Tag: fatigue

clatterbane:

I can’t even find one earlier post complaining about one ridiculous thing: fighting falling sleep whenever I mostly lie back with my legs propped up in the bed. Which I should be doing much more often trying to heal something, but not if it means a nap every time 😪

Sitting down for very long is bad enough that way these days, but lean back and get comfortable at all and it’s honestly kind of worrying.

Anyway, reading is a definite no-go. Watching something I’m engaged with is sometimes better for staying conscious, sometimes not so much.

But, I just discovered new depths of ridiculousness with it a little while ago. Caught myself dozing off while trying to go through a dungeon in Skyrim!

Didn’t even want to try anything but sitting totally up last night, but I figured actively playing a game should be enough to keep me awake. Tonight I could tell I really needed to elevate that leg (after not doing so all day), and…not so much. Trying to go out like a light anyway.

Taking a break and fortifying myself with caffeine right now, but yeah I don’t think I’ll try that again tonight.

Looks like this post is 5 months old, but yeah that’s still a problem. I just haven’t been getting down and propping that leg up much at all except to sleep, which is probably one of the reasons it’s still an issue.

I know I really need to stay off it more, but honestly I manage to get little enough accomplished around here anyway without fighting zonking out whenever I do. Probably a good indication that my system does need more rest, but hey.

Anyway, I do actually feel a little better about it now. I mentioned being frustrated with that tonight after supper, when I really needed to get down for a while.

Mr. C’s response? “Sleep more!”

I am aware that I do worry excessively about coming across as lazy when that’s not what’s going on. (And no wonder. That was a repeating theme, just extra jarring under those circumstances.) It can be hard to work past, though.

Seems like a pretty good indication that the people around you are maybe not tending to think that way if they’re actually suggesting you should rest/sleep more, however. Guess I needed the reminder.

(Then there was that “Seems like the problem is the opposite of laziness!” comment a few years ago. The jerkbrain is stubborn 🙄)

chronicillnessproblems:

[[Image description: over a grey background, the post reads in large black text: “MY DOCTOR RECENTLY ASKED ME HOW MANY “USABLE HOURS” I HAVE IN A DAY.” Below that, in smaller text,

“She told me that a healthy person has, on average, around 10 “usable hours” a day. These hours can be spent going to work, getting errands done, and fulfilling other responsibilities. We realized that, on a good day, I have around 4 “usable hours” with lots of rest in between.

—

This really hit home for me because, despite knowing better, I still try to keep up with healthy people. I try to squeeze their 10 hours of socially-acceptable responsibilities into my 4 hours each day. The equivalent would be if a healthy person tried to fit 25 hours of responsibilities into their 10 usable hours a day. It also made me understand why I felt like time was slipping me by so quickly; because a healthy person has approximately 6 more usable hours a day than me, 42 more a week, and 186 more a month.”

Below this in the lefthand corner is a black box captioned with @strongerthanpots.]]

I saw this on Facebook and I LOVE it. I think I’m going to start using this, because telling my doctors how many hours I manage to be awake (6-8 hours usually but sometimes less) is not really getting across to them how incredibly fatigued I really am.

They hear I can live alone and manage school part-time (even if it is all online,) so they assume I’m doing okay. It doesn’t matter that sure, I SURVIVE living alone, but some days it’s borderline dangerous, like when I can’t eat or get to my meds, aside from the fact that living alone and being this fatigued means that I never eat meals that take more that 5 minutes to make, my floors haven’t been vacuumed in a month, and my clothes do get cleaned, but then live in the dryer or the laundry basket until I wear them and throw them back in the washer, and they never make it to the drawers because that’s too much energy on a task that’s technically not necessary.

But my usable hours per day are like, maybe 5 on a really good day, and school takes ALL OF THEM. Some days I only manage to feed myself and my pets, which is about 2 usable hours. No wonder I’m always behind.

Source: chronicillnessproblems

stumblinginstarlight:

apersnicketylemon:

Just a reminder, but you do not need to “earn” being tired.

You’re allowed to be tired, even if you haven’t “done” anything and you’re allowed to be tired even if you did less than someone else.

Being tired is a normal thing your body does for a whole plethora of reasons, and is a basic bodily function. You don’t need to “earn” basic bodily functions, no matter what anyone else tells you.

And if you have any sort of neurodivergence or chronic illness this applies double, since tiredness is a symptom of practically all of them.  There are days even when I’m doing “well” that I come home and just go to bed because I cannot stay upright one more moment.  I call it a system power-down.  Your body needs sleep and rest and it doesn’t need an “earned” reason.  Don’t berate yourself for having a body that needs things, even if they seem unreasonable.  That’s kind of what bodies do.

I can’t even find one earlier post complaining about one ridiculous thing: fighting falling sleep whenever I mostly lie back with my legs propped up in the bed. Which I should be doing much more often trying to heal something, but not if it means a nap every time 😪

Sitting down for very long is bad enough that way these days, but lean back and get comfortable at all and it’s honestly kind of worrying.

Anyway, reading is a definite no-go. Watching something I’m engaged with is sometimes better for staying conscious, sometimes not so much.

