Extra Hours of Uselessness

I've had sleeplessness. Sometimes brought on by a racing brain, sometimes from shift-work broken sleep patterns, sometimes even just plain ol' insomnia that doesn't appear to have any cause. Sleep and I have always had an inconsistent relationship.

The last couple of years sleeplessness hasn't been an issue (which let me take a moment to say YAY). Instead fatigue has come to rule and now, while I still don't ever seem to be able to get enough sleep, I'm getting heaps of it. Without the structure imposed by core business hours, I will sleep more than 10 hours a day. Every day. Regardless of what those days may hold. It's easy to recognise that I just need more rest than most, but so far has been impossible to accept as I don't wake feeling rested and renewed. Sure, I really, really, really like sleep. Really. But this sleep is like fake sweetener, it does nothing for me, and fucked if I'm not mighty resentful at losing nearly half of the day to it. If I keep going like this, that's half my life gone. It already feels like there isn't enough hours in the day without sleep getting greedy.

Waffling on a bit. Brain is mighty woolly.

The night before last I just didn't sleep. At all. It wasn't anxiety driven, brain wasn't chewing over anything, heart wasn't stewing, had had a single cup of tea that morning, no sugar beyond the afternoon, easy exercise during the day. My body just didn't feel like powering down, and while I wasn't pleased to watch the small hours become larger hours, the frustration and annoyance that usually comes with sleeplessness didn't feel like playing, and mostly I just listened to podcast fiction between attempts to lie still and breathe slow.

Hell, I actually felt alright when my alarm went off, and the only reason I didn't go to work was because I knew the instant I got out of bed and started doing, that would change.

Fibromyalgia and RSI management requires sleep be respected. The meatsack relaxes in sleep in a manner that's near impossible to invoke while awake. The less sleep you get, the less time the nerves and muscles have to recuperate, the inverse result being that I simply get really fucking sore. And dumb. But mostly sore.

Fuck I'm waffling so much. So very dumb.

Anyway, I figured I'd sleep just fiiiiine last night, because my body's reaction to "not enough sleep" is "HIBERNATE FOR THE NEXT WEEK ALRIGHTY!!!!!!!!!"

And I didn't.

Annnnnnd it's actually really weird. This is not even close to the default behaviour of my body for the past few years, and I'm well and truly out of practice in managing sleeplessness, if my old methods would even apply.

And. And. And. I honestly can't remember what the point of this post was. Other than maybe just leaving a record for myself? Um?

I think it might have been to do with the fact that if I'm letting my body sleep as much as I want I lose too many hours being unconscious, but if I'm not getting enough sleep then I haven't gained any time at all because my mental faculties are – herein demonstrated – shitclogged and I'm so full of aches and fatigue all I can really do is sit and stare at nothing in a daze before gently keeling over onto a pillow that never feels comfortable and still staring at nothing in a daze.

I think it might have been something to do with betrayal, in that my default attitude toward my body is resentment, fury and contempt that it sabotages my capacities and abilities across the spectrum, and then this, whatever this is, comes along like a rogue planet as if to say, "You thought I was talented before, now check this out!"

I think it might have been better crafted. Nuanced. Actually a smooth, interesting reading experience. But this is the exact result of all this body betrayal. A whole lot of flibbertigibbet.

Man, I feel like I'm gonna chunder.

Have a kind day, yeah.

Confessions, a Train Ride Home

I have  been thinking about writing, and how I am not.

There is a part of me that wants to blame medication, even though I stopped writing before the medication ever came into play. This is not unfair as it has shifted the way I think and feel. The heart does not howl any more, or, I have forgotten how to listen to it. I think this silencing has in turn silenced my need to write, to capture and tame my storms with mere words, precise words. And this should not be a problem, but it is very close, only a step away from, having nothing to say.

Which is not true, cannot be true, yet is very true.

If the need to express a voice does not come from within, then, given all the noise being forced into the world already, how can I possibly justify adding to it? If I have nothing that I need to say, then output must be because there is something I believe others need to hear. The audacity and arrogance aren't mine, not comfortably, to assume I have the authority to decide this. Even though I may choose the platform so that the choice to consume lies with the reader - no. There is already too much noise out there. There is nothing I can say that has not already been said.

There is no requirement for need in the writing of fiction. Need in the writer's voice can lend power to a story, but it is not required. I could write simply because I want to. But when the power of need has fuelled you for so long, action by want seems pale and trivial by comparison.

