Pushing myself

Friday, Saturday and Sunday. 3 days in a row that I was out and about in the afternoon. I was feeling fine on each ocasion I had eaten before leaving the house. So I figured I was energized enough to get me through a couple of hours. But I hadn't. Each day, as I was out, it would suddenly hit me, as if out of nowhere, this awful emptiness along with tiredness. Like a smack in the face. Maybe it was the amount of people around me, maybe it was because I didn't have enough carbs or protein before leaving the house, I'm not too sure. But once I was back home, I couldn't do much. I needed to rest and all I wanted was to eat and eat.

I tried to pace myself, and I think I was. But it wasn't enought. Maybe I just can't do things that require physical exertion without eating for 2 hours. That can't be normal, surely? How can a person work and play, all day long, if they can't go for 2 or 3 hours without eating something. In my case, doesn't that mean that I can't do anything, without preparing myself foodwise? I can't do anything without planning ahead and thinking how long I'll be gone from home and what it is I'll be doing. Do I have to ask myself if I'll need extra calories to make it through the next hours and feel fine? Is this what life is going to be like? Or is it because my body isn't used to going without food for 3 hours and being active at the same time?

But if I've eaten, just before leaving the house then shouldn't that be enough? Apparently it's not. Not at the moment anyhow. My appetite is growing and growing, even after all these months. I thought I had reached my max. I didn't think it would be possible to need more food than I'm already eating. Surely that can't be healthy? Needing so much food..

Yesterday (Monday) it was the same. I was fairly busy, but I had to be because I needed to get things sorted. Me and Ma went to Diann, then did a little xmas shopping in Wexford. Then came back home, and I had to go to the doctor to get a heart scan done, then we stopped at few more shops to get some more shopping done.

I was feeling okay, until I got home and had finished my dinner. I started to feel so strange. So fragile and weak. I had to rest, I had to wind down. I went upstairs and started to feel sick. I thought I was going to vomit. But I didn't give in to that feeling. So I lay as still as I could in bed, and waited for the feeling to pass. Feeling so fragile made me so upset. I don't know why, because I had a good day.

I lay in bed for ages. That's where I needed to stay and I wasn't able to deal with noise and people around me. I started to think I was going crazy and I felt flutters in my chest, like I was running a marathon but I was lying still, staring at the curtains in my room. I then started talking to myself, like a crazy woman. Talking outloud, to coax myself into switching-off all the things that had happened today..talking to Diann, shopping, the doctors, more shopping.. So much. I really thought I was going mad. So I read a book and waited and waited to feel a little better. I would have happily stayed there all night, and would have slept right through until this morning. But I had to eat again, at around 9 or 10 o'clock. That's the only reason I forced myself to get out of bed even though I didn't want to. I felt so good, being alone and in bed. I was giving in maybe, but I didn't have the energy to do much else.

While I was being "busy" yesterday, it all felt okay. I didn't feel like I was overdoing it. I didn't feel distraught. I was fine. It wasn't until I stopped, that it hit me and I wasn't able to start again. It was different from the feeling I felt on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Maybe because yesterday I did more meant I needed more time for the warning signs to come through telling me I had overdone it.

But how am I supposed to know that I'm going to overdo it? It's not until I've done it and I feel that it was too much. I don't plan it. It just happens and on days like yesterday I don't realize it until it's too late. Will I constantly be pushing myself and overdoing it until I'm fighting fit again and able to function actively without needing food every 2 hours? Will I always need to "test the water" as to how much stronger I physically am? What's the best thing to do? Never overdo it and therefore never know where my boundaries are at the moment in time? Or overdo it regularly to feel that each time I can take on a little bit more?...

The past 4 days have shown me that pushing these physical boundaries can be good, if I pick up on the fact that I'm overdoing it, at the right moment, before it's too late. But when I'm thinking about other things and my mind is pre-occupied then I'm not always fully engaged with how I'm feeling. Nobody walks around the shops, constantly asking themselves: Am I walking too fast? Am I standing too long? Are there too many people around me?.. Nobody does that.. maybe only people who don't need to ask themselves this, because they are strong and energized. I'm not, even though I would love for nothing more. It's just how it is at the moment, and I might need to deliberate if I'm overdoing it or not.. constantly. And I figure that if I'm really overdoing it, then the feeling will be stronger and maybe even overbearing so I won't be able to ignore it, no matter how much I'm being distracted by the things going on around me.

It just frustrates me, because sometimes I think that I'm bringing it all on myself. The tiredness and the bad feelings. To the world, I do my thing and nobody ever knows if I'm tired or not. I would never say and I wouldn't always show what's going on with me. So when Ma, for instance, reads this she might think it's all an exaggeration and that I was doing good yesterday and Sunday.. So will she believe me when I say I'm fine? Will she believe me when she reads the words I write? Will Ma think that either the me who writes or the me who goes about daily things as if nothing's wrong, is lieing? I know Ma doesn't think this, but I have this awful habit of trying to think FOR her and I tell myself that what I feel towards myself is the same as what others also feel towards me.. this isn't the case.

I don't like to say that I'm not feeling well. I don't like to admit it. And that's just Anna playing up. Telling me I'm okay and that I can do anything, whether I have the energy and will power or not. Only occassionally I can say that it's too much. And I know it's up to me to say "stop". I can't rely on others to pick up on the fact that I'm acting as if all is well when really it's not.

I don't really know... All I know is that what I write here, isn't a lie. It isn't a front. It's nothing of the kind. It's real and I don't hold back because it's where nobody judges me, nobody makes remarks, nobody looks at me funny and nobody questions me. This blog can contain a lot of s*** to some of you and that's fine because I don't really mind what others think of what I write. The only thing I know for sure is that what it does contain, is the truth.