You're a Weakling

You're weak. The weaker sex. Weak in mind. Weak in everything. You can't even open a bottle of water. Life is about survival of the fittest, weaklings don't survive. What is the point to you?

These are thoughts that have been whirring through my brain for the last few years. Despite the fact that I knew I wasn't well, despite knowing that my lack of strength wasn't entirely my fault, my brain liked to convince me otherwise. And the problem is that the longer my brain poked at me and told me that I was, essentially, a pathetic human being, the weaker I felt myself becoming. I didn't want to fight the voice any longer. I didn't want to survive much longer either.

And this is just one of the issues I have with my brain. Sometimes it can be a struggle to get out of bed. And one point it was because my body was physically unable, sometimes it is because my brain made it emotionally impossible for me to gather up the motivation.

Yet through it all, I still tried to convince myself that I wasn't that weak. Growing up, a lot of my personality stemmed around the fact that I was strong. Not mentally because I don't think I've ever been mentally strong. But physically. I was the one in our female only household who could open the tough jars, the one who could carry the heaviest items. I helped at school doing the things with the boys that some of the girls shied away with. My strength and my muscles made me feel less conscious of my weight. I wasn't just overweight I told myself, I was also overweight because of my muscles that made me strong and capable. 

I never wanted to be one of the men and I never wanted to be one of the strongest women ever, but I was proud of the fact that I wasn't weak. 

So becoming weak has definitely taken it's toll on me. 

It didn't occur to me until recently just how weak my body has become though. After being physically ill for over two years and still not doing much strength exercising, I am at a point where I can barely carry a handful of books without it hurting my arms. And it sucks. 

It occured to me the most when I was moving my furniture and my little sister who was always weaker than me was able to carry items effortlessly whereas I stood with arms shaking and sweat pouring out of my skin, barely able to keep holding on. 

And then on holiday when I went to Go Ape and didn't have the strength to lift myself up over some of the obstacles or even keep myself in a sitting position for a small portion of time. 

My physical strength has gone and it is going to take a lot of emotional strength for me to get it back up to speed. Now that I am feeling better - albeit that's a swinging roundabout at the moment - it is time for me to start getting my strength back. It's going to be a tough and long uphill battle. It is the longest time I've ever gone without properly exercising but I can do it, right?

So every day I am going to wake up and tell my brain that it is wrong. 

I am not a weakling, I am weak today but I will be strong again. You just wait and see.

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I Feel Like a Woman

Over the last week I started reading The Gender Games by Juno Dawson (I'll be reviewing it on my blog on Monday so keep an eye out!) and as I was reading, I was suddenly overwhelmed with thoughts and thus I decided that I needed to write them down, which is what I am trying to do in this post here.

This is NOT a review of the book.

This is NOT a comment on any of the contents in the book either.

It is merely a post that was inspired by the book. Because as I was reading it, it felt like someone was talking directly to me and telling me things that I needed to hear, for years. It is everything I have known deep down but haven't really been able to put into words myself.

And that is how I feel about being a female. 

In my bio it says: "for a large part of my life, I've felt different from the majority of the female population" - this is still so true and I wanted to use this blog to explore these feelings. And then I stumbled across this book and it suddenly makes sense.

I have always known very firmly that I am a woman. There is absolutely nothing inside me that wants to be a man.

BUT

I do not feel like a female.

And as Juno Dawson explains much better than I ever could, what I mean by this is that I do not feel like the society construct of a female. I do not fit in with the terms that are used to describe being feminine.

- girlish
- make-up lover
- emotional
- sweet
- cute
- likes dresses and skirts
- likes fashion
- likes gossip

And so on and so forth.

Instead I like to believe that I'm not exactly boyish but I do believe I have a lot of "male" qualities to my personality.

But these things are only male qualities because society says they are. They are not what actually makes you a man.

