Je suis fatigue

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.

Raise your hand if you could see that coming.

For the majority of the last year and a bit:

Me:  I can do anything!  I can do everything! 
Most people I know: You should probably reconsider that.
Me:  Pshaw!  If I can handle X, then surely I can take on Y and Z at the same time!
Most people I know:  That is probably a bad idea.

Well, I was almost right.  I could do anything and everything right up to the point where I couldn't.  Then I just needed to sit down for a while and stop expecting miracles - but unfortunately, that was the exact point where I needed to pull yet another miracle out of my hat (and, about 15 hours of well planned miracles, at that).

I was expecting the prac to be no more taxing than everything else I've been juggling - except I've still been juggling everything else while trying to do the prac.

Oddly enough, it didn't work.

I was offered the chance to keep pushing and hope for the best.  I've decided to take a rain check on that.  I'll kick myself for it later.  Right now I'm sleeping a lot. 

If there is one thing I've learnt over the years, nothing is as make-or-break as you think it is... unless you break.  Right now, I'm going to give "not breaking" a shot.  If I really care about this, I can make it up later.

Those who can't

There's an old saying:  "Those who can, do.  Those who can't, teach."

It's a terrible saying that is meant to insult teachers (particularly, I suppose, university and trade teachers).

I've often wondered, though, where does that leave the people who can't teach?  What do they do?

I had my first "proper" teaching day at prac today, and it sucked.  I was so terrible I even surprised myself - and, quite frankly, I usually expect to be terrible, so I'm not normally surprised to found out I am.

I was over prepared and underprepared at the same time (no mean feat), and I was also just plain awful.  I was boring.  I gave the students work that veered wildly between "too easy" and "too confusing".  I had no sense of where I was with the crowd, and I could see all the horrible things I was doing as I was doing them...  But couldn't catch myself.  I just kept grinding downhill, and taking those poor students with me.

There are two things about myself that I know to be equally true:
1.  I'm a frickin' genius.
2.  I'm the thickest of dunces.

When I'm in the zone, and on a role, you can't stop me.  I can solve any problem.  I can handle any situation.  I just sit there and say to myself "Well, Sharon, you're a frickin' genius, how do we make this better?" and a few minutes (heck, sometimes just a few seconds) of frenzied thinking reveals a solution that was worth the arrogance.  Sometimes I can come up with something instantly.  Sometimes I can say "leave it with me", and by the next day I'll have an answer that works.  I have this power.

But I also hit these points where all I can do is make mistakes and repeat them.  I'll say to myself, "well, Sharon, you're a frickin' genius, how do we make this better", and from deep inside something in me says "I got nothin'.  Just keep doing that thing that isn't working and hope it gets better."  When I'm a dunce, I'm a serious dunce.  I can't even read the situation, let alone handle it.  It may take me five years to realise what's actually going on. (No, seriously.  On more than one occasion I've had the "Oh, that's what she said" moments several years after the event).

And then I'm standing there, feeling completely useless while part of me screams "make it better!  Make it better!" and the rest of me screams back: "I don't know how!  I don't know how!"

I had a large portion of those moments when I was a high school teacher.  I'm having them again, now.

Yesterday, because I didn't have any classes in the morning, they got me to catalogue some resources for them.  I solved six problems before lunch.  Yesterday, I was a genius.

Today I was teaching, and I feel like I'm drowning in my own incompetence.

If this prac has taught me one thing, it's this:  I really like being a librarian.

Actually, I already knew that.  I just thought I might also like being an ESL teacher.  I think, now, I can safely say I don't like being any kind of teacher.  It makes me feel stupid and useless.

Maybe "those who can't teach should stop trying to kid themselves" should be the other part of that saying.

Borrowed energy

I'm currently running on borrowed energy.  Sadly, I'm actually borrowing it from 2010 - specifically the 2010 Oslo Eurovision Song Contest.

I decided, in a weak moment, to buy the Eurovision albums from 2010 and 2011, seeing as I've been using the 2012 album to keep conscious for the past few months, and am starting to worry about the fact that I think I'm beginning to understand the lyrics from the Italian entry (whadaya mean it was in English?  That doesn't seem right...)

The 2011 album was unavailable through the shop I used, and they cancelled my order, but I've been listening to 2010 for the past few days.  If I start muttering "Allez allez allez" in the middle of otherwise normal conversations, or talking about the blue underwear I bought just the other day, you'll know why.

It was actually much better than I remembered.  Mind you, this is coming from someone who is using Europop to stay awake.

I haven't been able to think coherently for more than a few minutes at a time for a while now.  The music helps.  Well, it helps with the task at hand - it's not quite capable of making me remember the other things I have floating around on my lists of things to do.

I have no good reason for being so out of it.  I'm just tired.  I live most of my days backwards, waking up feeling exhausted and then beginning to perk up and get things done just as I should be thinking about going to sleep - and then I hit a point where I know I'm definitely over-tired and I should have gone to sleep hours ago, but for some reason I'm still doing something else.

I'm not alone in this - there are others who have it worse, so I really have nothing to whinge about.  I'm just feeling the effects of what amounts to self-inflicted exhaustion.  I do get at least 5 hours' sleep most nights, so I actually have it pretty sweet for an insomniac.

But I'm tired.  I'm physically tired, and only seem to wake up when I'm moving (and finding it harder every day to actually start moving).  And I'm mentally tired and only seem to be able to keep going when there is some sort of rhythm feeding through my ears.  And I feel tired on a deeper level - I'm tired of trying to figure out what I want from life and coming up empty every single time.  I thought I knew what I wanted earlier in the year, but now I'm back in limbo.  I'm so tired of being in limbo.

And I'm completely resigned to being tired.  When I was younger I used to have these one-sided arguments with God, asking him what stupid lesson I was supposed to learn and why he hated me so much ("for he grants sleep to those he loves" Ps 127:2).  But these days I'm like, "Eh, God hates me.  Whatever."

I spend so much time in this place where nothing moves that I've stopped expecting movement.  I've spent so much time in this place where all I feel is "tired" that I've stopped expecting to feel anything else.

I suppose that sounds depressing.  It doesn't feel depressing.  I've been depressed so I know what depressing feels like, and this isn't it.  I feel happy enough, cheerful on most occasions, just tired and washed out.

So I whistle a happy tune, and it keeps me upright.  I remind myself to keep functioning, and I keep functioning.  I'm just running on music until I can find some reserves.  I must have some somewhere...

And they went to sea in a sieve

There are days when I feel like my brain could
If it wanted to
I suppose
Although I must admit that it doesn't
Not really
Not often
And very rarely does it make any
Although,
It must be said
That I never really
And that's what I've been
Kind of
All at sea in a sieve...
One day I'll remember to sleep

Everything done is a minor victory
Everything not done is my own damn fault
I have no one to blame but myself
That I'm all at sea in a sieve

I know what I do and I know what I should
And if only I'd listen to me, I'd be good
But all of it ends in a heap at my feet
And I'm all at sea in a sieve

And I'm all at sea in a sieve, my dear
I'm all at sea in sieve.
And in the end it's my own damn fault
That I'm all at sea in a sieve...