Yesterday and today I have felt logy and exhausted, which of course is worrying in a pandemic. I have a cousin who tested positive for Covid-19, and she said the first two days of it all she felt was extremely tired. So it springs to mind. And it was about a week ago I had to take Edward into a hospital for his Remicade infusion, and we were there for several hours breathing hospital air, so it is good to keep in mind as a possibility.
But I think it is more likely this is a sudden decrease in anxiety/adrenaline that my brain/body is interpreting as depression and exhaustion. I think I’ve been running on stress for awhile, and my body isn’t sure what to do for energy now.
Also, I think in my relief over the inauguration, I may have abruptly stopped alllll of my stress/coping supports. I haven’t been careful about taking my vitamins. I haven’t been careful about food. [Clarification: I mean, haven’t been eating enough of it. Initially I left it deliberately vague since there are many ways to be uncareful about food and it’s more relatable if we can each imagine our own way—but now I am more concerned about making sure I’m not feeding into (ha) the idea that the only way to eat uncarefully is the way that results in gaining weight.] I haven’t been using the lamp that mimics sunlight.
Also-also, are you too finding that you suddenly have so much more free time and mental space, now that you don’t have to constantly worry about the president steering our airplane into a mountain? Until the last week, I had been worrying about going back to work someday: I originally got that job in part because of feeling like I had way too much time on my hands; but since the pandemic began and I stopped working, I HAVEN’T been feeling bored or like I had too much time. I didn’t know where my time was going (TWITTER DOOM-SCROLLING), but I felt like I was easily filling it (TWITTER DOOM-SCROLLING). I was also spending a LOT of time planning/monitoring groceries and supplies, and that need hasn’t gone away but it has abruptly dropped in urgency, so then I don’t spend as much time searching for out-of-stock things. I am finding myself with more time than I can fill. (I realize this is not a sympathetic complaint right now, as many people are trying to work from home and care for small children. Try to think of it as me listing a symptom, rather than as me complaining that my heaps of diamonds keep scratching up my furniture.)
I still check Twitter, and when I see some minor outrage that is being blown up into a huge outrage (I think because there is a sudden drop in huge outrages, and a lot of other people don’t know what to do with that new situation either), I can just…stop scrolling Twitter. I can listen to the NPR news update once or twice a day, but don’t have to leave it on afterward to hear someone explaining how potentially dangerous and democracy-destroying the most recent action by the president is. If I start feeling stressed about the former president, I can snip that right off at the root: he’s just some terrible person with no connection to my life now.
Anyway, today I am taking some steps. I got up and made a good hearty breakfast, and took my vitamins, and used my sun lamp. I am writing some posts. I will do some chores, perhaps. I will read a book. I will try to keep warm, because once I get too chilly I don’t want to budge. I will find some things to do. I will look forward to getting back to my library job.
I usually feel a slump right after the new year. But this year, with the extra innagural activities, I am instead feeling the slump this week. Hopefully next week will feel better.
Someone posted a picture of a roller coaster recently as a reminder that we can’t always be happy and doing well. I think my car might be heading up an incline finally. I hope yours does too soon.
I downloaded Reddit to my phone again and am thinking of deleting it again. It began as a good way to focus some feelings I had been having. The AITA forum is good if you need to feel some moral superiority. But it’s also making me feel like there is still so much injustice in the world. Yet I read all the entries and all the comments. DOOM SCROLLING indeed.
I also downloaded the Noom app, which is not free, but is a more positive fixation. I’ve lost 8 lbs since January 9 and my skin is looking clearer since I am now more reluctant to log sugary drinks and snacks.
I started Noom just over a year ago and my paid subscription just ran out. But I’ve logged over 1160 meals in a row, and was down 40 lbs just before Christmas!
I have ascribed my persistent gloom to the weather, but I think it also has a lot to do with what you’re talking about. The post-adrenaline hangover.
