Archives for posts with tag: good self-care

Remember that day I said I need to get some rest? (Was that only yesterday?) I eventually arrived home from work, bone tired, brain tired, so tired… that down deep, long gone toward stupid & clumsy tired. I careened around the apartment for some little while. I don’t recall when I went to bed, but I can gauge my cognitive fatigue, specifically, by the disarray I woke to.

My cell phone was left on a side table and never recharged, fitness tracker carelessly left on its charger and never put back on, half a dozen coffee mugs left behind pretty much everywhere I paused thinking I’d have a cup of decaf…tea…broth… forgetting as the short evening proceeded that I’d already made something, and left it elsewhere. As I changed from work clothes to comfy clothes, I carelessly left things laying about, which is not my habit. My hiking boots in the living room, my socks oddly left draped on the shoe stand by the front door, my jeans draped over the side of the bathtub (?!), my top dropped on the floor and left there, my earrings on a bookcase… I can follow the path I took, from the front door, to the neatly stacked yoga pants and t-shirts in my closet, back to the kitchen – the cupboard with the coffee mugs was left standing open. When I did I go to bed? I don’t recall that at all, but I don’t guess my state of mind counts as “awake” to begin with. lol

I woke at 5:15 am. I slept in! (Yep, it counts.) I slept deeply, dreamlessly, restfully, and I had no intention of getting up so early… so I went back to sleep. When I woke again, to sunlight streaming into my room between the slats of the blinds, I eagerly got up for coffee… no coffee. I’d meant to go to the store last night. Clearly, though, I was in no condition to be operating a car, so I’m rather glad I didn’t. I throw on some jeans without any particular effort to be particular, and grab the nearest clean top and drag my brush through my hair, step into my sandals, and make a quick trip to the store for coffee, salad greens, and… tangerines. Why the tangerines? Why the hell not? (Actually, it is in part a rather practical thing; they are the right size for a serving without being cut in half, and they are quite delicious in recipes, too.)

I returned home, wandered about the place putting things right, and getting myself organized for a day of… getting organized. LOL I find creating order from chaos very relaxing when there is no deadline or agenda, so a day of tidying up, laundry, and housekeeping sounds just the thing for a relaxing day. At some point, the windshield replacement technician will show up, do that thing that needs to be done. I hear a contented sigh in this quiet room. Me. A side glance confirms what my lips reported last time I took a sip from my coffee cup; it’s empty. It’s a good time to begin again. 🙂

By the time I got home last night, my brain was just… done. I don’t even have any particular recollection of the evening, aside from a brief chat with my Traveling Partner. I crashed out a little earlier than “on time”.

I wake this morning to a gray storm-cloudy not-quite-sunrise of a dawn, after an interrupted night of otherwise deep sleep. The morning seems both very ordinary, and also a little strange, and a bit surreal. I have the peculiar subjective sense that I’m seeing things differently than usual, but can’t pin down anything obvious. A potential sign of mental fatigue requiring better rest than I’m getting. I’m not surprised, if that’s the case; I’ve been giving a bit more than all of myself at work for the past several days, working to complete a complex bit of analytical work in advance of a deadline. I haven’t been sleeping particularly well. I dream about work. I’m super glad this is the last work day in my week. I’m ready for some rest.

I pause to appreciate a small change that has developed over time; I am more aware of the rhythms of my experience. I more easily observe when poor quality sleep becomes, over time, an impediment to cognition and emotional balance. I am more likely to be aware when the pattern of my emotional “weather” changes over the course of the day, in such a way as to indicate I am more deeply fatigued than I may realize. I am more able to recognize when – and how – I need to step up my self-care, to support and nurture this fragile vessel for further lifetime’s enjoyment. It’s nice. (It took – and takes – practice, and my results vary.)

I think about a friend I know is suffering right now. I think about how far I’ve come, and how little certainty I felt then that my experience would change. I had no understanding that change could bring me to “now” – or that “now” could be this good. I still have some shitty moody angst-y despairing or angry or irritable, frustrated, rage-y moments. That’s what they are, too. Moments.