And thus I feel a little better within myself. Because maybe I won't be accepted by society but I am accepted by my friends and I now understand myself further. Having male quirks to my personality doesn't make me a man or even make me close to being a man, it simply means that I am who I am.

And I'm pretty much okay with that.

So thank you Juno for helping me to realize that there is nothing wrong with me - or anyone else for that matter.

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Being a Bridesmaid

So a couple of weeks ago now I was a Bridesmaid at my sister's wedding. This is something that I have both been incredibly excited about and also incredibly nervous and anxious about. Excited because I wanted to do my sister proud and help her make her wedding day be everything she wanted it to be, nervous and anxious because even though it wasn't my day, I was a) sure people would be looking at me, b) I would look so different to the other bridesmaid (my other sister) and the maid of honour (brides best friend) that I would stand out and ruin everything, and c) I would not fit in to the bridesmaids dress.

As it was, the dress fit - albeit I didn't last the whole day in it and I had painful grooves in my skin for the next few days afterwards so point c) was absolutely fine. Point b did happen and it did make me feel uncomfortable but no one actually said anything which was good. And Point a also happened but everyone only had good things to say.

What I learnt from being a bridesmaid is what I want to discuss today.

1. I am not okay with my body. I have written a post about this before but it really came to light at the wedding that I am not happy with how I look. I do not love the skin I am in.
2. I am envious of everyone for looking absolutely stunning. I spent the day looking at both my sisters and my mum in their amazing dresses and was so incredibly jealous of how beautiful they looked and how awful I felt I looked in comparison. 
3. Weddings are very different to how they look in the movies but the one thing they always get right is that often something always goes wrong. In the case of this wedding, the table plan wasn't laid out exactly right...
4. Weddings can be fun. They're a celebration and a perfect opportunity to wish the bride and groom a happy life ahead.
5. It is difficult to stay awake until midnight when you're one of the only people not drinking alcohol.
6. Weddings are not great places to meet new people, despite what I've heard...

But lastly, the biggest thing I learnt (although I sort of already knew)...

I do not want to have a wedding.

I'm not even sure at this stage if I want to get married but if I do get married, I don't want a wedding. There is absolutely no way I could have that much attention on me. Or that much stress. I know some people might be upset with that so I might have a party if the time comes but I just do not want a wedding - and certainly not a traditional princess wedding like my sister had!

So I think I learnt quite a bit. The whole day was absolutely lovely and I'm so happy for my sister and my new brother-in-law. But I'm also quite glad that it's all over...

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Fashion Failure

I am not a fashion expert. It is one of the things that I am very, very aware of. In fact, I am probably the opposite of a fashion expert - whatever that makes me! It is the one thing about my personality that has always made me feel like I was lacking in the feminine department. Because girls love clothes and shopping, right? And I hated both of those things. I wear clothes because I have to but I never really know what to wear.

Yesterday I was watching a programme and a moment happened where a dress was made for the female teenager and she was happy with the dress but the grandmother refused to accept her happiness because she was crying for joy. Adjustments were made but still no tears. So the girl explains how she doesn't know who she is or what clothes she likes or how to describe who she is but that she loves x, y, and z. The next time you see her open the clothes bag, she physically cries of happiness. Inside her grandmother has created a pant suit of perfection and it is exactly what the girl wanted.

I have never felt this way.

I wish I have. I see things on the clothing rails and I love them but they aren't me. I love clothes on other people too, and love when they look super comfortable and lovely in them too. Always wishing that I could feel that way too.

But I don't.

Last summer I brought some dresses and I really liked them. I wore them out and felt happy that I was wearing dresses for the first time in a very long time. But deep down, I didn't feel comfortable in them. I know that I looked nice and I liked how I looked in them but I didn't feel like they showed who I was.

And I think the biggest problem is that I don't know who I am. I don't know how to dress myself because I don't know what my style is. I wear jeans and hoodies the most because they make me feel comfortable but as I am growing older, I feel that soon I need to ditch the hoodies because I'm too old. But once they go, where do I go from there?

