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Welcome to the Health Activist Writer’s Month Challenge brought together by WEGO Health – a social network for all health activists.  Again, I am participating in the annual Writer’s Month Challenge in which I will be writing about my health activism and health condition based upon prompts given.

The first prompt reads as given:

Superpower Day…It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s…you!  If you had a superpower – what would it be?  How would you use it?

I am sure that the majority of people who are asked this very question, they would answer with hypothetical superpowers such as invisibility, flying or the ability to read minds.  However, being a spoonie, I would like a superpower which is rather ordinary and mundane – and that superpower would be the ability of having endless energy.

Spoonie Superhero - looks just like you and me but with lots of energy!
Spoonie Superhero – looks just like you and me but with lots of energy!

One of the most common symptoms of a lot of chronic illnesses is fatigue.  Fatigue being defined as “extreme tiredness“.   As a result of fatigue, energy levels are severely reduced and in turn activity levels are also severely reduced.  All the chores that you once could easily complete, now feels as if you are attempting to climb an impossible mountain.  And as you are no longer able to complete as many (or sometimes no) chores, we are often very reliant on others to do things for us – such as cleaning, doing the shopping, cooking and so on.

This can often feel very demoralising , especially when being young and seeing others’ your age going out partying for hours on end and still being able to get up the next day and head for work, and there you are unable to complete small chores around the home. Therefore, the one superpower that I would choose to have over any other, is simply the power of having endless energy.  Being able to have the energy to be able to do everything that I would like to do, instead of completing something and then having no energy to do anything else for the rest of the day.  Even to be able to do the housework for my Mother and feeling that I have done something  to take the added burden away from her, and generally feel that I have accomplished something would booster my self-esteem and make me feel valued.

Recently, the fatigue that I have been experiencing has been very bad – after going out with my carer shopping, going for coffee or to the gym, I am absolutely worn out; and at times have changed straight into a comfortable pair of pyjamas and having a nap!  And I am finding that I am even feeling the effects of going out the next day with no energy to be able to do anything.

So, wouldn’t it be lovely just to have endless amounts of energy instead of being so tired that you have no energy to be able to do anything?  Imagine the freedom that could come from that…

 

What would you do if you had endless energy? Feel free to comment below.

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Welcome to the eleventh day of the National Health Blog Post Month Challenge hosted by WEGO Health.   Every day during the month of November I will be writing a new blog post related to health and living with a chronic illness based on given prompts provided by WEGO Health.

Today’s prompt reads:

Veteran’s Day: For all our veterans and family members, we celebrate this day because it marks the end of WWI, at the 11th hour on the 11th day of the 11th month.  Do you have a task you complete every day at the same time that helps with your chronic illness?  How long have you been doing this, how has it helped?

I cannot say that I complete a task every day, at the same time which helps with my chronic illness.  In my personal experience, no two days are exactly the same when living with a chronic illness.  In addition, life with a chronic illness can instantly change within a blink of an eye; one minute the symptoms are in the background, calm…and the next minute they are wreaking havoc amongst your body and impacting upon your life and your routines.  For example, very often the neurological condition that I live with causes such severe weakness in the legs and intense dizziness that I am unable to get out of bed, and even if I did have task that I complete every day at the same time, I could not very well leave my bed to complete the task.

 

Keeping to a routine can be very difficult when living with a chronic illness
Keeping to a routine can be very difficult when living with a chronic illness

 

Making plans, whilst living with a chronic illness can also prove be very difficult as because every day is so very different, we can never tell how we will feel on that particular day.  Do we dare to book tickets for a concert or play just in case we are unable to attend?  We are ruled by our bodies and as a result we are governed by our conditions and its symptoms; dizziness, pain, weakness or overwhelming fatigue may result in a person with a chronic illness to cancel plans, or cease our routines to rest and recuperate.

 

Cancelling plans can be as disappointing to us as it is for our friends and family...
Cancelling plans can be as disappointing to us as it is for our friends and family…

 

Recently, I have even been finding that the coping strategies that I do have in place regarding the dizziness, can work one day but as the intensity of the dizziness may be worse the next, these coping strategies are not proving to be effective.  So, to conclude, living with chronic illness can vary from day-to-day; and even from hour to hour or in certain cases from minute to minute, and although we all would like little tasks and routines to complete every day to make us feel better, our illnesses can prevent us from completing them, ruining all of our plans and routines.  Certainly, life with chronic illness is never the same from day-to-day….

 

At the end of this post, as it is Remembrance Day, I would like the opportunity to pay tribute to every member of the armed forces, past and present;  all of their hard work and sacrifices that they make in serving our country and allowing us the freedom that we are so fortunate to have today.  You are all heroes and we will remember all those from all the wars that were not so fortunate to return home to loved ones.  I certainly will be wearing my poppy with pride today…

 

Wearing my Poppy with pride today! #lestweforget
Wearing my Poppy with pride today! #lestweforget

 

As always would love to hear your thoughts and views!  Do you have any strict routines you adhere to when dealing with chronic illness?  Does it help?  Please leave comments below!

Welcome everybody; am writing this post on a quiet Sunday afternoon.  For today I have chosen a short prompt as this particular day I really am not feeling well.  I have chosen a prompt from an earlier date.  In the prompt entitled ‘Anatomy Post’ it was asked that we re-labelled an anatomy picture with new names or descriptions the body parts.  I have chosen to label the different parts of the body which are affected by the differing symptoms that are caused by my condition; some of them are invisible such as the dizziness and vertigo so I have used the body part in which these symptoms originate (i.e. the brain).

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