How to survive doing a Trade Show with ME

Actually that’s a bit of a misleading title. I have no how-to advice at all, since I’m not quite sure how I did survive it. It is though amazing what you can do when you don’t have a lot of choice and put your mind to it. My week has gone like this:

Monday-Work all day + pack and head over to mum’s.

Tuesday-Go to work for a bit before leaving for Coventry (the saving grace here is that I don’t have to drive). Get there, load all the boxes onto a pallet, drag said pallet up a hill (which was actually comedy, apart from Cooper and I hyperventilating half way up and having to stop!). Then shift cabinets and cables around, before unloading the pallet and setting everything up. Finally finish and head back to the hotel. Drinks and dinner, then bed.

Wednesday-Hang around getting very stressed, waiting for a delivey that is late. Get stuck in traffic. Eventually turn up quite frazzled. Then stand up for 8 hours.

Thursday-Repeat the standing, minus the stress but plus the having to pack up and get everything reboxed and on the pallet again. Tbf we did this bit in record time and were out of there well within a couple of hours.

Now-Collapsed in the bath, aching more than I have done in a long time (since Brands Hatch in fact), but feeling rather pleased with myself for having done it. I was really undecided whether to just say to Chris that I couldn’t do the show this year cos really, which bit of standing for 8 hours a day and lugging boxes around really goes with having ME?! But in the end I decided if I took tomorrow off and had a three day weekend, it could be ok. And it is, I did it, I hurt, I’m tired, but I’m happy and looking forward to three long days of snoozing 🙂

The moral of this is that I realise just how much my ME and my mental state are linked. I knew this in theory, and my doctor has already advised me to keep an eye on depression, but to see it in action quite so blatantly makes me realise how important it is. So from now on I shall endeavor to be a little kinder to myself and fully utilise the carrot on a stick system 🙂

Not the best week in the world…

I am currently moping around at home, being ill and feeling somewhat sorry for myself. I started the week not feeling great, not helped by everything all going a bit wrong at work and having to deal with problems I could have really done without, but then by Tuesday a mega headache of doom had set in and it’s kind of gone downhill from there really! I got through Tuesday, despite threatening to go home several times, and actually ended up staying late trying to get everything done. I headed off to Mum’s for the evening, hoping that the headache was stress related and that I could just relax it all away at hers, but no, no amount of tea, fussing, blanket, dinner or co-codamol could fix it. Consequently I came home, went to bed and haven’t been to work since. The headache did finally ease a bit yesterday afternoon/evening and I thought I’d be all ok to go back to work today, but no, I woke up at about 3am with an almost alright head, but a very achey, painful rest of me! So here I am, off work again and generally frustrated with feeling like this. It’s just that it doesn’t feel like being ill as such – I’m not sneezy or snuffly, I haven’t got a temperature, I’m not being sick, so I feel a bit of a fraud! However, it is very painful and makes me very fuzzy, as has just been confirmed by the fact that “What would you like for dinner?” has just proven to be the hardest question in the world. Braincells are definitely not all in working order today! Probably best I go and curl up in the bath with a good book and try not to do anything too taxing….

This pretty much sums up the last couple of weeks…