Slow Recovery – The Climb #579

Wednesday 23^rd September 2020

Since coming down with a cold over a week ago, I’ve had zero energy. And I mean zero. I’ve been going to bed at 5 in the afternoon, and just don’t have spoons to concentrate on anything. I suspect that a combination of the pandemic, general life stresses and burngeddon have left me feeling run down. And whilst I’ve managed low spoon activities like playing games, there’s part of me that wants to energy to get on with other things.

In many ways (trying to find a positive spin for it), it couldn’t come at a better time. I’m waiting back on a few things and as such, I have no active project anyone is waiting on. I want to start a rewrite, but this one is for me rather than anyone and as such, even if that book ultimately ends up going nowhere, it’s all writing practise. If ever I needed a time to recharge, now would be it.

But still, I don’t like sitting still. My coping mechanism for Lockdown has been to keep busy, and I just don’t have the energy to feel busy this past week.

But I feel like I’m finally feeling less mentally drained. I’ve started doing some small admin tasks – the sort that aren’t urgent but need to be done at some point. It wasn’t a lot but for a couple of hours I was able to concentrate and focus.

I’m hoping this is a sign I’m coming out the other side of this illness. I’m not usually ill for this long which is usually a sign my immune system is currently downgraded – a sign I’m a bit run down. And no, as I remind myself every couple of hours, I have none of the symptoms of Covid.

I’m wanting to tackle this rewrite, but I need a lot of focus and concentration at the start, and since I’m not under any deadline, it makes sense to delay that start until I feel better. This is just common sense rather than procrastination. If I was doing other productive tasks and not the rewrite, I’d attribute it to the latter.

The positive signs are that even though I’m not quite there yet to tackle it, it’s feeling closer. Also, given how much I’ve been flitting between projects during lockdown, the fact I’m still focused on this as the next project is a good sign. I just hope it can be as quick a rewrite as the last one I did.

Although, as I remind myself: it’s not a race, Adrian