Reading a good book helps tremendously, but I have had a hard time finding any that qualify for my current state of mind. I finally – FINALLY – read “The Heir Affair” which was EXACTLY what I wanted/needed, but now it’s done and I am morose once more. (If you haven’t read “The Heir Affair” and the book it follows, “The Royal We,” might I recommend them as Very Diverting Content?”)
OMG. I too have time. Where is this time from? And I don’t eve think it was doom scrolling, I mean, it was but not ONLY doom scrolling. The kids seem settled in zoom school. Finally, there were schedule shake-ups and teacher rotations and unknown and some kids going hybrid and AAAAHHHH, but I think we’ve figured it out? Anyway, it’s been like a whole 4 weeks without some huge shakeup. The schools have been having internet issues, which is a pain, but my children are here – the teachers are in school and there are a lot of zoom rejections – but, whatever, my children are here.
I’m again grocery store freaked out, because NEW STRAIN (of course a friends post was like, dude, every other pandemic in history we just wouldn”t have known this new strain and it is a big difference at a macro level, but at a micro level, eh…be aware) so I’m trying not to go as often. However, none of our local stores seem to have sale price consistency across shopping methods and THIS MAKES ME INSANE. I am paying for the delivery, I am cool with that. I am tipping my delivery person, I am cool with that. But, like, why is the only way to get the cheese at 2/$5 for me to actually go into the store??? WHY???????
Anyway, yesterday, while the children were STILL IN SCHOOL, I put on some Bernadette Banner on you tube and knit for a bit. This is what I did when people left my house and it was lovely.
So, time. Some good things. The turtle in the senate IS NOT A GOOD THING. And this whole how terrible are these insurrectionists who are also members of congress is ENRAGING Sigh. I have nowhere to go with that either, because they’re not in my state and I have zero idea how to convince Congressional leaders to expel them and then try them and then throw them into a dungeon FOREVER. I’m not a normal fan of prisons, etc, but if anything ever warranted it…it would be this. Not that poor woman who voted and shouldn’t have or pretended she lived somewhere she didn’t for school access or STOLE SNEAKERS or ate skittles and AAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
I feel that first paragraph. Last week I had a weird nose-tickle that reminded me of seasonal allergies, but it’s not spring yet. And I must have been run down because I also got a cold sore. Of course I thought, maybe I had a cold but cold symptoms are also Symptoms, so should I get tested? But I hadn’t been out of the house in the previous week except to do a very quick masked run to Costco and I’d only been there for 20 minutes. Then it went away. Then a couple of days ago I thought, is my throat sore? But it lasted less than a day. And I haven’t been anywhere since that quick Costco run. Last night I found that lying on my side made my chest vaguely hurt, not like in my lungs, but in the middle like in the area of my heart. And the thought of a potential heart attack did cross my mind, but then I went back to sleep and I feel fine now.
After thinking about it though, I really do think I’m having issues related to stress – my stepfather had a phone appointment with his oncologist to get some test results and I’m the one who listens in, takes notes, and asks for clarifications, then sends out a summary to the immediate family so I’d been anticipating that. Then it happened Monday and the news was not good – tumour size increase by 20% so his chemo meds have now been doubled – and I was the one who had to tell his kids (one of whom I’m married to, and to tell you how he took it: he ate a pint of ice cream for dinner).
And I’m changing jobs and am steeling myself to break my leaving to my current boss today and I am DREADING it, because he’s a great boss and I have a good job with him and I know that he’s already feeling pressure because we don’t have quite enough people to do all the stuff we do, but I was made an offer I simply couldn’t refuse, by someone I’ve always wanted to work with and already turned down 2x in the last 3 years to stay where I am. Ugh. The new job sounds cool, but I’d feel way better about it if I didn’t like my current boss/job or at least had decided it was time to move on when the new offer came in. (Now I’m the one who feels a bit like I’m complaining about the diamonds scratching my furniture.)
