28 April 2010 - Still feeling like crap

Tired, worn down, dizzy, out of it, in pain - just a few words and phrases to describe how I feel today.  I did make it in to work this morning, but am not having a fun go of things.  Sitting here is very uncomfortable and I'm having a tough time keeping my eyes open.  I slept decently last night, but feel like I got no rest at all.  To add to the tiredness, my achilles hasn't gotten any better and my back has resumed hurting.  This is after taking it completely easy all day yesterday.  I think my body just really, really needs more rest.  How to accomplish this, though?  I can't just not show up for work, especially since my manager is gone and my other co-worker is MIA and is due to quit in a couple of weeks.  Someone needs to be here to man the office.  I guess that's me.

I received a comment to yesterdays post that was honestly brutal - and completely true.  You can read it and my comment back to it below.  This has got me to thinking quite a bit this morning.  I know what I need to do, but I have no idea how to accomplish this.  I guess the first step is going to have to be cancelling all trips I have booked for the upcoming months and just stay at home to rest.  As this past weekend showed, I can't even go out for a walk without my body rebelling.  There is no way I'm going to get better if I keep treating my body like this.  I'll have to keep coming to work, of course, because I have no choice in the matter.  As much as it hurts to come in some days, I really have no recourse.  I can't work from home, I can't miss multiple days of work to heal up and I highly doubt that management will let me take any type of extended leave from the job.  That's just how American life is setup.  Go to work spending most of your life doing something you don't really enjoy, beat your body to hell so you can't even enjoy yourself when you finally retire, then die.

Sorry to be so morbid, but that's the type of mood I'm in today.

My biggest concern about getting myself healthy is how selfish it seems to everyone else.  Sure, most of my friends and family have an idea of what I'm going through, but they truly don't fully comprehend my situation.  Even after barely being able to walk for four days, I still had to explain to my wife why I didn't want to go to the store after we got back from Vienna on Monday.  Making a trip to the store is something that may seem very simple to most people but something I couldn't do that day and it disappointed her.  What am I supposed to do in that situation?  How is she going to feel when I tell her I can't do other things, things that make living in Europe attractive?  I can't travel.  I can't go for walks or hikes.  I can't even go mosey around some of the nearby cities to explore.  All of those things leave me in agony.  How long is this going to last?  How long will it take for my body to get better?  Will I ever be able to resume life as I once knew it?  How do I get people to better understand what I'm going through?

On a bit of a lighter note, here's something I've been working on over the past couple of months.  Who knows if I can ever do something like this for a living, but I'm doing what I can in my spare time to see if it pans out, even a little bit:  Taku Photography and Posters   Pass the link on to your friends or anyone you know!  I love doing this type of thing and would love to do it for a career some day!  It's rough right now.  Finding enough spare time to devote to this project isn't always easy.  That's what I need -  time.  Time, time, time.  Time to devote to giving writing a more serious whirl.  Time to market my photography and art.  Time to figure out how to take all of the skills that I have doing this stuff and turn them in to a career.  Maybe some day this will all pan out.  Sooner would be much more beneficial for my body than later!