Gauging Energy Still Proves Difficult

Man… I’m still having a hell of a time figuring out what I can and can’t do, as far as energy is concerned.  I kind of thought I’d have this worked out by this point, but every day is different.  While I’m trying to watch for signals, I’m going to be honest – I’m still clueless.

My boss finally hired someone to take my place, as well she should.  I am her only employee, I managed her whole office.  I’m surprised she gave me as long as she did, to be honest.  I have no hard feelings, I recognize that I’m entirely unreliable at this point and she needs someone to take over.  I think I’ve stated before that she’s been extremely generous and would like to keep me helping the office as much as I can.

Yesterday, the new woman started and my boss asked me if I could come in to help train in the morning.  She even said to me that she didn’t expect me to do more than two hours.  If I felt worse before those two hours were up, go home.  If I felt like I could do another hour, do another hour, then go home.  Well, I worked from 9:15 until about 12:30.  I intended to leave around 11:30 but there were so many little details I remembered and I already felt so bad for the poor woman who was just being thrown into the position.  (Luckily, she’s familiar with this kind of work and is entirely computer savvy, so she caught on quickly.)

I was glad my husband was my ride because when I left, my legs felt a little mushy (weak) and my vision was starting to blur.  We’d been meaning to go to Costco for the last few days, just for a few items.  So we stopped at home first to grab some quick lunch, and with that sustenance, I was ready to go to Costco.  Now… I felt tired when we left the house for Costco.  I recognized this fact.  But we only had about 7 things to grab, Costco is only about 6 blocks from our house, I really saw no issue with me going.

While we live in town, our area, in general, is fairly remote.  I’m sure I’ve said this before, but we’re 5 hours from any large city (San Francisco or Sacramento).  In fact, we’re the “largest” town for about 3.5 hours drive, and our little town is only 30,000 people.  The next nearest Costco is 3.5 hours away.  You can imagine that our Costco gets a lot of traffic from all the people who live two, two and a half hours away and come into town for supplies.  For me, a visit to Costco is really a mental strain.  Just navigating the parking lot is enough to make one flip their lid – I told my husband, if I ever have a mental breakdown and start going off on people, screaming at them to go fuck themselves, it’s going to be at Costco.  So while I was just thinking about going to Costco in a physical sense (yes, it’s only a few items, I can get in and get out, no prob), I hadn’t really considered the mental exhaustion it might cause.

When we pulled back up to the house, I even had to sit a moment before getting out of the car because I felt a “wave” of numbness wash over my already-numb right foot.  I had to give it a second to see what it was going to do – would my foot hold me up when I stepped out of the car?  Could I get up the stairs to our second-floor apartment?  In the end, yes, my foot was fine, albeit numb.  But that was it.  It was 2:00 and there was nothing left in me for the rest of the night.  My legs were shaky and weak.  My vision was a little blurry, which makes me feel light-headed, and I end up yawning so hard, I swear my jaw is going to crack.

So yeah, I recognized the fact that a few hours of work stacked on top of a trip to Costco is too much for me at this point.  What I didn’t expect was the exhaustion I felt this morning.  I was due to go back in to work for just a couple of hours again, but I couldn’t do it.  I slept poorly, I woke up feeling exhausted and slightly nauseous.  My vision was already jacked.  I had some muscle spasms in my hands, thigh, and foot/ankle.  And I had to sit and really debate – is it worth pushing myself a couple of hours?  It’s just a couple of hours!!!  TWO HOURS!  It’s so, so, so hard to tell myself I can’t do something for a mere two hours.  It’s so hard to call up my boss and tell her.  I imagine her, or anyone else, on the other line thinking, “This is bullshit.  She can’t fucking come sit in an office chair for two hours?”  Maybe my boss understands, maybe she doesn’t.  Hell, I don’t understand it.

So I’m at home, trying to take care of the things I can do from home – pay bills, wrap up a few loose ends with insurance and temporary-disability.  Trying not to feel guilty and to accept that this is just life now… maybe it’ll be different next month, maybe it’ll be the same.  I try to keep in mind, all the time, that things could always be worse, and for some, it is worse, so I have to be grateful for everything I’ve still got and just learn to deal with it.  To remind myself that even though it’s only been three and a half months, it’s still a learning process.  🙂