OMG, the random “Is this normal or did I contract COVID through the walls of my house?” I feel that. We have (until Friday, then it’s appointment only, which I find tricky in waits for those are usually a few days and if you need to know, waiting a few days isn’t a good idea. If you’re me and basically going for peace of mind, it does make sense to schedule it every week or two) easy, free, on-demand testing in town, so I tend to just go get my nose picked and then the email comes and it says negative and we’re good for another week – 10 days.
I hope your current boss is supportive and your new job is everything you hope it will be.
I thought about going for peace of mind, but once you’re tested you can’t physically interact with other members of your household or leave the house until you get the results, which can be a few days, and if you do interact with the household they can’t leave the house for the same time period. And my husband has to be able to go to work, which is an essential job.
And it seems kind of counter-intuitive to avoid a test so that you can continue to live your life as normal (normal for these times, when we’re not leaving the house except for essential purposes), but if I haven’t actually interacted with anyone outside the house the odds are almost nil I could have actually caught anything, so the anxiety of isolating and making my family isolate for nothing overrides my anxiety about what would potentially be, as you said, contracting COVID through the walls of my house. If I had more definitive symptoms like a cough, sore throat, fever, etc. and/or had done anything that exposed me I’d do it of course. Also, if anyone else in my house had come down with similar mild symptoms indicating I had anything transmissible, there would be testing warranted. But a tickle in my nose and only me being affected wasn’t enough to make me go out into the world for an official test.
I too lie awake playing the “allergies, sinus, COVID” game and it is unsettling. So far we’ve been lucky that nobody has contracted ANY illness in forever (knocks wood). My elementary age kid, who is attending school full-time, got sent home yesterday because he had a headache, so he has to stay home today too. I’m very glad the schools are taking any symptoms very seriously! But also, kiddo, drink more water so you can actually BE in school.
My 12 year old son suffers from chronic headaches and misses at least one day of school a week in bed with an icepack on his head. It’s one of the reasons we opted for full-time remote school for him this year. Even if the school let him go back the next day knowing about his condition, we’d still likely be going and picking him up all the time.
*hugs* to you. (non-contagious internet ones, to be sure) Really sorry about your father-in-law and all other pileups on you.
(also, yes, something can be a privilege that many people would give their eye-teeth for *AND* also be stressful and hard – see also: having small children – so. Yes.)
Stress can lead to inflammation, though, and I’ve noticed that allergies [i.e. the ubiquitous dust mite] that don’t normally bother me *do* add up to something when there’s stress or other allergy load. Which is why I now have anti-allergen heavy cotton zipped pillowcases inside my pillowcases and over my pillows.
There’s a lot going on with you, and I sympathize with all of it, but the main thing that stood out to me was you were in and out of Costco in 20 MINUTES? What is this black magic. Teach us your ways.
I know! The thing is, there are a few things that we get at Costco that are either unavailable elsewhere, or are just better or better-priced at Costco. So I write a list with those few things and run over on my lunch break when it’s not busy – we literally live within walking distance so it’s only a 5-minute drive. I also belong to a local Costco Facebook group, and sometimes I see products recommended there, so I add them to my list to pick up rather than browse in-store.
I could easily wander around if I let myself, but I concentrate on getting in, getting stuff I know we want, getting out. Plus, since the suspension of the sample program I’m no longer wandering around trying foods. We do curbside pickup at our regular grocery store for a lot of our regular grocery shopping, since Costco doesn’t carry a lot of our preferred items/brands and I have to take an egg allergy in the household into account.
For those following along: I did it! I told my boss I was leaving and he was surprisingly gracious about it and also told me that if things didn’t work out at the new place he’d hire me back “in a heartbeat”.
I feel so relieved to have that conversation over and done with!
That is great! I’m happy to hear it went well, without guilt-tripping or hard feelings.
Congratulations and hooray!!!
