Hello everyone,
Probably a short one today again because I’m feeling struggles both within and without … What’s behind the door ?
There we go, stormtrooper today.
Why the struggles ? It does feel like it’s coming from all sides at the moment, with work and family stuff that will definitely not be going here.
It’s definitely coming from within, because I’ve been feeling that I’m nearing the end of a very long and very frayed rope. I think the big part of it is psychological, because I’m finding it very hard to find joy in things. Perhaps that’s a sign of a depression creeping in there ? Maybe.
What I have been finding cheering me up is how people were finding things like the Dwagon on Tour pictures. It was really lovely seeing the various interactions popping up with those with people giving the hearts, the likes, the occasional omgs and general seeing that other people were really enjoying seeing what I’d been posting. Kinda makes you want to disappear out of the world again for a little while and go some place to let me send out more Dwagon on Tour pictures.
Hopefully at some point next year, I’ve run the annual leave down to about the minimum I can carry over. That refreshes at the end of April, so it needs to cover Xmas, Easter and I’ll need to disappear from work for a week around Feb as well due to …
I’ve been in burn out for a very long time now. The first symptoms really kicked in around covid times, with things like the sketching just ending. I haven’t sketched in years now, although a couple of emotes happened when idea plus can I do it combined at just the right time.
At the moment, it’s manifesting both mentally and physically. It doesn’t feel like my brain’s running on all of its cores at the moment, plus I’m even more absent minded than usual. Physically, I’m having increasingly sore hips, what feels like a void in my lower back and the injury I did to my right knee during the cruise hasn’t recovered yet. Add to that, the shoulder joining in and an elbow that’s making me shy away from losing myself in games like the Truck games.
And all that together means that while I look at the new games and think I’d maybe enjoy playing them, I’m not at a spot where I want to learn those games.
It’s not at a point where I would consider myself physically disabled, plus I was able to walk for around 15,000 step days during the cruise. But that constant low level pain does get to you after a while.
Last bit before I fetch my dinner which has the timer bell starting to go …
Any more of you feeling especially exhausted at the moment ? I’ve had that for quite a long of time. I keep hearing it from so many people as well. It doesn’t feel like it’s just me at the moment. It feels like a more generalised malaise has settled in where everyone is struggling to find the energy to do even just those basic tasks. And that’s not just for me in too many years to count, it’s younger people in their 20s and 30s as well.
If you recognise that in yourself, then I hope you can find that energy to get at least some of the things done that your brain is telling you needs to get done.
Another aspect of it for me is that I find it very difficult asking for help. I don’t take time off sick, I haven’t been back to a doctors in years and I probably need to do that for both an allergy test to finally confirm what I can and cannot have and to see if there’s an answer for why I’m so exhausted so much of the time. I can still start doing something and keep going until it’s done … but when that need to finish is over, I’ll go splat.
This isn’t intended as me reaching out and asking for help. I don’t like to impose like that on other people. But what I will say there is … whenever I see an interaction with something I’ve done, it gives me that little bit of Happy that I struggle to generate from within. It tells me that I do things that people like, that people want to engage with what I do and that people care.
If you’re reading this and are wondering if that means you – DEFINITELY YES it does.
I hope you have people looking out for you as well. Hopefully back with a happier post tomorrow but I think I needed to safety valve out some of my feelings like this tonight.
I kinda wanted to end on a cheery happy meme but that counts I think. Where to for Dwagon on Tour 2025 ? We shall see.