Anyone else feeling completely exhausted this week? What's making you so tired?
2023 has been one of our busiest years in a decade for me and my partner. We moved house, experienced big career changes, and tackled responsibilities that kept rolling in. The pent up energy from COVID years helped us get through it, and I'm proud of how much we've gotten done this year.
Now suddenly I feel like we're so tired, especially this week, after Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving was super low key, we had a video chat with family because some nieces and nephews were sick with flu, so we're not tired from celebrating, it must be something else. It could be the shorter days, like two or three hours less sunlight than a month ago.
We've even gotten emotional and bickered over random petty things, which we usually don't, and I think that boils down to the tiredness too.
Speaking of the flu, there are people getting sick around us at work and the neighborhood, so I'll bet our immune systems are working hard and making us tired too.
What about you all? What's making you tired? What have you had to give up on because you don't have the energy to deal with it?
Man, I don't even know if I should be blubbering over this but it's been a damn hard week so if you're asking, I guess I'm telling. To set the stage, my wife is currently working through breast cancer treatment. Her treatments are in a city 3 hours away and the constant doctor visits, chemo, surgeries, travel, lodging, food, etc is getting harder and harder to bear.
Now, don't get me wrong, I would do this 1000 times over if it meant she got the best treatment we could manage. Still, I'm the sole breadwinner and though my income is good, it isn't enough to float all the extra costs. Not only that but we have 2 young daughters (5 and 6) and the constant back and forth to school and occupational therapy and speech therapy while trying to work and keep an eye on my recovering wife so she doesn't over extend is rough. She feels bad that she is "useless" but the surgery is delicate and requires her to take it easy, which is not particularly easy for her.
I am blessed with a great boss who knows my work schedule is going to be all wonky for a while, but he knows what we are going through and he isn't interested in adding to our plate by being an ass about being on time.
Today for example went like this:
Woke up at 5am, breakfast made, kids dressed, out the door by 6:30 for an early doc appointment for one of the kids
Get oldest to school just in time
Run over to the tire shop to get a nail removed and patched
Run over to the pharmacy to pick up prescriptions
Run to the store to pick up curbside grocery order
Run home to make oldest kid's lunch with the grocery order I just picked up because I ran out of time the day before
Run back to the school to drop her food off
Bring the youngest to speech therapy
Get to work finally around 11 (I generally start at 8)
Leave at 2:30 to pick up oldest from school
Back to work till 5
Make dinner, eat, get the girls washed up, books read, in bed
Back to work till ~11pm
Luckily not all my days look like that but there are a lot that do. I'm just so mentally strung out I can't think straight. And after all this I still can't even pay my bills without dipping into my nearly completely spent savings account. I have been torn down in a way that I thought I was prepared for but it laughed in my face.
But, after all the bitching, I have to re-focus and realize that I have to keep going for my family. They need me and I have to grit and keep going. All this will be over eventually and the money stress will lessen (or maybe it won't) and we will find normal again some day. For now, we just keep putting one foot in front of the other. I have always been a fairly depressed person and I often think of how nice it would be if I just didn't exist anymore, how quiet and dark and peaceful it must be. Don't confuse that for "calling for help" or wanting to harm myself because that is not the case. I will not burden my family with such an act. I'm just saying that I have yearned for cool, dark, peaceful quiet for a long time. Like a still, clear January night on a hill looking out into the stars, just doing no thinking or worrying, just floating. I crave it. It will come in time, I just have to keep moving forward.
"The only way out is through."
I'm so glad you chose to share your situation, it's such a sobering story and I feel for you, seriously. I know my situation is nothing compared to yours, but know that people are here to listen in case you need to vent anytime. Your family are so lucky to have you, and I'm glad you recognize that and channel that as motivation to keep going. It's like a beautiful light you carry inside you.
Thank you, that really means a lot. I am often unnecessarily very hard on myself so it is nice to hear an outside take.
I'm so sorry for what you're going through. Having been in a very similar situation that you are in I can completely empathize.
It's so unfair that our modern society places such a burden on not only one family but now on a single person as well. The schedule you posted is enough to make my eye twitch with how exhausting it must be but you are strong to burden yourself with this for your family.
We need to fight back against this culture of silent suffering and extreme independence, it takes a village after all. Are there friends or family that you can call on to help form a new a kind of community where they can help you lighten the load, even a little?