(and also: yay for knowing that if the new job turns out to have slightly too many unexpected downsides, you can revert. It doesn’t sound like it’s likely to, but still: lovely to know that you have options if you ever want to use them! Good bosses are amazing.)
That’s the very best response a boss could give. Hooray!
The night after the inauguration, I felt like a completely new person. I slept soundly for the first time in MONTHS. I felt like a physical weight had been lifted. I was so excited that perhaps my months-long funk was over! I just needed a non-psychopath in the White House! ….except that lasted about 2 days, and now I’m back to being exhausted, staying up too late, not getting up early to exercise because I’m exhausted from staying up late… and I’m so disheartened. Perhaps my issue is also the anxiety/stress crash? I hope so; that would hopefully mean I can start to come out of the funk as my body normalizes? I’m worried that so many months in this state has trained my body to live in a weird depressed unhealthy place.. like… permanently.
The good news/bad news about prolonged stress and trauma, if it has been severe, is that yes, it will get better, but it is also possible to do permanent damage to your body and mind, so hey, that’s super-fun.
(but it will get better from where it is right now, and you can do work to improve current status and likely long-term outcomes, too – exercise, meditation and seeking gratitude and observing good things [for some people, an activity like gardening or a tactile hobby works to cover all three; it doesn’t have to be woo woo, just something that provides good positive sensory input and that you are actively in a good mental position about], laughing [no, seriously, it does Things to your autonomic nervous system, it’s weird], eating things that don’t make your body cranky, getting plenty of sleep, and also possibly talk therapy if you can find someone good) (but also, it may not have been bad enough to do long-term damage, and you may just be in a post-adrenaline slump, or need more vitamin D, or any of the *other* totally normal January Blahs! In which case, do whatever it is that works well for you in combating the January Blahs! And it will probably be fine, really.)
After the emotional adrenaline boost I got from the inauguration I’ve also crashed. Some of it is likely due to the fact that Oldest finally completed all of his college applications and we got everything in we needed to apply for financial aid last week so I also finally got to let go of the incredible amount of stress that was causing me too. Combined with our weather, which has been in the upper 30s and rainy, well, I’m extremely unmotivated to do my work and must have self talk all the time to stay focused. I recommitted to exercising regularly and taking vitamin D and am hoping that after a couple of weeks things will even out and I’ll be back to a more normal level of motivation. This has been such a stressful period I think my brain and body just need to rest and recalibrate and it’s going to take awhile.
Totally had three go-to-bed-at-8pm nights in a row after the inauguration…. Just so much exhaustion, for no apparent reason. I’m with all of you in the too much long term stress category, I guess. I’m finding that my day to day takes are also somehow lacking all urgency and therefore are simply not getting done…. Which is becoming a different sort of problem.
This very feeling, which I also had for a few days, vaulted me into a (so far quite successful!) Trying New Things mood.
My biggest success:
I downloaded the Overdrive app so I could check out audio books from our library. I have never done this.
I chose a fluff audio book, which many people had recommended to me, but which I knew I would never bump to the top of my ridiculous To Read stack of physical books.
I put on my big, fat sound-canceling headphones, and listened to the book while I picked up around the house and vacuumed.
OMG. It makes ALL THE DIFFERENCE. I almost, ALMOST wished I had more time to clean.
It’s life changing, no?
As the default parent, I feel like I cannot have headphones on during zoom school but I used to spend most of my days like this or with podcasts (missed in history, savor, side door, gastropod being my FAVES) and I would get so much done.
All the James Herriot books are excellent on audio and so inconsequential. It’s lovely. Flavia DeLuce books by Alan Bradley, Oregon Trial by Rinker Buck are also excellent.
YES!
I enjoy the podcasts, too. My current favorite is You’re Dad to Me, and I’ve actually, amazingly, gotten my children interested in it. Now we can all listen to them in the car!
What is the fluff audiobook you chose? I need more of them for my list!
Am I too embarrassed to say? It seems not! It’s a sci-fi, YA retelling of “Cinderella.” I do not yet know if I can recommend it, but it starts off pretty well.