All that occurred in my life was for writing. All the learning and heartache and new experiences; all grist for the mill. It would all out in the stories one day. But now I don't need to cast my trials in such a light in order to make them palatable enough to see through, my lover stands by me throughout all fire and flood. It is enough to simply spend my days with him. But is it? Is a life that is enjoyed but to no end of any purpose? Writing was a purpose I gave my life in order to keep my life. Now that I am in no such danger, the purpose is no longer required, and yet to simply live is not enough, would be such selfish and wasted time.

I have already lost so much time. To waste more will lead only to self-disgust. Still, I cannot underestimate fear and the scars left by physical pain and emotional anguish that come into play. I lost my future, one I did not even know I projected upon myself, and so all I have and had done became untethered. Echoes of this singular horror I've heard from those struggling with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. It is not for me to self-diagnose, but it would be remiss of me to overlook this one and only echo.

To confront my identity as a writer, to consider reviving it, is to also risk the possibility of losing it again. Hope is such an awful creature. I had to give her away. She cost me too much. To survive I had to give her away. I had to.

Even from now, this place of strength, I can't dip into this subject matter without feeling it in my nerves and knowing that I will never be strong enough to survive the loss of my identity again.

There most probably lies the heart of the matter. Not all the medication and emotional well-being in the world will help me finish a story if I am afraid.

And I am so very afraid.

Traveling with Fibromyalgia

That I have deleted some six starting sentences for this post indicates that perhaps I am not yet ready to write about it yet.

To begin with, I am not as well versed on the effects of fibromyalgia as I should be. This ignorance was initially willful and deliberate; I was in denial about the whole thing and just didn't want to know, which is not a novel way with initially coping with the idea of a chronic condition.

Then tempus fugit and in the last couple of months in Melbourne I was busy failing to get my affairs in order for my departure and trying to see as many friends as possible. After that, well, travel is travel. I've been busy.

I can say with utter certainty that not spending 8+ hours a day sitting at the computer has alleviated my daily pain levels substantially.

I can say with certainty that lugging my rucksack and satchel around isn't really good for me, but so far I haven't done this for any great length of time. This will change as soon as I leave the US, but given most of my stays are several nights at a time, there is plenty of time to let my muscles rest.

Reasonable suspicion that sleeping on so many air mattresses, couches and sofa beds with all sorts of different pillows isn't doing me any good, but the effects haven't resulted in any impediment yet.

I don't remember what it was to live without perpetual pain and discomfort, and I know that sounds dramatic, but I don't want it to be taken that way. I just don't. Things seem to be holding steady, and that doesn't mean I'm feeling good, it simply means I am not stuck in the grinding cycle of work followed by aggravated muscles and pain, building up over the week until the weekend when I got enough time out - only to repeat it again. Things still hurt. I'm sitting here today, with the express intention of not going out but writing this and putting things in my diary, and I know I will pay for this tomorrow.

The coming price doesn't upset me as much as it used to, because now I have the time to recover.

Fatigue, however, has begun to worry me greatly. Fibromyalgia and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome are very closely tied, and do tend to come hand in hand.

I am flattened. Excitement and wide-eyed curiosity got me through San Diego and New York, although toward the end of my time in the Big Apple I desperately wanted to stop the ride and get off. North Carolina has being a wonderful balm of quiet and calm, and to the friends who have opened their homes to me I have no words. Thank you. For comfortable silence and big couches and your wonderful delightful pets. Thank you for letting me be boring and sleep. Thank you.

And yet, it doesn't feel like enough. As though there simply isn't enough rest in all the rest fields of the whole world for me to feel fully rested. My need to sit, not to catch my breath but simply to use less energy, happens far more frequently than it should.

I want to blame this on being unfit and failing to eat and drink properly (the latter of which always happens when traveling). Except I'm sitting here now, having done nothing but watch the #OWS hashtag and drink tea, and I still feel flatter than a pancake.

I don't know if I'm being reasonable or alarmist in even considering CFS, especially considering my own fibromyalgia is...

...I was going to say mild, but it isn't, is it?

I'm just good at ignoring it.

At any rate, my advice to people traveling with either of these conditions is to allow yourself plenty of opportunities for rest, whether that means allotting yourself time to sit on the train between museums or blocking out entire days to do nothing. Unfortunately, New York simply has TOO MUCH IN IT which makes not going out and doing ALL THE THINGS very hard, but, you know, try.

Common sense is, sometimes, not that common. Especially when you have shit to prove.