Well only a few days to go before the big day, we seem to have been in the run up for months. I am not sure how I am keeping going as there seems to be one problem after another on top of Christmas preparations and school holidays and normal routine. I am not sleeping despite being exhausted as my body is flooded with adrenaline and cannot relax.
So many people seem to be struggling and finding it difficult to get into the Christmas spirit, whilst the kids are hyper and singing Christmas songs dawn till dusk!
The weather is weird, not very festive at all, but some newspapers are still saying we will have a white Christmas!
It is difficult to know what to do at this time of year it is so exhausting and the demands are huge and there is so much conflict about what to do, what you can manage, what you should miss out on and then there are always unexpected things that crop up, in my case; toothache, a very sick cat, things falling down or falling apart, Emily wanting to do cooking, crafting etc.
I never know what I should try to do and what is not worth the effort and probably spend far too much energy on this debate. I don't want to miss out on seeing people and seeing Emily enjoy Christmas, but I know I will feel awful. The alternative is to be stuck on my own still feeling awful and wondering what I am missing. To be honest most people won't really notice if you are there or not as long as you don't miss a major event like Christmas dinner. I usually end up doing a mixture of being there and not being there and still always do too much. Other people carry on with whatever they are doing with or without you.
The lists symptoms starts to feel a bit like 12 days of Christmas;
On the first day of Christmas my ME gave to me Chronic Exhaustion,
On the second day of Christmas my ME gave to me, aches and pains and chronic exhaustion
On the third day of Christmas my ME gave to me brainfog, aches and pains and chronic exhaustion
On the fourth day of Christmas my ME gave to me dizziness, brainfog, aches and pains and chronic exhaustion
and so on until you get to the 12th day where you feel like you got trampled by 12 reindeer and never want to see Christmas ever again!
Also at this time of year I start thinking about what I want to achieve next year and how it will be better than this year, more pressure, more things to do and in the end I am disappointed as I never fulfil what I wanted to, I miss out on things, I push myself way beyond my limits, I send all the time feeling awful and another year passes and not much changes except we are all another year older, I'd like to say wiser, but don't think that is the case.
Well I had better finish now and wish everyone a Merry Christmas whatever you choose to do and hope that 2016 is a better year for everyone and remember
Hang in there!