In all honesty, when shopping for clothes these days I mostly just look for things that fit and cover up my hideous skin and do my utmost best to find longer shirts to hid my "builder's bum" because I seem to have a horrible problem about keeping my trousers up. - I am someone who is almost always between sizes and belts help only so much.

So I'm hoping that one day inspiration will strike and I will know exactly what kind of clothes I want to wear.

But for now, I will cling to my jeans and my hoodies and hope that I don't age too quickly.

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Spring Clean Your Life

It’s that time of year again when the winter disappears and spring steps in to take its place. The time when people start de-cluttering their homes, re-sorting their gardens and as such, letting their lives have a bit of a fresh start - sort of like at new years but different. So today on Safe Space we are talking about how we recharge and refresh ourselves during this time of year. Or well… at any time of year when we really need it. Today, we’re going to tell you all about how we Spring Clean our lives.

Louise

I definitely use this time of year to actually clean - throw away things I don't need anymore, donate clothes that don't fit, find new homes for old books, organise the space in my room better - but when it comes to spring cleaning myself; it's abit more difficult. Whilst rearranging my room can certainly help clear my head, I also try and use Spring as a new start. I don't really like NY and it's pressurised attitude for a "new year, new you" vibe. My birthday falls in Spring, so I look back on my past year and see how I can improve. I also reflect on what I have achieved. It might not be huge things but the small things have value too. This helps me refocus on the next couple of months.
I make lists on what I'd like to blog about, what I'd like to do, things I wanna see or places I want to travel to. I find time to read and rest; because who knows when they next get the chance to! I usually throw some baking in there too; it's all hungry work.
What is helping me focus this spring time is moving out and away from home and relocating for a new job. Nothing like that 'pressure' and excitement to help you really clean.

Faye

I very much believe in the expression, tidy kitchen, tidy mind, because every time I clear my room, I feel rejuvenated and refreshed, ready to tackle whatever is next on my to-do list. But I am also a busy person and so actually tidying my room does not happen as often as it should. Meaning that I often actually have a very messy room and a very messy mind. I’ve never really been the kind of person to use a time of year to re-fresh my life but this year I definitely have. I’ve got a new job, cleaned my room, tidied my bookshelves and am actually trying really hard to re-prioritize and re-organise my life so that I feel better both mentally and physically.

I don’t really have any tips on how to do this. For me I have just been looking at what is most important to me and focussing on those things first, letting things that I maybe haven’t looked at or done in a long time to be “let go” as such. It’s a new notebook and a plan to try bullet journalling, a physical to-do list that I can continually tick off. It’s also been an actual spring clean of my room so that I can feel more open when I am in my room. But who knows if it’ll actually help?

All I can say is that the one thing I love about spring is going outside. I love being at one with nature and this, this always makes me feel happier and “fresher”.

Lily 

Winter is my least favourite season and Spring my favourite so I always find there’s a massive shift in my mind-set around this time of year. I start to realise how messy I’ve let my room and life get. I definitely feel better, re-charged and more in control with a tidy room, and everything is neat and has a place or is thrown out. Something I do periodically to ‘spring-clean’ although I’d say I do it about once a season is go through all of my books (there are a lot) and get rid of any I have no interest in anymore or the ones I don’t like and give them to a charity shop so they can find a better home. As someone who is a massive introvert, re-charging for me absolutely means spending time by myself. Whether that’s a long walk, sitting in my room watching YouTube videos or parks and rec, I absolutely have to have me time. I find with Spring and Summer I tend to be in situations, whether on holiday or staying at friends, where I’m surrounded by people a lot more than in Autumn and Winter and so finding that ‘me time’ is essential, otherwise I’m a horrible grumpy mess. Despite being a city girl at heart I do love going out into nature during Spring – there’s something about the sun and the birds and the blossoms that really revitalises me.

