It's one of the first phrases I learn in any language:
Je suis fatigue
Ich bin müde
Ma olen väsinud
Actually... ma olen väga väsinud
I am (very) tired.
It's because they get you to fake conversations with people where you ask standard questions like "how are you", and my honest answer, most of the time, is "I am tired".
I have been tired since I was a teenager. Around about the time I hit puberty I also came down with something (glandular fever, I believe), and I've been tired ever since.
Say I was a car with a V8 engine. On my good days, I'm running on 6 cylinders. Most days, I'm probably on 4. Sometimes I'm on 2. And when I get really run down (which is more often than I'd like), I'm limping along on 1.
I'm still somehow functional, even at my worst - even though I feel like I'm going to lose consciousness every time I blink when I'm running on next-to-nothing, I never actually pass out. I never actually find it impossible to get up and keep going. So a lot of the time I do just get up and keep going. Although sometimes (it seems to be happening more and more often lately), I'll recognise I'm no good to anyone in that state and just stay home.
It comes and goes. I have good stretches when I'm moving between 4 and 6 for weeks at a time, and bad stretches where I keep dragging myself along at 2 wondering when I'm going to hit 1.
When I'm particularly tired, everything is so much "worse" than it normally is. Lights are painfully bright, sounds are distressingly noisy (there's a particular cupboard in the staff tearoom that slams shut in a way that I can ignore completely when I'm feeling good, but shoots right through me when I'm run down)... And people are just overwhelming.
When I think about it, I normally find lights a bit too bright and noises a bit too noisy and people overwhelming, but I ignore it better when I'm not completely worn down. When I am, I don't have whatever fortitude helps me cope with all of that.
All I want to do is pull myself into a quiet space free from expectations - somewhere where I don't have to think about what other people feel or need or want from me. Somewhere where I can just stare into space for 20 minutes straight, if that's what I want to do, while working up the energy to lie on the couch and read.
If I'm feeling of two minds about something, when I'm run down is when I'll be stuck thinking about the negatives. When I'll be wanting to avoid making decisions because if I do, I'm going to make the pessimistic choices. If I'm feeling stressed about something, this is when I'll try to drop it like a hot potato so I can just finally stop worrying about it (although then I'll worry that I've made the wrong choice because I'm run down).
Arguably, these are decisions/choices that I should be making anyway - getting off the damn fence and choosing something with the idea of minimising pain. I still feel terrible about them afterwards - especially if they involved other people. I much prefer it if my moodswings don't impact others.
At this stage, depending on your mental health background, you're probably wondering: "Depression?"
Well, I was diagnosed with clinical depression when I was in high school. Back then I'd been tired for several years, was suffering from several undiagnosed food intolerances and probably an undiagnosed ASD as well (I still don't know about that one - I have my suspicions, but I probably know too much for the tests to be conclusive, and I've had my quota of inconclusive tests for a while). Some doctor (who we since became quite dubious about) decided depression was the cause. I remain convinced it's a symptom.
Of course I'm depressed. I'm tired all the damn time, my neck and shoulders ache constantly, I frequently have aches and pains in my other joints and muscles, nothing I eat seems to agree with me, and I have the kind of memory issues you'd expect in a woman with onset dementia. And that's just my normal. When it gets really bad, and the headache flairs up, and I ache all over, and I have to work hard to form sentences, and I have to force myself to go for a walk because I desperately need the exercise but staying upright for it seems like hard work...
Well, if I didn't feel depressed I'd be rather surprised.
But there's nothing particularly wrong with me. I've had enough tests over the years. They all come back the same: there's nothing particularly wrong. Just lose weight, get more exercise, eat better food and tidy up your sleeping habits.
If I keep doing all of these things, if I keep trying to pull myself up by my own bootstraps, maybe it will work. Maybe it will eventually all fall into place and I'll feel something other than tired.
Right now, though?
Je suis fatigue.
