Friday, thank goodness its here! I only get to enjoy typical Fridays every other week so I am grateful that the week is almost over. I realized that I have been going pretty much nonstop since before Christmas. I’m actually impressed I managed to get through most of February still going that hard. Now though it is time to pay the piper. My body has decided to rebel. There is a mutiny over my treatment of myself. Basically I’m having a major Fibromyalgia flare up. My face looks like a 13 year old with bad hygiene, despite using extra strength facewash daily! My joints sound super annoying, creaking with every movement. I even had to start using my cane again. The last bit is emotionally difficult. In college I accepted it more as part of how I needed to function. Now I struggle with the thought that I look weak, that maybe I’m not as strong as a woman my age should be. I have had up and down swings like crazy through this whole time frame. It’s exhausting. A lot of my symptoms are a result of poor sleep I know. Unfortunately between life and work that hasn’t been a priority for a while. I feel like I am approaching a burn out. I know I need rest and a break. Hopefully with the new set up in my room I can obtain that rest. I want my room to be like a charging station. I want it to be a place I can go in close the door and just rebalance. I love my job so I have no intentions of calling out unless I absolutely need to do so. This is the first time in my life I have really cared about being present every day. Part of it may be that I work from home so I don’t have to stress about how I look or even how I feel physically. The biggest thing for me is I know with my job I am making a difference in someone’s life. Communication is a core part of life. The ability to talk to anyone you need to is incredibly important for emotional and physical well-being. Given that the body can often reflect the mind so taking care of 1 also involves taking care of the other. So I push myself. I set myself aside and think about the people I serve in my job. My therapist says I need to do that less, setting myself aside and focusing on others. I don’t exactly know how honestly. It feels so natural to think of others before myself. I hardly notice I am doing it unless I get called out on it. That behavior is unfortunately what has led me to this point, a point of breakouts and burnouts. Like I said the body can often reflect the mind so my face being broken out to this degree tells me I need to relax. The exhaustion and all the other symptoms I’m having are screaming at me to slow down, warning of the approaching burnout. I need to listen. Listening to my body isn’t easy. It is a constant balance between pushing myself and tempering myself. I know I need to do this though.