Kate

I think it’s fair to say I’m stressed or worried around 90% of the time. Quite often, I just need to down tools and step away from everything to reassess what’s important. I’m a real believer in feng shui, so the first thing I do is remove any items that trigger negative thoughts or memories from my personal space. Fresh bedsheets and a furniture switch-around will follow. I love to fill my bedroom with fresh flowers - usually two or three bouquets - you can’t help but feel happy when you look at them. Finally, to recharge, I just do things that make me happy. I go to the gym or for a swim, take day trips and sing along to terrible music with my best friends, have a deep bath filled with Lush products, plan my next big holiday abroad, and drink rancid vegetable juices until I feel sick.

Georgia

When I’m stressed I tend to grab a glass of herbal tea (usually peppermint) and a blanket, and I just sit back on my couch and try to relax. Sometimes, I quite like to binge-watch shows on Netflix, just so I can take my mind off of some things. However, I also like to meditate, the breathing exercises help me calm my nerves and it helps me focus.

Recharging, however, I take a nap and afterwards, I drink some more herbal tea.

Charlotte

Life in Charlotte land can get very hectic sometimes. I try to take a small chunk out of each week, sometimes even each day, to have some relax time. Time to give myself a little break. I made a relapse box a while ago, which I use mainly for times when I’m getting distressed and need to focus on something to stop the thoughts becoming out of control. The box is full of stuff that makes me smile and stuff I can do to calm down. Recently i’ve started getting the box out more regularly, so that it gives me a chance to wind down and have a breather. I take out the strawberry tea and pop the kettle on. I put the CD, which is forever being changed, into the stereo. I look at all the pictures of good times with friends and family. I lay out the colouring book and pencils. I spray the raspberry mist around me. It’s nice to just take some time out for yourself. This helps me to think more clearly and then I can start to plan things and make positive changes.

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Feeling the Pressure

As mentioned in my previous post, I've just started at a new job with added hours and an added commute and I was sure I would be able to sort it all out. Sadly the first week - two weeks? - have been really stressful - more than I thought they would be. Essentially, I was sure I could deal with a few less hours a week but it turns out the first two weeks have been more of a struggle than I realise. But what I wasn't expecting was the guilt and anxiety wrapping itself around my throat when I realised how little time I had. 

I had evenings where I needed to do so much work and then ended up too tired to actually do anything but sleep. And then the work piled up and it all just made me feel worse until I felt stretched far too thin. 

Add to that the fact that although I have only reduced my hours by 3 hours at work, I've also reduced it by two days and it's hit me how much a difference being in more days make - even if those days are only a few hours long, it was still time to get stuff done and to contribute to the team. I am 100% sure that I will get used to the change in hours soon but for the first two weeks it has definitely been a little bit of a shock to the system.

So what have I done to combat this feeling?

Well, on Wednesday I had plans in the evening but I ended up forgoing the plans so that I could stay in and get some tasks completed so as to lift some of the burden currently weighing down my shoulders. It's not a brilliant plan as I cannot keep just cancelling on people or changing plans at last minute but it has helped me get through the week.

I also prioritised my own to-do list into what was the most important things to do.

Namely my PR work came top of the list, then blogging, then reading. I also need to remember that I am not to feel guilty if I cannot read as much as I once did or blog as much as I once did too - anyone notice the time this post is going live? In remembering to remove the guilt, I can relax in the evenings and sleep without worrying about what I'm not doing instead and that in turn will make this transition a little easier - I hope!

Fortunately it's the Easter Weekend now so I have a few days off to get all of my personal life stuff back into balance and I can start next week fresh and ready. I technically won't be working a full week now until the second week of May but I have other plans in the meantime but here's hoping I can either keep on top of things or at the very least stop feeling so guilty for getting a little bit behind.

How do you keep on top of things and/or stop feeling guilty? I would love to know any tips you may have! Comment or tell me on twitter!

