'M.E. myself and I' by Anna Redshaw

Every now and then, after a particularly exhausting time, I will rest and rest and rest, and be that little bit more sensible, and I will wait and wait and wait, for the day I wake up and don’t feel quite so wiped out anymore. Because I’ve rested so well and allowed myself to recover. A* patient. 5/5. Gold star for me.

But then that wiser little voice in my head will remind me that THIS level of wiped out, the one I’ve reached after careful rest and sensibleness, is actually as good as it gets. This level of recovery that I reach each time after socialising or exertion or harder times is as good as it gets. This is my normal; this heartbreakingly overwhelming fatigue, and exhaustion, and pain in my joints and bones, and lack of concentration, and bleary-eyed-ness and sore headed-ness. This my normal.

So I stop waiting patiently and I feel, then shake off, the disappointment that this really is as good as it still gets, and I try to go about my little life at this lower than I’d like level of ‘wellness’.

But sometimes, like today, I can’t help but feel this level is just not enough.

(PSA. Don’t “At least…” me 😆 Let me be.)