One moment of many.

Lately, for the past 2-3 days only, I’ve been waking feeling pretty generally content but finishing the day feeling moody, disappointed with life, frustrated, and angry without any particular cause that makes sense. It was last night, sitting quietly with my fatigue and making no point to distract myself from it, that I became re-aware that deeper, prolonged mental fatigue, tends to also coincide with that pattern of slowly losing emotional resilience over the course of the day. I am more self-aware and inclined to observe my experience without judgement these days, and it’s delightful to note that the pay-off seems, in this instance, that I will be able to avoid some unfortunate meltdown or freak out, that would ordinarily go down just at that point that I am not aware how deeply fatigued I am, at the end of some long (probably joyful and exciting) day, because instead I’ll get some damned rest this weekend. 😀

…I make a point of checking my calendar, of course… Well. Obviously, a weekend which I am counting on for rest is that rare weekend fully booked with events, errands, and tasks. LOL Shit. I sit smiling under my furrowed brown, chewing on my lip, mildly frustrated, a tad annoyed… I’m replacing the car windshield; a non-negotiable errand that needs to be done. No room for change there. An appointment with my stylist for Saturday… I could cancel a haircut and reschedule… but it’s hard to get those Saturday appointments. So. A great opportunity to point out how good self-care intentions go sadly wrong. You can say “I told you so” when I’m cross and moody on Monday morning. 😉

I won’t be running myself ragged this weekend, in any case. I’ll make a point of resting, and treating myself with care, gently, because I matter to me. Camping next weekend. My birthday the weekend after that. I suddenly feel tired before those events even get to “now”; my brain is reminding me to take getting some rest seriously. I sass myself silently with a smile and daydream about relaxing out among the trees next weekend. I’ll certainly get the rest I need then, but I know that doesn’t change how much rest I need, now. 😀

Fatigue changes the emotional weather, and the emotional landscape. Just saying. I have become more aware how important it is to get the rest I need.

Speaking of rest… it’s already time to go and do and be. One more work day – then rest.

 

I woke ahead of the alarm after a restless night. The apartment was 77 degrees when I woke, which was 5 degrees cooler than when I went to bed. Even some strategic open windows and a fan going were not enough to cool the place down much. Now I sip my coffee, all the windows wide to the pre-dawn breezes and cooler air. I’m hoping to get the indoor temperature down to 70 or less before I go to work; it’s another hot day, but forecast to be only 82. Tonight won’t be so stifling hot in here, if the day is no hotter than that, out there. 🙂

Because the windows are open, I am listening to the chorus of birds waking as the sun rises, and it is now, in every practical sense, summer. The birds were up before the sun. The cacophony of peeps, chirps, tweets, whistles, calls and responses, twittering, and trilling become a more complex grander song of morning than any one bird could sing. The commuter traffic beginning in the audible distance, and the sound of a later-than-usual freight train on the siding a mile or so away are not enough to drown out summer birds. 🙂

Just before the sun breaks over the horizon, I see the slimmest crescent of moon just at the edge of the treetops. As the sky begins to lighten, it disappears. The lawn at the edge of the patio is revealed with the sunrise; it is covered with geese and ducks contentedly sleeping in, heads tucked down, just one sentry looked out for cats and kids.

Summertime

My Traveling Partner checked in yesterday, just at about that time when it had become more difficult to stave off worrying, having not heard from him for more than 24 hours past the end of the calendar event. The timing was most amusing. I’d barely completed my thought, “how long would I wait before doing something about nothing hearing from him reasonably becomes a thing I’d want to do…?”, when my phone buzzed with a message from him, letting me know he was on his way back. Well…so… clearly the answer to my question was “a little longer”. lol I feel more at ease now, in some subtle way, just from knowing he’s okay. I definitely don’t enjoy having doubts about that, real or imagined. 🙂

The sun is not yet quite “up”. The sky is light, a pale wash of cerulean blue, with a hint of orange along the horizon, showing through the trees. No clouds. Still… it’s a good moment to begin again. 🙂

Admittedly, thoughts of love are not even at all the same thing as loving, live in real-time, flesh in the presence of flesh, hearts entwined, embraces, words, moments… Not the same at all, and yet… I love. Sitting here in the quiet before dawn, with a cup of hot coffee, and a delicate sliver of moon on the horizon, I love. My heart is just full of it, and it spills over into my thoughts, becoming a smile. There’s no particular cause or occasion, and I am amused and amazed at the strength of it. I love. I am capable of loving. I have enough to share, with plenty left for further sharing. It’s a nice place to be in life.