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Dealing with Changes With Mental Health

There are some people who deal with change easily. Whatever life throws at them, they just deal with it and get on with it and it barely affects their life. These are the type of people who welcome change as it makes life more interesting and intriguing. It makes them feel like they are actually living their life rather than just being alive. I used to be one of those people.

It feels weird to believe this of myself these days. To remember that I used to dive head first into adventure without knowing anything about what might be around the corner. Because it is something that I find almost impossible these days. Changes now feel overwhelming, terrifying, and cause me intense anxiety issues.

After primary school, I went to secondary school on my own and everything was fine. After secondary school, I went to college on my own and it was good. During secondary school when I was just 15, I went to Denmark without an adult and with just three friends. After college, I went on a gap year to Canada with just my brother and five strangers with me. It was the first time I had ever been to Canada. After Canada I went to university on my own and threw myself into new activities I had never done before, such as Waterpolo and Journalism.

I craved change in the past. I hated it when it felt like my life was still and not moving anywhere. I needed to try new things and go different places and live life to the fullest.

I’m not sure when it changed. I wish I knew so that I could go back to that day and shake my past self. But now change terrifies me. Eating in new restaurants fills me with anxious worries, going abroad seems like something I will never be able to do again (unless it is to a country I have been to before and can orient myself into something familiar but new places is a big no-no). Trying a new activity seems daunting and bizarre.

Change is no longer easy and is something that I have to really gear myself up for. This can sometimes take me a long time just to make a decision and even then I might back out before it comes to pass. As happened last year when I kept agreeing to meet new people in new places to try and be social and meet people and always cancelled the day before due to not dealing with the anxious feelings that coursed through my veins.

So, if you follow me on twitter or on my personal blog, you might know that I actually had a very big change happen in my life this week. I started a new job. But not only that. I started a new job in an entirely new city – two hours away from where I actually live.

Now as you can imagine, this has not been easy for me.

It actually took me five days to accept the offer for which I am entirely grateful to the employer for still keeping aside for me while I took the time to decide. I then had four weeks to get used to the idea of everything.

Those four weeks were full of planning and organising. They were also full of anxiety and panic. I had moments when I wanted to go back on my acceptance. Moments where I was sure that I was making a huge mistake and that I would hate both the job and the city and my life would be entirely ruined – naturally.

There was also excitement. Something different was going to happen in my life. Someone had seen me as worth investing in. Someone believed in me.

And I think that is what really helped get my anxious thoughts in order. That and having the most amazing friends and family around to help keep me grounded but to also continually remind me how wonderful this opportunity is and how proud they were of me, and all that wonderful good stuff that filled me with hope and that bit of strength I needed.

This week has been tough. On Monday I ended up having the biggest anxiety attack I’ve had in months. For two hours I struggled with my thoughts and my fears and the panic. I ended up driving to my mums house so that she could calm me down which led to further fears about what I would do when my mum wasn’t 30minutes down the road. But I got through it and I knew that underneath it all, I was just struggling with the change about to occur.

Tuesday was actually okay. This was actually the first day of actual change in my life but I managed to get through it easily enough. Wednesday came with a few blips and my heart raced a few times and I struggled to sleep in the evening. Not to mention I got stressed and a bit snappy as well. Fortunately, those I snapped at where very aware that the next day was the day of the big change so let me get away with it without too many repercussions.

And then yesterday. Yesterday was terrifying. But I planned and I prepared and I did everything I could to make sure I felt as comfortable as I could, including arriving at the job 15 minutes before shift started. And then the new job started and I met what seems like a very friendly and welcoming team who I am more than sure I will really like working with. I was shown the building I’d be working with and fell in love so very completely. I was also shown a few of the things I would be doing on the job and I knew that I could do everything I was asked and that I would most likely enjoy it too.

So now I still feel a little anxious about my next shift which starts tomorrow but I also feel better too. Because I did it. I made a change in my life. This is just the start. I have some more changes to make in the next few months but now I know that I can just get on with it when it happens.

I simply need to feel the fear and do it anyway. 