I appreciate your kind words and I appreciate your experiences - it is sometimes hard to convey the strife we go through with people who have not had similar experiences. I am especially aware of this regarding back issues and specifically nerve pain, but that's another topic :)
We both have family somewhat nearby who have helped us with scheduling and logistics and we are incredibly grateful for that. It would be much harder without them. There have been times where I could not go with her to treatment and so her mom or aunt would bring her instead of me, and I would stay here and take care of the kids and house and work. Other times we wouldn't be able to pick up our daughter from school due to being out of town for too long, so we would have someone pick her up and babysit until we returned. Without this support, I'm not sure what we would have done in some scenarios we found ourselves in the past.
In terms of funding, my dad did set up a fundraiser at one point that was very helpful (though I was very against it at the time because I felt I didn't deserve the money and there were others that were in worse situations that could have used it instead) and as wonderful as that was, around the same time our air conditioning went out (summer in southern US) and that drained every bit of that plus more, around $10k. It had been running on duct tape and faith for a long time and of course it decided to give up the ghost at our most vulnerable. When it rains, it pours :) My personal condition for allowing the fundraiser to exist in the first place was that when we were able to do so, we would pay all of it forward, either through another fundraiser or some kind of research fund etc. It may take me years to do it, but this money is not mine and I will not keep it. At best, it is an interest-free loan, completely transient to me and my bank account.
Other than that, we have mostly been on our own, save for some times where they would refuse gas money or food when they accompanied my wife to her appointments. Our families are not well off, and they want to do more but I find it completely unreasonable to burden them with this when they have their own problems and life goals. They disagree, but my number one goal in life is to not burden other people, even if only temporarily. In my mind, if I have time to sit down at the end of the day and play a game or watch a show, I should have no right to ask for others to pitch in. I know most people would disagree because people need unwind time which I fully agree with, but I can unwind later, and some days are easier than others so it's not so bad as I made it out to be. We will be ok :)
I understand the feeling of wanting to never be a burden, and furiously holding onto independence. I’m much the same.
But you don’t deserve to go through this alone, and your friends and family who want to help don’t deserve to be sidelined because you’re (barely) able to “cope”
It’s one thing to ask people to help out of the blue, but turning down help when it’s offered is (at least to my mind) just a different version of selfishness in a twisted way.
Please, for the sake of your friends and family, for the sake of your kids, and for the sake of yourself — let go of this fierce independence, even just for a while. Accept help when it’s offered, and if you tell yourself you only accept it on the condition that you’ll pay it forward later, that’s totally fine! But you should accept it!
I have been thinking about this post for a bit (read it shortly after you posted). I know you're right, I feel it when someone offers help. I think it's mostly to do with my upbringing.
This is going to sound stupid, but I'm the type of person where if I need to make a left hand turn across an intersection and someone pulls up behind me, I will turn right instead and just make the block. To me, it's so stressful considering there's someone who is being held up by me, even if I know it's just a traffic pattern and 99.9% of people don't even think about it, they just sit there and wait their turn. I still can't stomach it. it makes me nervous and really uncomfortable.
In the same vein, I feel physically uncomfortable accepting anything that I didn't pay for or work for. I don't like receiving gifts, compliments, praise, etc. obviously this is a character flaw that I have been working on but it's been a lifelong thing for me.
Regardless, last night my coworker asked if we needed anything and I said we were doing ok, he said "what about the kids? Is Christmas covered? I don't have any kids to buy for anymore, they're all grown!"
I would normally say "yeah we buy sales throughout the year so we are pretty much set" but in the moment I told him they were well stocked but I'm certain they wouldn't complain for one more gift under the tree. If it makes you happy, then I can't say no, can I?
They were elated, and I felt ok about it afterwards. I didn't feel like I was reaching my hands out. In the moments after the conversation, I thought about your comment and I think it had something to do with me saying yes to them.
So basically this is a long way of saying thanks for putting your perspective into your comment, it did resonate and I will try to get better about my anxiety around this type of stuff.
Before anything else, thank you for sharing. I can’t imagine how much effort goes into executing your various obligations much less emotionally processing them. I wish you and your family the best.
I would like to ask a question though, in part because of the comment you replied to and in part because of your response to it.
When you see someone in your life - a friend, a coworker, a family member - who could use some help - a few bucks, help painting or doing some other job, pet sitting, someone to listen - do you find joy, fulfillment, or some other positive emotion when you’re able to help them?
As far as helping with stuff like yard work or building a shed etc, I enjoy that very much. It's more complicated for gift giving. I'm terrible with figuring out what to buy or make someone. I'm very analytical and it makes it difficult to be satisfied with an idea because I always seem to find some hiccup with it.
