for completeness’ sake.
With the partial exception of sleep apnea, each of those areas cover issues which have messed me up repeatedly. When they do, my energy level (and by proxy my ability to self-motivate and stick with projects) is usually the first to go. So… hopefully this helps.