Just a couple of months before Covid hit last year, I hit a low that I hadn’t visited since summer 2015. I was suicidal, disassociating, essentially splitting myself into a different person at home vs at work. I was plagued with random, excruciating, rib pain that none of the doctors could adequately explain. First, I couldn’t sleep at night, after my late work shift, only during the day, then I had to quit my job, and even though I slept at night, I still couldn’t stay awake during the day. I was sleeping anywhere from 12-18+ hours a day, usually closer to 18. I had no energy at all for months.
Summer hit, and I knew I was going to be homeschooling in the fall, and I tried my hardest to get turned around. I actually got off to a strong start, though I still slept more than I should have needed to, but the kids were learning, and that was the most important thing to me. I even got into an Intensive Outpatient Program for Dialectical Behavioral Therapy, which made a significant difference in my mental and emotional health. However, due to the Covid shutdown, there was no accountability, nowhere to go, no one to see that I was slipping again, except my husband who was so afraid to trigger me back into the deep depression that he didn’t feel he could hold me accountable. Once again, the fatigue took over, and I began sleeping more and more. The strangest part was that I didn’t *feel* depressed. I wasn’t self-harming, anymore, and my outlook was brighter than it had been in a while. I didn’t (and still don’t) understand why I was constantly so exhausted that I felt like I couldn’t function.
Just before the beginning of this summer, I realized that I was literally sleeping my life away. Worse than that, I was sleeping my kids’ childhoods away! 😭 I knew I had to regain control, one way or another, but felt so helpless to do so. I decided to start “small”, and signed my kids up for everything I could afford to through the summer. 2 weeks of morning swim lessons, and 6 different VBS-type, multi-day, church events. If nothing else, I knew that the kids needed to get out of the house and away from electronics as much as possible, and having somewhere to take them made me get up, get dressed, get THEM dressed, and stay aware of the time, to go pick them up, again. We also did play dates at parks, and an occasional day of swimming, between activities. It was through all this that I discovered that the fatigue and sleepiness that I’d been fighting weren’t likely to be caused by narcolepsy, as my psychiatrist had suggested I look into.
I’ve come a long way. I’m now cooking dinner most days (instead of relying on everyone’s microwave skills) and the we all (usually) have clean clothes on when we leave the house. I don’t feel depressed, which is honestly a weird feeling to me, now. I’m trying to change our diet, and just enrolled in a 2-days/week martial arts class with my kids. We’re in a homeschooling co-op for this year. Things are looking up:
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