My smile falters a moment to recall other experiences, other times in my own life, other lives altogether – moments lacking in love. I breathe. I relax. This immense capacity to love is not so easily defeated. 🙂

I sip my coffee, contentedly, and still aware that there exists suffering elsewhere. Even aware that in some future moment, I too will suffer further. Perhaps even later tonight, when I return home to a swelteringly hot stuffy closed-up box of an apartment, unshaded, lacking in any feature specific to cooling, and an 87 degree day just beginning to cool down. lol It’s forecasted to be a hot summer day today. I am trying to cool the apartment down this morning, before I leave for work. The dawn begins to break, amber and orange hues, no hint of mauve, pink, or violet; even the sunrise looks just the sort one would expect on a hot day.

The wind shifts and a refreshing cool breeze blows in from the marsh. I am grateful for the brief chill that lifts the hairs on my arm for a moment.

The calendar suggested, yesterday, that I might hear from my Traveling Partner before the night ended. I didn’t though. I haven’t yet started to worry, and may not for some time. He did not prepare the calendar event, and my understanding of his calendar is not calibrated to other event hosts’ ways of planning. (Was the end time in the calendar the end of the event, the end of the journey, the end of the time away… some other ending… and why aren’t there any notes? lol) We had discussed, in March, what the season would look like, and how little time we’d share through the summer months. So. Nothing to worry about, really, unless I make shit up in my head over which to become overwrought. I think I’ll pass.

I sip my coffee and listen to birdsong, peeping frogs, and the distant sound of commuter traffic. My turn soon enough. I add a contented sigh to the symphony of the dawn.

The best moment to begin again? This one. Now.

Changes of plan are just a thing. As much as I enjoy the safe comfort of planning my day, my week, some moment, or even life – plans are only plans. The map is not the world. The journey is independent of the destination (which oddly seems to remain true even from the perspective that the journey is the destination…).

My plan, this weekend, was first to see some acreage Friday. It went pending and changed my plans. There is more to see, and I could drive out to see it today. The drive would be lovely regardless. I’d settled on getting the windshield of the car repaired or replaced on Friday and made time for that, but it turned out there was no available appointment time on that day, and that’s now scheduled for next Friday. Okay, no problem…but I was also going to get the car detailed, after the windshield was replaced, and it’s pointless to do so with that crack in the windshield…so… no. Next week. Okay… well… it was a lovely day, yesterday, and friends and I made the decision, rather spontaneously, to drive out to the coast together, today. I woke in pain, couldn’t make myself really wake up very well, and drifted in and out of sleep a long while until something like sleeping in happened, which sort of through off the timing of the day, but beyond that, I woke in too much pain to spend a large part of the day in the car. Again, the plan for the weekend changes. I’m not even complaining, just observing how little effect on my reality my plans have had at all. lol

I sip my second coffee rather sleepily, and nibble on a breakfast salad of garden-fresh vegetables, wilted greens, and still-warm hard-boiled egg. I’m pretty sure I could go back to sleep this very moment, if it weren’t for the pain I’m in directing me rather firmly to get out of bed and move around some. At this point, I’ve given up planning anything at all with what little remains of the weekend. Maybe a hike? Unscripted, unplanned – really just a walk down the nearest trail for some comfortable distance, and then returning home? I may be up to that. 🙂 Or a nap. A nap later sounds lovely, too. No planning required, just a modest amount of attention to the quantity of coffee I drink. 🙂

Mornings, moments, plans, dreams… and another cup of coffee. A little later, perhaps I will begin again. 😀