Beary

Beary, at the top. The boy's bedtime friend. Won't sleep without beary and tucks him in before he goes to nursery. The image is an indication of my lack of outside activity this week. Not been out much at all. Its not being lazy. More to do with tiredness and overdoing it. I could have done with my own little beary to help me sleep. No matter how late I'm never tired enough yet too tired when I wake. This is where I think the time anxiety comes from. Anxiety over the time on the clock and how long is left in the day. In fact that could be the root of by daily general anxiety as unlike most who after waking at some point feel refreshed and tire as the days goes on I start very tired and wake up from tea time to late evening. Come midnight I am at my most awake. I think when the time comes for work I'll have to go for a night shift. Its like jet lag. I think my body clock works in the wrong time zone.

At the start of the week I pulled something in my shoulder which came with its usual good timing. When I got up it was a bit painful but more uncomfortable. My wife had decided it was time to swap bedrooms. Rightfully she is worried about the kids and the damp in their room so wanted them swapped over. I said to leave it a day as my shoulder was a problem. As usual she said she'd do it herself then. So discomfort with a guilt trip versus more uncomfortable and anxious. Well I ended up with both.

I told her if she was determined to go ahead with it then she'd have to realise it would take more than a day to do. So if she was determine to go ahead the best thing to do would be move everything but the bed. That way we'd all be assured of a bed that night and the following day the two of us could dismantle, move and re-assemble the beds together. She didn't reply. Ten minutes later she was in the hall pulling a mattress from the bedroom. Twenty minutes after that when I went through she has started dismantling the bed. So I was roped in. So determined was she to see the delight of the kids at having a new room to sleep in she went ahead doing it her own way. By the end of the day I was knackered and that night as I predicted we all slept on mattresses. There was no big show for the girls. The day after it was all done.

It was good to get some activity. It did have a knock on affect with my walks. But it was probably better exercise that I needed. The second day was easier than the first which is how it should be. I was sorest two days after. I get frustrated though. I expect to be able to do things I could do before. This is an aspect of my problems which could be anxiety or might not be and how it all started with tiring very easily. To be honest most of the problems I had with the beds were not to do with lifting or anything requiring strength but from bending for long spells and stretching. What I need to remember that although age isn't a big factor it is a factor. I am 40 now not 20. My body is going to react differently. But the biggest factor is how inactive I am so obviously any activity is going to be more difficult than it is for someone active.

But it is linked to anxiety. Its an anxiety cycle of sorts. And as I said its how its started. Activity leads to getting tired quick and out of breath and shaky. Feeling that way makes me anxious. Because it gets me anxious I tend to avoid it if I can. Activity then becomes harder and gets me in that state quicker and makes me more willing to avoid any more. And so on.

I see how in the past this came to be. I was going to the doctors because I was get tired so quickly. I was noticing it a lot more. I got tests and no problems were found. Then the anxiety. I think the anxiety wasn't just the tiredness and lack of energy but more from the fact not only did I not know what was happening to me but the doctors couldn't find anything physically wrong with me either. They were only too pleased I suppose when I stopped going because it was proving futile.

And so it continues. The only way to break the cycle is by getting more active- on my own terms. Not a long period of inactivity then a short burst of activity that proves to much for me and just re-enforces my desire for avoidance. Acceptance that at the moment I'm not as capable as I used to be. Build it up slowly.

Rejuvenation

Working in IT wasn't my most enjoyable experience. To begin with it was daunting because I hadn't a clue and towards the end it was tediously repetitive. For example one week I had to install a bit of software on 50 PCs which equated to identifying a person, phoning a person, locating a person,  visiting the person within the vast building, inserting a CD, pressing a few buttons and waiting. Times fifty.

But it was a good time because there were so many other benefits and not least of these was the money as I was making. No less than four figures every week which was a massive jump for someone used to earning much less in a month. It was also the point I left my home town and had my own place for the first time. I was single and enjoying it. The staff had changed around about me too. To begin with I was surrounded by older married types and over the course of a few years I found myself amid more and more people around my own age yet to marry. From living the life of a virtual hermit in a foreign town it was fast becoming my new home and I was out socialising nearly every night of the week and weekend. Good times.

At some point some bright spark decided it would be good to start playing five aside football once a week against other departments. This to me was great news. I played football from under ten level up to under fifteen until the local district leagues dissolved leaving us all footballless. I played for the schools right up until second year when the football was knocked on the head by teachers' strikes. I played all my life but at this time had not done so for about 5 years. So I was first in the queue to put my name down. For weeks until the first match was arranged I was telling anyone who would listen how good I was.

The day came for the first match and it was like riding a bike. Back in the saddle in no time. Or so I thought. At least that was how it played out in my head. My body for some reason didn't seem to work the way it always had done. This was bewildering. My body was failing me.

As I ran about for those first few minutes my legs started to feel like jelly. When I stopped moving they started to shake. As I started to run again they were stiff and like lead all in a matter of minutes. As I jogged about slowly coated in sweat and a little breathless it suddenly dawned on me that I hadn't actually ran or jogged for a number of years. It never occurred to me as I never thought my body would ever react any differently from the way it always did. But as someone ran past me with the ball I started to chase. Then like someone who had just spun themself around 100 times before chasing I started to stumble and fell flat on my face as my legs gave way. It was the strangest feeling. Never before had I run and my legs given way. For a moment I just lay there not believing what had just happened.

A few minutes later after finally accepting I could not go on I lay outside the hall on the floor having let someone else take my place. I was flat out on my back soaked in sweat taking short sharp deep breaths. My heart was bursting through my chest going at a hundred miles an hour. My vision was all distorted with the bright lights shining down at me from the ceiling. The funny thing is typing this now it sounds alot like a panic attack but only in symptoms alone. I was perfectly fine and knew I just had to give myself a bit of time to get my breath back. And eventually I did. My body would hurt all over for the next few days but it was a good pain I remembered well from the years of football training and when I did Karate.

The following week we played our second game and to my amazement it was completely different. It was all back to the way I remembered it being. My body did what my mind wanted. Instead of bowing out after 5 minutes I played the whole hour without hardly breaking sweat. And every week after that I was fine. It appeared it was just that initial shock to the system of an out of condition body which didn't take long to get into its stride again.

I relate this to how I am now and my abstinence from exercise. Many times I have tried to exercise at home (press ups, sit ups, jogging on the spot, stretches, etc.) and found it hard. But remembering the time I just described I have pushed on regardless of the symptoms in the hope that the next time will be easier. That though has never happened. Each time I try again it is just as hard or harder. Never does there seem to be any progress. And it is the same with my walks. These never seem to get any easier, physically, either which bemuses me. It is the main reason for not going further.

Nowadays I am waiting to be rejuvenated like I was before by my actions but it never comes and so I still wait. Of course this leads me to question why this is so. Is there something physically wrong or is it because the symptoms of anxiety/panic are so close that it is hard to tell them apart? For now I don't know.