Make it happen!Lately, I have been feeling like I haven’t been hitting the mark. What is the mark, you ask? Just feeling like everything is balanced. Right now, I don’t feel balanced in my work nor in my personal life. The scale has been unavoidably tipped, and all of my time seems spent on How I Feel. I am diligently working towards getting this scale balanced again, but now, throwing work back into the mix, it feels like an impossible mark to hit. While my job is rewarding in so many ways, it also drains every ounce of physical and mental energy I can muster each day. By the time I make it home, I feel wasted and withered, no matter how easy or how difficult the day has been. I can’t seem to change these dynamics, which is so frustrating!
After years of fatigue and physical pain, I still haven’t figured out how to squirrel away any energy for myself and my personal life while I am working. I wish I had like a bank where I could deposit blocks of energy, then withdraw as needed! How awesome would that be! When I feel this way, Guilt stealthily creeps in, the guilt involved with not feeling like a productive partner in my marriage, like an active participant in social events with friends, like an emotional engaged human. I know guilt is self-imposed and controllable, but it is my go to feeling when I am worn out and stressed. No bueno. Trying to play psychological games with myself, every time I feel “guilt”, I am working to replace it with feeling “Grateful” instead. Am I hitting the mark? Who knows.
Yesterday, I started feeling Guilty for not immediately reading a student’s novel she wanted to share with me. I asked her to email it to me for future reading. Realizing the Guilt was moving in quickly, I endeavored on removing the Guilt and replacing it with the Gratitude that this person is willing to share a piece of herself with me. I will read the novel, and I will give feedback. I just couldn’t manage it during my lunch break yesterday. It’s all good.
Do you feel Guilt? Do you feel like you are hitting the Mark?
So we’ve (as in my husband and I – we are both teachers) been on summer break almost a month now. It has been pure heaven. What have I been doing? Producing? Well absolutely nothing, my dear friends. I’ve had some doctor appointments, dentist, eye doc, you know, just those things that have been impossible for me to manage while working because of the massive fatigue.
But otherwise? I have nothing to show. And how do I feel about this? Delightful!! Fantastic! Superb! It is down right, totally fine. I used to feel guilty about not doing anything, or not being productive every minute of the day. I was always busy. Now, at the time, I enjoyed being active, working, exercising, socializing, and such. But Lyme disease changed all of that.
Over the years (even before I knew I was ill), I’ve struggled with a lot of guilt and angst about not doing enough (these are, of course, self imposed standards of “enough”). I would push myself, as I always have, to make “things happen,” to “get er done” as we say in Texas. While resting, I would stress out about the things I had (self imposed!) to accomplish that I hadn’t completed. Then came along nausea, headaches, joint, pain, severe fatigue. Well, all of this made for a witch’s brew of toil and trouble!
Now, I admit, it has taken time to make this change and there are still times when I click into that previous me mode, and I take it to the limit. It’s usually not a good thing though and if I can catch myself before that manic phase kicks in, well everything is better overall.
Looking back over my 15 years in education (I worked 10 years outside of education so I most definitely appreciate the time off), I realize that I have worked almost every summer for the first 10 years. First, out of necessity, and then, for the extra money and experiences. These past 3 summers of Lyme have been about treating and resting. Actually, the first summer after being diagnosed I taught a 3 week class. What was I thinking? At the time, I thought, oh good, extra money and this Lyme thing will probably be done by the end of this summer after treating for about 4 months at that point. HA HA!!! That was BEYOND wishful thinking for reals!
Anyway, I know this post is kinda all over the place, but I guess one point I am trying to make is Take it Easy. Don’t Kill Yourself trying to do everything you did before. Your body has to heal. You beating yourself up about it is certainly NOT GOING TO HELP your recovery process. Believe me, I learned this the hard way.