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Ch...Ch...Changes

Recently I have been through a lot of changes in my life and there are still a fair few that I need to make in 2017 too. So today I thought I would discuss how changes affect me, now and when I was younger. Because, ironically enough, how I deal with change has drastically changed in the last few years - and sadly not in a good way.

When I was a child, I would just go with the flow. Things would change in plans but I was just a child so it was never really up to me anyway. I may have had a few tantrums but nothing that I can really remember. Essentially I was well aware that change was a big part of life and that I just had to deal with it.

As a teenager, this was even more noticeable to me. After Primary school, I transferred to a secondary school on my own. It was the biggest kind of change I'd ever faced but I was ready, excited and happy to accept the change. It was tough at first but I soon fell into a friendship group and we got along well for two years. But then two of the four of us left for a different school and my last friend decided she no longer wanted to be my friend. Thus began my jumping from one group of friends to the next for the next three years.

Change was a constant in my life. But it was getting harder to embrace. It felt like I needed a constant in my life. And that was where the internet came in. I formed friendships. Found my writing and wrote every single night. It was, essentially, what kept me sane. It helped me to deal with all the changes going on in my life.

After secondary school, I moved to a sixth form college, again I did this alone. I had to make friends again and was very fortunate to meet some on my very first day, friends who I still see and consider my closest friends, ten years on. But it was a change that I could deal with - I had already done it before. After college, I went abroad for six months to Canada. While this time I did go with my step brother, when we got there, he was in one job and accommodation, and I was in another, once again alone.

But the past few years had taught me how to deal with that. And I made some friends and I got stuck in and I really enjoyed my time there. A few ups and downs occurred but that was to be expected on a gap year so far from home. Then when I came home, I went off to university alone too and found some more friends easily enough. I knew what I was doing. It was good.

So now we come to the present. And change was something I used to embrace. I loved changing things up, meeting new people, steering my life a new way. But now? Now change scares me. I'm not entirely sure when this happened but whenever I think about something changing in my life, I freeze up, feel my stomach turn and want to just stop it all from happening.

I need change. I'm not currently happy in myself so I need to do things to make me feel better again but I also feel panicked at the thought of change. For example, I hate many aspects of my library job but I also love my colleagues and a lot of the work that I do do so the idea of getting a new job, of changing it, fills me with dread. I want to leave, I need to leave but at the same time, I am just too scared to do it. I know this job and these people.

I think the problem is that I'm settling. For the first time in my life, I'm not sure where my future will be or go. I haven't got school to look forward to or move on to. It is just an open space in front of me and the amount of possibilities of things that could change or could happen, makes me want to stay where I am. Because it's not the worst job in the world but if I get a new one, well, that could be worse, couldn't it?

So I need to just push past my fears and my lack of control, and just put myself out there and embrace change again. But it's probably going to be more difficult than before. But I know that 2017 is going to be my year. Last year was awful but this year is going to be the year that I finally work out where my life is actually going.

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A New Way Of Living

Earlier this week I read a spectacular blog post by a friend of mine called Zara. (You can read it here). In the post she talks about how important books and words are for her and how they’ve impacted her life, especially as she has recently been diagnosed with Autism. And the post made me look at my own life and how books have helped me.

I’ve always been a lover of books. For as long as I could remember I had my nose stuck in books. From Roald Dahl to Jacqueline Wilson to Karen McCombie to R.L. Stine to Lucy Daniels to J.K. Rowling to Cecelia Ahern to Jodi Picoult to Linwood Barclay. One book after another after another. Diving from one story to the next. I feel lost without the comfort of my books.

When I was a young child until my teens, I read every single night before bed. Devouring the words on the pages as quickly as I could and escaping into fictional worlds that were different and more exotic than my own. Eventually I started reading at other times of the day too. At breaks in school and at work, on the bus, whenever I got a few minutes spare. I would rather dive into a story then sit and think about my life.

