I’m writing this mostly for myself so I remember… Yes I could have written it down in a non public way too but maybe someone has an answer or a lead that I haven’t thought about. You never know.

It actually started before I had Covid but I think back then I was about to get sick. I was extremely tired. As soon as we posted at work I was asleep. I did everything I was supposed to do but sometimes it was fighting my own body. Didn’t think about it really, excused it with working too much.

Covid came and went and I started to actually feel more like myself again. The horses came back and of course that put a little bit more workload on me but on the other hand, mentally I have not felt better in many years. Physically it’s a different story.

Last week it all started again. Totally exhausted. I blamed it on a little sleep between my Tuesday and Wednesday shifts. I think I ended up with about 3.5 hours. Wednesday was a fight against myself.. If I say that I wasn’t tired so I wanted to go to bed and sleep, I was not able to move my body. Everything had to go through my brain first. I had to think how to get out of the truck. I had to tell myself what to do with the patient, and that is something I only have to do with critical calls or something we don’t deal with often. It was like my muscles did not cooperate.
The night between Wednesday and Thursday I got at least 5.5 hours of sleep and from the beginning I felt okay but as the day went by it went downhill. My body was tired but my brain was okay. I wasn’t dizzy or had pain anywhere that could explain this.

On Friday morning I had planned to take the dogs for a walk early, go to the meeting in Quitman that was at 9:30, go and get the car inspected and then to the barn on my way home. But when I woke up, first of all it was almost 7am. My plans for the day was off right away. But I stood up from the bed and could not stand on my legs. Again, no dizziness, no pain. I didn’t pass out, the muscles in my legs were just not there. Hit my head hard on a furniture, thankfully it didn’t bleed. It took me a couple of minutes to get up on my bed and then make a new attempt to get my legs to function. Well now I was dizzy but I knew why. There was no way I would take a walk with the dogs. Not risking it. So I re-planned my day. I took a hot shower and tried to get blood flowing better. The dizziness went away slowly. Went to get my car inspected first (it passed!!!). As I was waiting for it to be done my entire body started to shake. Like tremors all over. I was wondering if I had some kind of anxiety attack but had no reason to be anxious. Went to the barn and took care of the girls. I still had the tremors or shakings but was able to ignore it and take walks with all three girls. Made sure I had Gatorade and water in overloads because it is so hot in the barn. Went home, took another shower and ate some food. Slowly the shaking subsided and I started to feel quite normal again (whatever normal is). Thankfully there was another meeting in Athens at 2pm that I was able to make instead of the one in Quitman. The Athens meeting was the one I was supposed to be to but either would work. When I got home from the meeting it all just smashed in my face again. I was so exhausted. I just sat in front of the computer and did nothing until I went to bed.

After about 9 hours of sleep I woke up on Saturday morning and I had planned to take Twix and BamBam for a walk. I need that for my hip and they love it. But I just couldn’t. You know that feeling right before you get sick, you are heavy in your body and you can’t move. That’s how I was (and am). If you are a woman, the day before your period… that’s the feeling. I pulled myself together and got to the barn and made sure the girls were taken care of. The only thing my body could do for the rest of the day was sitting in a chair. During the afternoon a headache came crawling but I was able to kill it with some Excedrin.

Now it’s Sunday… I woke up around 2:30 last night and my lower back and right hip was on fire. I could not move. Don’t ask me how I could go back to sleep again but I did. Woke up right before 7am and I new that I had to take the dogs for a walk. That would make them happy, and it would help my hip. So off we went. And it felt good. I kept a higher pace than I normally do, and that was unintentional. It was the pace my body chose, not my brain.

I was tired but not exhausted when I came back and after a shower and some food I felt really great! I was heading to the barn with a smile on my face thinking that this would be an awesome day. And it sort of was. I was walking the second horse for the day (Dallas) when it just struck me. It was like someone hit me with a bat. I got so exhausted and tired out of nowhere. I almost turned around but said to myself that I must be able to do this, it’s just ridiculous. So we walked almost around the pond. But when we came almost to the end I couldn’t do it anymore. If for whatever reason Dallas would spook out for something and I couldn’t react appropriately this was not a good outcome. And if I even think in that path, something is wrong. That is not me. That’s when I realized to myself that this ain’t normal.
I took off Dallas her bridle and let her do her thing. She was as happy as could be and went first to the pond and then down to her sisters in the barn. It took me a little bit to get back to the barn to let Amaria and Acriz out. No doubth they were happy to get out!

I still had the cleaning of the barn to do. I got it done but good grief it went slow. I had plenty of fluids with me, both water and Gatorade. It felt a little bit like I had just overdone myself but I haven’t done more than I usually do. Even the buckets with water was heavy.

Came home and just sat down. I had plans to try to do something in the garage but I can’t. Before I started to write this I made the accomplishment to put on a laundry and clean up the kitchen. That was an accomplishment right now.

So you may now after all this say; why don’t you go to a doctor? Well because I have no good symptoms more than being extremely tired. I am not dizzy, I have no pain anywhere, my blood pressure, pulse, sugar and all vitals are fine. So the answer will be “You are working too much”. That hasn’t changed the last couple of weeks. And when I was at the hospital last time they took so many tests and all came back normal so I already know that. So until my body gives me more than “fatigue” and lazy… I’m not going to the doctor. When I have more distinct symptoms I will be right in his office. Yet I know that it is not normal to have to fight your own body this way that I am doing right now.

One day I may get an answer. This three day weekend is soon over. Tomorrow is back to work on the truck. Hopefully it will be a good day where I don’t have to fight too hard. We will see…