It’s very possible to feel like “yay the election went well, we’re saved!!!” and then also “dammit, the pandemic isn’t magically disappearing for the new year, that’s so disappointing!!!” at the same time. And I know this because I (and a lot of other people, from the looks of your comments) are all doing both of those things, exactly. While January is doing its usual job of SUCKING SO HARD ARRRGGHHH!. All of which is to say, I’m right there with you and just hoping so hard that Spring will arrive soon and better weather will help us enjoy the awesome Biden/Harris-ness even more while making the freaking pandemic more bearable:). Here’s hoping!
I’m chuckling about your heaps of diamonds scratching the furniture. I hope things start to improve for you. This year has been full of extra. Just plain old extra. Everywhere we turn. More shocking situations.
My children are not small. I babysit for small children during the day, but having extra people in my house seems to suck up more time. Communicating could be part of it – or is it that I feel like a barmaid, constantly clearing dishes and cups from places where they aren’t even supposed to eat food? Honestly, I don’t always clear the crap they leave, opting to point it out to them. Sometimes clearing it myself just feels faster.
Yes! The morning of the inauguration, I was sooo happy! First, when the idiot left the White House, then I drove my newly repaired car to school and finally when the inauguration went off smoothly. My students were lovely, my lunch tasted delicious, and my coworkers were delightful. Today, my students were loud and needy, wearing two masks and a face shield was driving me crazy, and my car is annoyingly old and crappy. Back to reality, I guess? And to January, teaching in a pandemic. But…I’m getting my first vaccine dose on Saturday, we’re starting a school book club to read a book about reducing stress, and January is almost over. So, we’ll just keep trucking along.
I’m also in the “absolutely must prioritize my self-care” place, if for totally different reasons. I recently decided that yoga – without my children – absolutely had to make it’s way back in to my schedule even if class was absolutely out. So, I checked out what Adrienne (of the infamous Yoga with Adrienne on YouTube) was doing for her annual 30 days of yoga. Breath. Could it be more perfect? So, every night the children get tucked in, the dogs get sent to the living room to watch TV with Dad and I take 30 to 50 minutes to breathe and move. It feels so good.
I’m doing it too, as soon as i stop farting around on the interwebs right now. I love it. I like her a lot and I like Benji. Come for the Benji, stay for the yoga.
Hmmm. @Swistle I hope/trust you are (mostly) healthy; please keep us updated.
Yes. Usually we go south between Christmas and New Years and enjoy some beach time and often, warmish weather. This year we did not. And Yay! Biden is president. But. Unsurprisingly, the pandemic is still a problem. Now! Two (old :) ) members of my household have already had their first of the 2 doses of the vaccine and happily, my state is one of the ones that is organizing itself to make sure that if you’ve had the first dose, you get the second on schedule. So that is Excellent for Us! Also, we have instituted take-out Tuesdays, which is to say we’ve decided we will regularly get take-out food for supper on Tuesdays to mix things up a bit.
But still — it is January. It is cold. It is grey. The days are short (they are getting longer!). Oof. It is hard. I have put a countdown on my phone until daylight savings time as something I can (a) be reasonably confident really will happen and (b) that I will be happy when it does.
Thank you for talking about this! We really are in a dip for a variety of reasons. I have a ton of work to do but it’s the part of my job I don’t like so I’m having a hard time motivating and then feeling guilty because I’m so lucky to have paid work, in my field that I usually love. I did have one victory lately. I’ve been clenching my jaw so tightly that my saliva gland became swollen and it was very painful every time I ate. I purchased a new, memory foam, neck pillow that specifically helps teeth grinding and I have been totally pain free since!
How are you doing this light therapy? I have many small and medium sized children (5) and I don’t sit unless there’s one sitting in my lap. So where do you recommend I put one?
