I did too much. Way too much, and now I’m paying for it with full body aches.
When I’m this fatigued – and it is a bone deep dragging fatigue that pulls every bit of energy from your muscles and leaves you in agony – my good mood inevitably slides away to a numbness I associate with my depression.
I will shortly haul myself off the couch and put on my fluffy cosy socks. Then I’ll turn the heatpump on and cuddle up on the couch and read terrible fanfiction until the claws of fatigue retract from my muscles. It is important to coddle yourself on bad days.
A couple of months ago I got a dog to train up to be my mobility helper.
He was terrified of men. So he was rehomed, and now lives the life of luxury, sleeping on beds and being spoiled. I had to seek outside confirmation that I couldn’t have made it work with him, because he was such a sweet dog, and he was the first one I had tried. But, ultimately, I cannot work with a dog who is terrified of men.
Last week I got another dog, also to train up to be my mobility helper. This time I took it slow. I went out and met him, I took my friend with me to assess his temperament, and then went home and had a long talk about him. I picked him up, and he was anxious, but he never put a foot wrong. He didn’t put a foot wrong the entire week I had him. He was sweet, lovely, willing, and just adapted to every situation thrown at him.
But he had some health quirks that could have been indicative of serious problems, and he smeared saliva everywhere. My amazing human isn’t able to cope with dog saliva, so we agreed he would not be joining us permanently.
I know it’s a process, I know the right dog is one-in-a-million, but I am feeling disheartened by this. It’s hard work to meet the dog, check them over, take them on for a bit, and then figure out how to explain to the old owner why their beautiful, lovely, fantastic, and genuinely amazing dog failed, because that’s what it feels like to them. The last owner didn’t understand, and was very upset by it, and I think that, more than anything, has led to me feeling so bad this time around.
I haven’t given up finding the right dog. Or rather, I have flights of fancy that I don’t need the extra help, that I’ll be able to figure out a way around all of this so I don’t need a dog, and life will continue on as it always has. But they are brief, and generally beaten over the head with a mallet with my leg doesn’t want to hold my weight, or when I have a dizzy spell.
But for now I am going to sit back and relax and rest up. The stress of the last few weeks is finally catching up with me.
One delightful part of fibromyalgia is having unrestful sleep. For me, that means having vivid nightmarish dreams. Last night involved floating cows, deer crates, and then people infected with rage virus trying to kill each other (including me). It wasn’t a particularly fun night, and as a result, I woke up feeling a little bit like death warmed up.
Had breakfast and coffee, sat around for a bit … still death warmed up. Had second breakfast of cinnamon french toast, courtesy of my Amazing Human, and more coffee, but the excessive fatigue persisted.
Giving in, I curled myself up on the couch and lay down. I was out like a light.
I say ‘sleep’ rather than ‘nap’ because I’m typically out for about 4 hours, and I usually wake up feeling more rested than I do after a ‘good night’s sleep’. Today was no different.
Despite needing to do more cleaning, I slept solidly from midday until 4pm and I woke up feeling so much better. I wouldn’t have achieved a single thing by remaining conscious, but after that nap, I managed to finish off the bathroom and toilet and the cat pooping room / laundry.
With fibromyalgia, or with any other chronic illness, if you’re knackered … you need to sleep. Even if it means sleeping half the day away!
I hate cleaning. I hate it with a burning passion, because it takes time and energy and effort and then you have to do it all over again next week. I like things to be done once and then stay done. Which, sadly, isn’t the case for the dishes, or the dust, or the cat litter trays, or the bathroom, or the toilet, or the carpet, or the cat hair …
I live with two lads who firmly believe that cleaning is a thing you do once every six months when it’s a flat inspection and that’s about it. If anything was cleaned, it was me who did it. Including most of the dishes. A few years ago we decided on a compromise: we’d all pay a bit extra, and each week we would have someone come over and clean the communal areas for an hour, these being the floors of every door that’s open (so my flatmate can leave his office door open if he wants and it’ll get vacuumed), the bathroom, and the toilet. It worked out fantastically for everyone involved – I suddenly had more spoons to spend elsewhere, and we all got a nice clean house.
Unfortunately COVID is a thing and my amazing cleaner is half way up the country at home. I’ve been managing to vaguely keep on top of at least the cat and dog hair, and the bathroom, but the toilet’s gone to the lads. Even more unfortunately we have a flat inspection in three days.
So I get to do all the cleaning.
Now I’m the kind of person who likes to get up, do everything in one hit, and then sit back down again. This sometimes works, and sometimes doesn’t. I’d read somewhere about doing things in bits, and taking rests in between – a concept that fills me with deep unease and no small amount of misdirected anger. Since I have only a few days to get the house to rights, and then a full week ahead of me (with a full day of driving immediately after that), I figured I should probably do the sensible thing and pace myself.
I got up, I cleaned a few more spots of cat puke off the carpet, liberally applied toilet duck (although at this point I’m convinced the toilet requires an exorcism), and sprayed the cleaning product all over the shower stall. Then I lay down for 40 minutes.
It was a bloody challenge to haul myself off the couch again and continue cleaning, but get up I did, and thus I cleaned. I did the shower stall and the sink, and lay back down. Then I got up and went out to the paddock for the first time in days.
And you know what? I think this whole ‘doing a bit at a time and then resting’ has a lot more going for it than my usual ‘DO ALL THE THINGS AT ONE TIME’. And I didn’t combust with misplaced rage while doing it, either. I’ll have to experiment with it more!
Life has changed dramatically. We have been on lockdown for months. It’s affected every area of our lives and things will never quite be the same again.
The added stress of lockdown, a pandemic (a freaking pandemic, how is this reality??), and the second economic crisis I’ve lived through (so far) really knocked me for a number for the first couple of weeks. Well, that and being on my feet for a week solid beforehand. Regardless, I slept for two weeks pretty much solid, and it wasn’t until the fourth week of lockdown that I became a semi responsive human being again.
I haven’t been able to go to for acupuncture for my trigeminal neuralgia, so that’s flaring up a wee bit more than usual, but otherwise this is the healthiest I’ve been in donkeys years, because I’m not surrounded by people. I haven’t had a cold, or the flu, or the snuffles, since lockdown began.
And I’m loving it. I am unashamably loving lockdown. I don’t have to go anywhere, I don’t have to be human, I can study in my PJs lying on my couch with my cat on my stomach … I still take the dog for a walk and get a bit of exercise – social distancing is a thing – but otherwise I stay at home. And I love being a home body.
This won’t be the case for a lot of people – there have been catastrophic job losses and people attempting to survive on unemployment where before they had decent paying full time jobs.
But for me, it’s a little bit of quiet bliss. A bit of down time to rest, relax, and study.
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