Sunday 22 February 2015

Laziness or disability, or a bit of both

I've had my laziest Sunday in ages.

My plan had been to go for a good distance run - 15 to 30 km - but a month or so of poor sleep culminating in the last few night of barely any sleep at all put the kibosh on that plan. Walking once around the park with the dog was about all I could manage. After breakfast I dragged myself to the supermarket then I've been on the sofa, reading when I had the mental energy to concentrate or watching videos when not. Well, putting videos on and letting them run.

I sometimes feel that it's hyperbolic to call my sleeping problems, my sporadic insomnia, a disability, but never when going through a bad patch. People who haven't experienced it just don't seem to get it. so you're tired? Well, I guess having a sprained ankle and a broken rib are both just pain, but it's a matter of degrees.

This patch as been a weird one, weeks of poor sleep interspersed with patches of very little at all. It almost makes me think of days of a complete lack with fondness, but only almost. Three, four, five days with literally not a wink of sleep is pure hell. By the third day your senses begin to warp reality and by the fourth you're hallucinating - although luckily I've rarely been far gone enough to not know that I'm hallucinating. Even at the less extreme levels everything is just harder. As well as having trouble exercising - when putting one foot in front of the other is almost too much effort how can I run? - my body interprets my low energy levels by making me constantly hungry and, obviously, tiredness makes self control on this front much more difficult. But it's the lack of mental energy that is the worst. Holding a conversation, concentrating on anything, being confident that I'm not making stupid mistakes.

So, I worked yesterday and had today off. I've been drinking steadily for the last few hours, hopefully to knock myself out. OK, it may not be the best quality of sleep, but it will be sleep (although that is not guaranteed; the sleeping tablets I've managed to beg from my GP do nothing, exhaustion and tiredness have no bearing on how I sleep, alcohol is no assurance of sleep. But I am so very tired.

Sunday 8 February 2015

In January I've run just over 260 km. This astonishes me. I first started running about three years ago in the gym in an attempt to get some measure of fitness back. On deciding I quite enjoyed the treadmill I thought I'd give proper running a go - and found it much harder. A km left me knackered, but before too long I was doing a few k once or twice a week. I set myself the goal of running three time a week, then four. I ran my first 10K, the Age UK Wrap Up and Run, in March 2013 and my first Half Marathon a year later. It isn’t too long since I couldn't imagine being able to run on two consecutive days but in the last month I've run to work and back and then run in the evening. I’ve signed up for the Yorkshire Marathon this year. Goals that I wouldn't even have considered aiming for are behind me without me even realising it. Somehow, I've become a runner.