I can tell my spouse has had SAD for a decade, usually mid November through March. Are these good ideas for Guys Who Dont Like Accessories or Standing Out? Will it be obvious on his desk?
Mine sits on my computer desk, and it looks kind of like a 5×7 picture frame except the whole thing is white. I bring my coffee to my computer and turn the light on and leave it on for Awhile—generally until having a bright light shining on me gets annoying. Half an hour or so? It’s very bright when it’s on: it would be quite noticeable if other people were around. I don’t think having a child on one’s lap would prevent using it, but that would be something to research just in case.
I’m so sorry you’re in a slump! I hope the vitamins, sunlamp, good breakfast etc helps. xoxoxo
I came over here to tell you that yesterday I was at the grocery store and the following things that I wanted to buy were COMPLETELY wiped out: whole wheat LINGUINE (every other whole wheat pasta was widely available, but not, mysteriously, linguine) and vanilla Danone yogurt. All other flavours, fine, fine, but not vanilla. This is probably just some weird Superstore thing, but when I noticed that the first thing I thought was “I have to tell Swistle!”
One of the weather dudes in our area keeps track of the amount of sunshine we get each day. 2 years ago it was cloudy and gray from November to May. We had something like 20% of our normal sunshine amount. I don’t think of myself as being affected by the lack of sun but that year? Yeah. It also didn’t help that the house we moved into has sun filtering film on the windows so it blocks some of the light that comes through. The whole house just feels darker on cloudy days. I need to work more on getting the film off the windows. We are replacing the windows, too. They are old. The first batch of new windows get installed in 2 weeks and it’s really crazy how much I am looking forward to that.
Also, I was clearing out a box and found an old bottle of vitamin D and thought it might be a good idea to start taking it again. So I’ve added that to my grocery list.
I felt hopeful and optimistic watching the Inauguration. But then the Republicans didn’t miraculously realize the error of their ways and become better people. Going into another year of dealing with the pandemic stuff is not a surprise, really. It stinks that we are still dealing with it but until the vaccines are mostly distributed, that’s what we do. But politicians who know better but have decided that they would rather indulge the white supremacists in their party to hold on to power is what is really getting me down. How much longer are we going to have to deal with the BS, gaslighting and threats of violence? That is what is making me feel exhausted.
I’ve been feeling the same way, and also quicker to anger, and quicker to sadness. I think we all took our metaphorical bras off our feelings because we’re in a safer place and now everything is more out in the open.
I am definitely experiencing the slump of which you speak. January is always slump-y, but this year is worse than usual in most respects. This week it has hit me the worst. I’ve had a super-intense several weeks at work and this week was marginally less chaotic and it’s as if my brain just checked right out altogether and my body turned to goo. So difficult to motivate or summon any interest in anything.
We are also back to a lot of uncertainty, since the vaccine rollout has been anything but smooth and I’m trying to plan summer things (yes, already – camps fill up, etc) but it’s so hard to know what anything will be like even next month, let alone in several months. We haven’t seen my parents in over a year and they are now one dose into the vaccine, which is great, but we are not in a group to get it until toward the end, so then the question is how and when do we see them based upon various travel and logistical complications. And who knows what kind of travel restrictions will be in place at one time or another. Meanwhile, throughout the pandemic we have only done outdoor, masked social activities but when it’s like 15 degrees out and windy and gross, that is no longer a real option so my kid and I are starved for time with friends and human interaction generally.
I keep saying to people that I’m hitting a wall and I keep hearing others say it, too, and yep. Here we all are.
My daughter and I are just coming off a few days where we felt horrible, mentally and physically, but we had literally been nowhere, so Covid wasn’t really a concern. I think it was allergies plus anxiety. I have stretches that I do every day, and if I miss them I really feel it. In a way it makes me feel old and sad that I have to do this to feel better, but in another way it’s an easy enough way to feel a little bit better.
Also, ‘my heaps of diamonds scratching up my furniture’ *chef’s kiss*