Well last week, I successfully worked rest into the schedule. Yup – three out of four in the house got the flu really bad. Chris ended up looking after the kidlets so I ended up just having an iffy day of not feeling right instead of the full-out flu. I was on clean up and laundry duty instead of kid puking all night duty. So when the household is down and out; I slowed down too! The week was filled with rest among the sickness! With some brain R&R, I noticed that I was remembering more and feeling totally on the ball with everything. My head didn’t hurt as much as well too!
On Saturday we were all finally better so we went to our first family movie together – Wreck it Ralph. This was my first 3D movie. It was a little loud in parts – especially the commercials in the beginning (deafening). There were a couple of the scenes that appeared fast moving and was really surreal for me to watch. I enjoyed the movie and I especially enjoyed hanging out with the family unit. But when I got home, I didn’t realize how tired I was and I all I wanted to do was sleep. Can you say – Overstimulation – my processor was overloaded! We went to a friend’s house for dinner the next day and I think my brain still hadn’t recovered from the movie and me swinging at the playground earlier that day. My head hurt, when I talked the words were in my head but they weren’t coming out easily or I was forgetting things again. I was feeling disconnected!
All that progress and it so easily took a big step back when my brain was overstimulated. Who would have thought. My body wasn’t tired, but the brain was. There is this crazy disconnect between my brain & body; and Brain within brain for me to get a message at times. It is like the brain is no longer in the loop to tell me it’s limits until it is too late. But will that stop me from life – hell no! I just have to figure out where and when to take the downtime to recover to feel normal. I also need to prepare myself when we go out to visit so I have enough rest before and after.
In 2011 I had participated with a group of photographers on Facebook to create your own album cover. I submitted Road to Relaxation. So fitting as this is a learning experience to really come to terms with the word “Relaxation”; to throw out the my misconception that “Relaxation” means you are lazy or procrastinating; to embrace that “Relaxation” now is not an option but is required for me to allow my brain its extra recovery time so I can function normally. All I need to remember to heed my own words!
I think we lose how to rest and relax as adults. Well at least I know that I have or maybe I just never learned how to turn everything off and relax. I am used to doing many things at once and being very active. I have never been one to really sleep in, even after a night out. I don’t think that I am a 100% type A or 100% type B personality, but somewhere in between. I just like keeping busy, trying new things and being active.
Howdy Hydrocephalus 