And today I do the same thing. But I also don’t. It’s a difficult balance now. There are times when I want to read, so I decide to take the bus or the train rather than drive or walk and then open my phone and end up playing a game or scrolling through twitter because it’s easier than opening my book and exiting the world.

For once in my life, I sometimes find myself rooting my mind in reality. And it has caused a great deal of confusion. Because I am also struggling with life too. So I should want to just escape from it all, surely? And yet I don’t. No matter how much I itch to read, something always seems to stop me.

Once upon a time I would have classed this as a “reading slump”. But now I am trying to embrace it because maybe it means that there is something in the real world that I want to enjoy. Maybe not escaping into a book could actually, somehow be a good thing.

I guess only time will tell. But I am certainly going to try to turn this negative into a positive. Life is already too hard without feeling guilty for not reading a book.

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What I Wish I Could Have Told You

As I mentioned way back at the beginning of this year, I’ve been having some difficulties with my physical health for a while now. Over the summer I was put through physio which was actually really helpful and every day that passed made me feel stronger and less weak but underneath it all, I still felt overwhelmingly tired and there were days when my muscles literally felt dead and my joints just screamed at me. As far as I’m concerned, these things were not normal.

So I booked another doctors appointment because I would really like to get to the bottom of everything now. Unfortunately my regular doctor wasn’t available at a convenient time for me so I had to book with a different doctor. This was the first thing that went wrong.

Now I am not in the dark about my weight. I am 100% aware that I am in the “obese” category of BMI calculators. I am also very much aware that I have put on a lot of weight recently - which is often what happens when an active person is physically unable to exercise regularly but you know… whatever.

But I am also 100% sure that my weight is not my overall health problem at the moment. I am very certain that my weight is exasperating the situation. That if I lost the pounds, I may not be in as much pain but I am also certain that I would still be in pain as I am positive that there is an underlying problem going on.

Of course, my belief of this in my own body is hard to portray to a doctor in 10mins. So in a way I am not surprised that she blamed all of my issues on my weight but at the same time, I am devastated. It felt like all of my concerns about my own well being were being dismissed. That I was just wasting her time and my time when all I needed to do was lose some weight and stop complaining. I felt like I was taking up too much space - which I feel enough without the help of a doctor basically saying it to my face.

But the real problem was that the second she mentioned my weight. The minute she told me that I was in pain because there was extra strain on my muscles and that I was tired because when you become short of breath after exercise you generally are tired, the fight went out of me. I became submissive and passive, agreeing with her instead of arguing that I knew that and this wasn’t that.

At one point I tried to tell her how active I used to be and she just gave me this look that took my breath away and nearly made me cry right in front of her; she didn’t believe me.

So today, I want to say those things that I should have said in that room. Because I need to explain to someone that I am not okay and it is not just because of my weight.

• I have always been overweight. I have always been active and energetic and I actually kind of love doing exercise. The fact I wasn’t in pain before now makes me believe I’m not feeling this just because of my weight.
• I am napping in the middle of the day. Maybe not a huge thing for most but I have never been able to nap. I could never get so tired that I needed to nap.
• I am always tired. I have been tired from the age of 16 onwards but I still managed to do things. The tiredness I have now is different. It is exhaustion at it’s highest point. There are days when I simply cannot wake up and get out of bed.
• I went from running 10k to barely being able to walk 5 mins without being in excruciating pain.
• I am getting frequent migraines which never happened before. I have noticed that my trigger is over-doing it. If I’ve pushed myself too hard, my body repays me with a migraine.
• I miss being active so much. It is metaphorically killing me not to be able to go for a run or a gym session or a swim easily.
• Before this, I very rarely went to the doctors because I hate them and I just dealt with whatever was thrown at me. I don’t make a fuss of things. I am now because I know deep down that something is really wrong.

Maybe next time I will be able to make the doctor understand. But for now it is back to waiting and hurting and dealing. For now, it is just getting on with life, one day at a time.

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