Day 346: What is going on with me?

It’s going to sound like depression. I realize that as we dive into today. I don’t normally do this, but I’m rewriting this intro because I know what it sounds like. It’s not that, this is something else and it worries me. I know depression, I’m good friends with depression, this is something different so don’t tell me it’s depression, it’s not I promise. It just happens to be worse than I can ever remember right as I’m dealing with the worst flare up [of whatever I have going on] in my entire life, so it couldn’t be a coincidence … could it?

Okay, on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being the most motivated I’ve ever been in my life, I’ve been at a rock solid -4 for the past week or so. It’s been bad, like get out of bed and want to get right back into bed bad. Like, maybe I should just skip a meal because I don’t feel like I have the energy to cook, much less eat bad. Like, do I really need to shower today, I haven’t done anything bad. Like what if I just didn’t move all day bad. If I didn’t know any better, I would say I’m severely depressed.

The only problem is I know what severe depression feels like. Been there, done that, got admitted to the hospital for it, and this isn’t that. This is something else, something weird that has always been lingering and I’ve complained about it to my doctors with no luck. They always brush it off as depression or sleep, or both. Now I’m wondering if it’s tied to this flare-up I’m having since both have never felt this bad before. It’s a feeling of pure exhaustion. Like I don’t have the strength to move. To be clear, it’s not a loss of strength, I’m good there, it just feels like I have no strength. I have to force myself to do things, like literally talk myself up to do something.

This didn’t get bad until my flare-up. I never even thought the two things could be related. I always assumed I just was a bad sleeper. Now my hands still feel super stiff and are still pretty bad looking. I would post a picture, but it doesn’t show up so well in photos. Or maybe I’m just bad at taking them. In any case, things are still bad.

Bottom line, I feel drained. Like I haven’t slept in weeks or like I just ran a marathon. The worst part is this feeling has always been nagging at me and I always push it aside. I too have blamed it on sleep or my mood. Nothing I do seems to help fix it, but just like my flare-up, this feeling, whatever we want to call it, has never been this bad. Typically when I feel it a large quantity of caffeine helps me push it aside enough to focus on what I need to do. Now I’m struggling to stay awake while I’ve taken in enough caffeine to keep a person awake for a week. It’s bad, really bad.

Maybe they are related, maybe they are not. I wish I had the answer. It seems like one hell of a coincidence that this would happen at the same time, but coincidences do happen. I’m not holding out for answers, I don’t think the VA will give them to me. As usual, I’m thankful for the fact that I have healthcare, I just wish the people caring for me gave a shit. They have claimed it was depression or sleep issues for years now, but I’m not depressed, I should know I live in my head thanks and my sleep has been constant. The only new thing going on with me is this flare-up.

In the meantime, breathing feels like work. That seems like a reasonable thing, right? Maybe I’ll just do that for the rest of the day and call it good.