But, I just discovered new depths of ridiculousness with it a little while ago. Caught myself dozing off while trying to go through a dungeon in Skyrim!

Didn’t even want to try anything but sitting totally up last night, but I figured actively playing a game should be enough to keep me awake. Tonight I could tell I really needed to elevate that leg (after not doing so all day), and…not so much. Trying to go out like a light anyway.

Taking a break and fortifying myself with caffeine right now, but yeah I don’t think I’ll try that again tonight.

thebibliosphere:

thebibliosphere:

I’m outside and despite two doses of different antihistamines and my vogmask I’m wheezing like the steam train at the start of Dumbo trying to make it up the mountain.

Allergy season in MN is bad this year fam, it’s not good at all 😦

Also becuse this is not something you often get told when your pcp is like “lol it’s just seasonal allergies take some zrytec”, seasonal allergies are a huge contributor to worsening chronic fatigue.

So no you’re not going crazy or being lazy. It’s the tree pollen taking a toll on your body and you need to be kind to yourself and make allowances for that.

makingmyinvisiblevisible:

I think one reason we are fatigued a lot of the time is because we are constantly fighting. Fighting to be heard, to get the right treatment or referrals or just fighting to keep our heads above water. If this is you today, don’t give up and take encouragement that you are not going through this alone.

The “stay awake your life depends on it” switch from earlier reminded me of one medication I was on years ago that I would just as soon forget.

(Though I don’t clearly recall which exact one it was now. It’s been long enough, and there were enough different ones for a while which just did not work out in quite a variety of extremely unpleasant ways. I definitely remember the experience, though.)

Anyway, that stuff dragged me out almost as bad as the earlier one that had me sleeping 20 hours a day toward the end. Only my body had gotten more experience at keeping itself awake.

What’s one very effective way of accomplishing that? Seemingly random adrenaline surges! What has my system always been extra super good at anyway? Right. 😱

That was a fun couple of months until I finally figured out what might be causing all the sudden debilitating supercharged “anxiety” attacks with no obvious triggers. Didn’t even know that the dysautonomia crap was a real and highly relevant thing then, but it did finally dawn on me that it might have something to do with trying to stay awake and anything that could barely pass for functional. (In my defense, I was thinking worse the longer all of that went on. And no wonder.) And it did stop once that stuff was out of my system.

Thankfully, I haven’t been on anything since then which caused anywhere near the level of constant grogginess. Back then I was also already dealing with unrecognized celiac and probably-EDS related fatigue, though the number of things contributing and the baseline level have gone way way up since then with my health crashing.

But yeah, over the years my system has needed to learn some not always pleasant tricks for pushing through some serious fatigue and exhaustion. And it can be hard to figure out when you really do need sleep when that’s a constant background thing, much less try to get the not usually even conscious coping stuff cranked down enough to let sleep happen once you do realize it’s really needed.

closet-keys:

One thing I think is useful to conceptualize when thinking about the severity of depression is figuring out what counts as a ‘task’ to your brain

for example, healthy people outlining the tasks they need to do that day might be something like 

– class
– work
– homework

if a healthy person is having a low energy day, maybe it becomes 

– make breakfast
– go to class
– class
– go to work
– work
– come home from work
– work on an essay
– do 2 readings 

a depressed person, on a high energy day will probably see that same day as 

– make breakfast
– eat breakfast
– take meds
– shower
– get dressed
– walk to bus
– take bus
… etc

a depressed person, on a low energy day will see that same day as

– wake up
– get out of bed
– walk to bathroom
– use bathroom
– stand back up
– walk to kitchen
– open fridge
– take out juice
– set on counter
– go to cabinet
– reach up arm
– take down glass
– unscrew lid of juice carton
– pour juice
– drink the juice
– finish the juice
…etc

the sort of chronic exhaustion manifests in how each ‘task’ takes a certain amount of energy and when you have depression, what begins to take that amount of energy- and thus, cognitively count as a ‘task’- are smaller and smaller subdivisions of what other people consider tasks. 

And the more ‘tasks’ you do, the less energy you have, and the smaller the subdivisions must be to take equivalent amounts of energy. And the longer that “to do” list of tasks is, the more exhausting and overwhelming and hopeless it feels, which creates a feedback loop of dysfunction.

So say our depressed person on a low energy day gets all the way to finishing their glass of juice. They’ve actually gotten through a lot of tasks! They’ve tried really hard. 

But to a healthy person, even on a low energy day, that probably looks like not having done anything- not having gotten through any tasks. And when our depressed person is surrounded by healthy people, they will likely internalize that they haven’t done anything, and further that they can’t complete any tasks no matter how hard they try. And that feeds worthlessness and suicidal ideation 

That, I think, is why it’s so important to encourage your depressed and chronically low-energy friends when they accomplish tasks, even if they’re operating at a level of subdivision that you don’t recognize. It is an accomplishment to get water and actually drink it for some folks. It is an accomplishment to get to class or to work. 

And acknowledging how hard someone is trying and how much energy they’re putting towards accomplishing those tasks can make a huge difference in whether they feel worthless and hopeless or whether they feel like it’s worth it to keep doing what they can.