First off, I hope everyone had an enjoyable Christmas and that it wasn’t too stressful. Ours was quiet, more quite than usual. Our winter break started Saturday, December 20th, and I had been counting the hours. Not that I dislike my job at all; I was just looking forward to the uninterrupted and unscheduled – mostly – time until returning on January 6th. The past few weeks leading up to the breAk had been wrought with both personal and work drama. More work drama than anything.
The weekend was good and then Monday and Tuesday, I was feeling the best I have felt in months! I had energy, and I was working through my lists at a nice speed! 😁 I thought I was being careful and not pushing it to hard. It was exciting. Then, bam. Party over, sucker! I woke up Christmas Eve with a sore throat, and, well, it’s been all downhill from there. While I was able to cook a turkey that day get all of the gifts wrapped, and although we had a nice romantic dinner, I felt like hell. Christmas day was worse. I literally was in bed all day. Missing a trip to visit and dinner with the wonderful in-laws, I stayed in bed and pondered my life.
I’ve really been trying to be more accepting of my situation and more accepting of my physical limitations, which can change at any given moment as I am sure many of you have experienced. My initial reactions have been to become really upset and disappointed which then leads to stress, then to sadness and depression. The 4 S slope as I have coined it! The stressful, self-indulgent, sad, slippery slope! Down, down, down.
But what I am beginning to realize is that that kind of behaviour sets me back. Making myself go through that rollercoaster changes nothing. I still do not have the energy or I am too sick to attend an event, dinner, baby shower, whatever. It also leaves me much worse off physically and mentally. I need to change my “stinking thinking” as they say in AA.
So, yes, it was indeed disappointing that I could not go to celebrate Christmas at my in-laws as planned. I wanted to spend time with them. Instead, I had a little chat with myself assessing how I felt and thinking and saying, “It will be best for me to stay home today. Between the Lyme and cold infection, I have no business running around today, and that is ok!” While this seems like such a little thing to do, I guess it psychologically gave me permission to stay home without
feeling guilty. My in-laws were gracious as always, but the best thing for me was the kindness I showed myself. I need to practice this much, much more!
While I still have a cold, I am wishing for a speedy recovery so I can still enjoy the rest of our break. How was your Christmas? Anything you would like to share about dealing with Lyme during the holidays?
What a week!! I thought there about Tuesday and Wednesday that I wouldn’t make it, but guess what? I did! I wonder at what costs though. I say this because I have been struggling all weekend with symptoms. Most aggravating is the all over soreness and pain. Then, there are the IBS issues. And then the indigestion issues. All of this hit me on Friday at school, and it hasn’t let up. NO MERCY!
Without TMI, I just feel all over terrible. If I can get one issue to subside, another flares up. I have tried epsom salt baths, resting, pain pills, alka selzer gold, heating pads, gingerale, tea…..nothing, nada. I am pretty sure this is what is mean by herxing! I have tried taking my mind off the total uncomfortableness of being me by reading, Facebook, grading essays, playing Candy Crush, watching Netflix. Alas, I just can’t get out of myself enough to feel better.
I missed an event last night, a family event, and so that was tough. Then, today, my husband is working on his new shop area and of course, I am in no shape to help. Instead, my 60+ year old in laws are slaving out there. I feel so useless. It all hit me this morning in the shower, which was a chore in and of itself, and I just gave in and started crying. I do have meltdowns like this every so often but it’s been awhile. I do not like it when this happens because I feel so helpless. I feel like I have lost some pieces of me that I may never get back. I feel like I am at the edge of a cliff, teetering, looking into a vastness, a place where nothing changes and I just continue to struggle every day.
I know deep down that this is just a culmination of being exhausted, stressed, and depressed. I guess being aware of all of these things helps? My husband says that it is a good thing to have a meltdown every now and then, to grieve about this illness. And, for the most part, I do feel better after my little meltdowns. How do you deal with all of the stress and symptoms of Lyme disease? Any tricks you can share with us? I think I need some Kid President today.
Navigating the nasty mess that is living with chronic illness, keeping in mind the sage wisdom of Lil Wayne ,"Bitch I'm ill not sick," Just out here trying to be the illest.
