Tired

I’ve been fighting this thing for ten years – or longer. I don’t really know anymore. It’s been too long. And it won today.

My doctor says I need to believe I can get better, but I’m having a hard time thinking in a straight line, let alone moving to do the things that will help me get better. I’m too tired to despair, really. I’m just tired.

You should see my house. Or maybe you shouldn’t. The kids are generally well-behaved, but the house… They’ve made a mess of it. I want to summon some adrenaline to clean it up, but nothing comes. I’m holding the walls as I walk. I don’t know where my cane went. I can’t believe I want it again.

I’ve been numb on the left side of my body for a week now, ever since our gentle spring exchanged places with a full-blown Charleston summer. The heat and I, we don’t do so well together.

I’m praying to hold out just another two weeks – at the most – just to finish some things, just to find my way clear to take a couple of months off. I’m afraid today I won’t make it, that people are going to be waiting on me again for things I under-promised and may now be under-delivering.

I’ve felt this vulnerability coming on for a while – I told a lie last week to cover it, to try to be stronger, to try to maintain my autonomy. It was stupid, but, really, who needs all this drama?

Little things stress me now, like getting out of bed, things that make noise when they are dropped, questions that need answers. All this weakness, all this stress – I haven’t lived here for a while, and every day lately, I’m breaking down a little more.

I can’t do this, any of it, and most of the time the Christ-strength isn’t physical – it’s grace that says “all right then” and lets me breathe in the midst of my failure.

It’s taking me over, and to be honest, I’m a little scared. It’s too real, and I feel like a nightmare, moving sluggish without being able to wake up. I don’t know what is most important anymore. I can’t think that far. I can’t think beyond the next thing, if I can remember what that is.