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Thursday 28 July 2011

ten things I’ve learned about tiredness

  1. Tiredness robs you of the ability to achieve
  2. Tiredness robs you of the ability to perceive what you have achieved
  3. Tiredness makes everything feel bigger
  4. Tiredness can turn you into someone you don’t want to be
  5. Tiredness sensitises you to light, sound, and other external factors
  6. Tiredness sensitises you to sadness, frustration, and other internal factors
  7. Tiredness is difficult to explain to someone who doesn’t tire easily
  8. Tiredness makes it difficult to communicate in general
  9. Tiredness unravels your defences
  10. Tiredness can get so bad that rest feels impossible
Okay, nothing ground breaking here.  But sometimes I feel it’s helpful to remember that tiredness has an influence.  Sometimes it’s helpful to see the obvious, to say – that’s the tiredness talking.  A little re-arranging of perspective becomes necessary. And although my view is intimate and more extreme due to CFS/ME, I believe tiredness is increasingly common for everyone in a culture that prizes busy-ness and success. We try to fit so much in to our days, and then berate ourselves for not fitting in more.  We feel we’ve done nothing, managed nothing, except make ourselves more tired.

It’s a tired world.

On a slightly related topic, I've been included in the 100 Best Sites for Fibromyalgia or Chronic Fatigue Information at www.b12patch.com.  Not sure if I really qualify as it's not the primary topic of this blog, but thanks to whoever recommended me!

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8 comments:

Angela said...

Thanks for an intelligent and accurate list

Tiredness can get in the way of even the best relationships. It's so important to recognise when you and spouse are BOTH tired and acknowledge it to each other, before things go pear-shaped.

Only 10 days till our holiday - and we are counting the days!

blessings x

Lucy Mills said...

Oh yes - essential to realise when you're both tired before the tiredness starts doing the talking (or shrieking!) for you.

Have a wonderful break and I hope the next 10 days aren't too gruelling! x

Stuart James said...

It doesn't happen so often now as I take enough medicine to kill a small pony, but I used to have periods of up to a week without sleep.

I cannot even begin to relate what this does to the mind and body. 'Tired' just dosen't capture it.

Sleep deprivation coupled with over-stimulation is a waking nightmare.

Lucy Mills said...

We need a whole vocabulary to convey the scale that exists within the inadequate word 'tiredness'. I think of my Chronic Fatigue as tiredness 'with teeth', and am more inclined to picture it as a clawing, biting monster than I am to call it 'tiredness'.

Sleep deprivation as you describe is appalling. We simply can't function, and the desperate attempts of body and mind to continue to work often induces panic, desperation and thus more draining on resources that simply are not there.

Yuk.

Red said...

I think learning to notice the warning signs helps too, something that I am particularly rubbish at! but when I do, and change my plans accordingly, it makes a heap of difference.
I also think it's important to accept that it is a symptom, or even an illness in some cases despite what others around us may think. I find it incredibly frustrating that friends don't always understand why I am tired or why I choose not to go out, on the basis that I am tired, but I try to remind myself that I am not being crap, just dealing with the symptoms I have!

Stuart James said...

I think learning to notice the warning signs helps too

Absolutely imperative and yet something so many of us are rubbish at.

I actually have a list of warning signs that I have to observe and yet I'm still rubbish at discerning my own patterns.

It is strange indeed.

Lucy Mills said...

What always panics me is when I see the warning signs but I know life is going to be busy - and not all of it changeable...for example, I have a hospital appointment next week which always utterly exhausts me, but I need to go to it (not least because I'd have to wait months to get another).

Having said that, there are things we can change and often more so than we think. Saying 'no' doesn't always come easy -especially when it's yourself you're talking to...

Claudia said...

Sleep deprivation as a form of torture - as any parent of small children finds. Including me after just two nights of broken sleep thanks to a small boy with a cough. I haven't found the solution yet. Let me know when you do.

"The desperate need today is not for a greater number of intelligent people, or gifted people, but for deep people."- Richard Foster