For example, we have secret Santa at work and the guy I drew likes coffee and dogs and some other generic things. My wife was like well that's easy, get him some nice coffee and maybe some of his favorite candy or something. I shot that down because for one, I'm not a coffee person so I don't know what is good and what isn't, but I also don't know their preferences, there are way too many variables to pick a random coffee grind and hope they like it. She looks at me like I'm an alien, cause that was like a slam dunk to her but a complete miss in my mind. (I'm still trying to come up with ideas, the party is in 2 days...uh oh...)
But to answer your question, yes - generally speaking I always find joy in helping (like doing dishes for someone after a house party or stuff like that) and mostly with giving (if they are explicit in what they need/want)
I realize that should be an easy gap to bridge - if I enjoy helping out my friends and family, it only makes sense that they would also feel good in doing the same for me. I can't really explain but it feels like I'm in debt to them after that and I really don't like that.
If I let my wife read this thread she'd laugh and go "I told you so!" Yes dear, you did :)
Edit: I would also say (this is just generally speaking on reaching out to help) an overwhelming majority of people who ask if we need anything don't really know what they're offering and I don't feel it's my place to accept and delegate tasks to those people, it's just a weird place to be put in, hank green recently talked about this and I do think more specific offerings are more likely to be accepted by me, because it feels much less like I'm asking them to do something for me...if that makes sense.
Glad you picked up what I was putting down. Let me second what you’ve already told yourself, it doesn’t make you weak to accept generosity it makes you kind.
And, she probably did tell you so. I’m still learning to listen consistently to the great advice my wife gives me, so no judgement there…
That sounds incredibly hard, Im so sorry. Im sure you’ve already explored this, but do you have any family you could call on for help?
I replied to another comment here that kind of explains: https://tildes.net/~talk/1cif/anyone_else_feeling_completely_exhausted_this_week_whats_making_you_so_tired#comment-bcn4
I just didn't want you to think I was ignoring you :) Thank you for your concern
I blame having completed the NaNoWriMo challenge.
More seriously, though, I always get a low-energy mood around December. For me, it is a period where I slow down, and all I want to do is drink tea, go around the city enjoying the Christmas decorations, and spend more time with the family.
I think it is essential to follow the natural rhythm of the year. Winter is when Nature goes to rest, preparing for the following spring. And we humans are part of Nature, so...
I like this attitude of not trying to fight nature. Like a few people here commented, I think seasonal affective disorder is what a lot of us are going through. Those of us fortunate enough not to be burdened with "real" problems can try to take it easy, rest a lot more, so we don't become useless zombies, and try to save our energy to help others around us who could use a hand.
For me it's definitely the season and lack of sunlight. I'm living in a place with stark seasons for the first time in my life and this is my third, dark and cold, winter. I've noticed that in winter I just don't want to wake up at the normal time and that without an alarm I will absolutely sleep longer than in the summer.
Sleep research in Berlin shows that sleep patterns are seasonal and is probably why so many people are affected. I'm seriously considering just going to bed earlier now to hopefully balance out these demands. It sucks because my schedule is already loaded enough that I can't bear the thought of losing even more time but if it means feeling better and less bickering with my SO then it will be totally worth it
Have you considered vitamin D supplements? I live in Australia so we get plenty of light even in winter, and I never thought about it, until I worked a year of night shift — I just felt perpetually a little bit tired and lower energy reserves, until someone mentioned vitamin D is synthesised by your skin when you’re in sunlight. I was skeptical but oh boy, that first week of taking daily supplements was such a stark difference in daily energy levels and mood!!!
So your comment convinced me to try a Vitamin D3 supplement... I think it works!
It's only been two days so far, at 50 micrograms a day, but it feels like a noticeable improvement. I naturally woke up earlier than normal this morning, which was surprising because it wasn't particularly sunny or anything. It's also not like a giddy sensation or anything, just a stable and less-overwhelmed feel.
It's also not a perfect mood stabilizer, I can definitely still get frustrated and angry, but my baseline feels better, and I bounce back faster, I think. Fingers crossed, I'll keep taking them and hope it continues!
Sorry to reply so much later, but I’m testing early builds of Tildes apps which only recently added support for replies, so I’m catching up on the back log!
I’m glad to hear it’s helped, and what you describe is exactly what I experienced too — nothing earth-shattering, but definitely raising the baseline in a small but noticeable way.
Not suger coating it, feels like I'm in a nightmare and I've regressed to being forced out of bed.
In the last two weeks emergency dental work wiped out my Christmas kitty and a chunk of savings so the holidays are going to be a low budget affair.
But beyond that, just looking back at the year is depressing. I've worked nearly 300 days so far, met my friends twice, abandoned nearly every project and hobby, only vacations were two long weekends, multiple depressive episodes and panic attacks. Hell, I tried to retrain and get back into programming the other day but I just can't read or write anymore. Not just code or logic, I see words, try to comprehend it and just get completely exhausted.
