Friday Fury

I long for the day that I will be "ready" for a day. My sister, my daughter, my brother-in-law, and I were scheduled to leave at Noon today. We are spending Easter weekend in Duluth, hoping to see my grandmother and my mother (who is in town to help care for her). Even though we had a plan, I wound up derailing it for a time. Everything was fine, but it bothered me that my inability to get things done, or to garner any energy, forced others to wait. The true "problem" began on Thursday.

Invariably, I ran myself ragged yesterday. I did enjoy my abbreviated massage, and the chiropractor helped. After that, though, I headed to the University of Minnesota. My wife and I had a fun (but dorky) date. We met at her office to attend Grand Rounds. Dr. Mike Osterholm was speaking about influenza pandemics. It was incredible, but going to that meant that other things did not get done. I did rest at home for a time, but then I had to get my daughter. After that, I tried to do some cleaning around the house. Things look worse now, but my wife seemed to think that it was progress. After working for an hour and a half, I had to head to my daughter's school for a three-hour meeting. I got home at 10:30 PM. Needless to say, I had no energy for any more cleaning, or for packing.

Then, when I woke up this morning, I spent an hour and a half getting work done for the previous night's meeting. I did do some additional organizing of computer files (and dumping of files to clean out my laptop), but I was not ready to leave until nearly 1 PM. Again, it was not a huge problem, but I feel such internal pressure in those situations. I abhor inconveniencing others. Fortunately, I held things together. We arrived in Duluth around 3:30 PM, which was actually perfect. I just hope that I can let myself relax over the next few days. I remain vulnerable to my internal messages about doing more and unachieving.

These are the narcolepsy moments that I truly dread. I am doing "fun" things, but the energy required for them also drains me. The balance of living with this condition is often maddening. I am grateful that my wife and daughter remain understanding. I need to keep working on giving myself more of a break when I am in the midst of energy struggles like I am having this week. The one other tough part, though, is that my wife is out of town from tomorrow until next Saturday. Thus, I will get home on Sunday with professional work that needs to be done, volunteer work that needs to be done, and housework that needs to be done. I will face all of that as a solo parent and as a run down person with narcolepsy. It will be fine, and I will get done what I can, how I can, but I need to remember that I am doing a decent job, even if things turn out mediocre at best. In the end, I need to remember to breathe, while I handle each thing one step at a time.