So just thinking about where my life is just leaves me with so little energy to give a crap. All I can do is pour what little I have into my wife and kid but even that kills me because I know they deserve so much better.
So yeh, life's a shit show.
Is it the job? Job hunting is tough when you are already overworked but some jobs are shit shows.
Is it clinical depression?
You are suffering. I don't know what to say other than that I feel for you.
Appreciate the concern.
Don't want to go too much into it but it's a mix of a chronic hormone problem and family/work issues. COVID hit us pretty hard and I dropped my career to join the family business.
Its one of those monumentaly bad decisions thats becoming harder to rationalize and leading to some strong emotions. It also makes getting out of this situation a whole family drama.
Doing my best to power through. That little rant above was just coming off the back of a really bad few days.
It seemed like that I would finally find a place to start a career. But nope, company I applied to didn't seem to agree. After applying and applying over and over, while having a very solid education, it's difficult to not let it get to me.
And that gets exhausting after a while.
I'm in the same situation. The job market took a turn after the pandemic and it's incredibly difficult to find anything. We just have to hope it will get better.
All the things we read in the news about supply chain issues, healthcare labor and supply shortages and all, I'm too lucky to have been able to observe that mostly at arm's length, give or take a few close calls and scares with family members. I can't imagine what you're going through, living the ups and downs of the news I've been reading, having it directly affect your life from week to week. I'm sorry, that's terrible, what you're going through.
I’ve been having issues with sleep apnea since forever, so it would be nice to know what having energy feels like.
I have been on vacation over this past week, and it’s actually been fairly magical for me. I am notably more healthy than my last big trip about a year ago. But one thing it has made abundantly clear to me is how my health has been affected by the stress of work. My blood pressure has been high for the last month or so, with the diastolic measuring as high as the 80s. But pretty much all through my vacation it was around 60 or lower. I’ve got a few more days until I have to work so I’m trying to not let it bug me but I can’t help but worry about my health getting worse because of work again.
Here is an answer I got when I asked my parents about it many years ago: Turkey is a natural soporific
Did you have turkey for Thanksgiving? Followed by a few days of turkey sandwiches?
I'm not sure if they were right or just pulling my leg (never researched it), but it DOES seem to happen every Thanksgiving or whenever a full bird is served.
MythBusters did this one! They found that tryptophan can make you sleepy but there's not a high enough concentration in turkey to make a difference. The Thanksgiving sleepiness just comes from regular old overeating.
That's a good guess lol, but no turkeys were had this year, we decided on steaks this year. I know, blasphemy, right?
My contract ends on Dec 31 and although there’s a request in the system to extend me, almost all the recent requests have been rejected or stalled because of budget constraints. On top of that, there’s a surge of demand at work as everyone wants to tie off projects before everything slows down over Dec/Jan, plus I just signed a new lease and have a few weeks to move out, and I haven’t even started thinking about Xmas presents yet — it’s a lot all arriving at once, and I’ve been on that unsustainable not-yet-burning-out-but-any-day-now fake energy surplus for weeks.
This is the outline of what I wanted to reply with when I first saw this thread pop up a few days ago. Then yesterday my mum called, she fell for a scam and while the bank froze her account before too much damage was done, there was nobody else who could be tech support and un-malware her computer. She lives about two hours away, so the trip there, plus time to go through and do a completely clean install of her computer, plus the drive back, I’ve essentially lost an entire day that I would have liked to use packing for the move.
The silver lining is that literally all these surges and demands will have to be resolved and played out, for better or for worse, within three weeks. And then Xmas and Jan should be much more chill… depending on whether my contract is extended…
I've been hit with a pretty nasty sickness, so that's been keeping me down. Started last Thursday, and needed to take multiple sick days. It's only today that I'm feeling like I'm just about recovered.
Getting sick sucks.
Yeah I just had a bad cold last week - at times merely on the couch in the fetal position unable to even watch TV. But once I got myself some DayQuil things got better. You'll be through it soon enough!
Thanks for the recommendation. I have been taking cold medicine for the better part of last week (usually at least once per day) and whilst I feel fine after taking it, the headaches return once it wears off.
Fingers crossed!
I've been absolutely wiped. I think I've gotten good sleep but I've been overwhelmed with caretaking duties and worry /stress this week. And probably will be until the holidays. And maybe will be after. I don't know.
There's not really an "end" for this sort of thing.
Yeah. My three-month-old son is going through a particularly irritable phase.