More musings about not blogging

12 days again, dear me.

I have no excuse other than that if I have nothing to blog about, I don't blog. I didn't want to post gift guides, gift ideas or wishlists — I'm all shopped out and the idea of browsing more online shops made me shudder. I've been frantically knitting Christmas presents, buying Christmas presents, wrapping Christmas presents and doing things in aid of one day securing myself a Career in my Chosen Field. I also flew to Finland a few days ago and after a grueling 10 hours of travelling, I slumped into my 7 year-old sister's bed (she took the sofa bed in my other sister's room so that I could have a room to myself — which is nice even if it means sleeping on her miniscule bed) and haven't done much since, apart from More Christmas Presents and going to a friend's graduation party.

I'm tired. Again, and already. The only positive things I can scrape up to my mind at the moment are snow and friends who I'll be seeing more of in the coming couple of weeks. I know everyone loves being home with their family at Christmas time, but being very much moved out (I own 4 boxes in the basement and generally do not call this place 'home' anymore), I find Christmas time far from relaxing. It's a busy and loud household with my two stepsisters (7 and 9 year-old) and being used to quietness and a lot of personal space, it's a little bit of a struggle.  It's been about 4 days and I still have 16 to go.

I was going to take outfit photos, but I couldn't take my tripod with me. I still have no one to help me with photos and I've been feeling pudgy (and hence uncomfortable and terrible on camera). I haven't been to the gym properly in a few weeks, and the mix of freezing weather and festive season has meant little exercise and too much indulgent food. To top everything off nicely, today my mother pointed out that I'd, as she put it, 'gotten myself a bit of a tummy'. At the moment, I wish that I'd packed my trainers despite the possibility of overweight luggage and icy roads. Too much sitting is accompanied by not only weight gain (which I can deal with), but also with restlessness, aches and frustration (which I cannot deal with). I just want to do something.

Apparently this blog is turning into my space of clearing my head of all the negative thoughts that whirl around in there. I didn't want it to, but it seems I can't help it. Sorry. Hopefully the new year will bring more positive thoughts in its wake.

Tired

At this very moment, my thoughts should all be in the two 3000-word essays I have due in a week, because I am a) working all weekend, b) I am seeing my boyfriend for the first time in 4 months on Tuesday and essay writing will be impossible for at least 24 hours from that point.

I should not be blogging, yet here I am. Why, you ask?

I needed an outlet for talking about something that has been part of my daily life pretty much since my fourth year at Uni started just over a month ago. Namely, tiredness. This is also why my blogging has dropped to almost-zero since Uni started. So here I am, sharing the reason behind my quietness.

I didn't think having a part-time job and studying would be this time-consuming. But then, last time I did this, I was working 8 hours a week in high school. At this moment, I am routinely given almost 10 hours above my stated availability.

But balancing my studies and work are not the worst of it. I've been feeling very weak ever since I got sick, even after I recovered. Today, I got home from work and thought my legs were going to give out. My hands were shaking and I felt lightheaded. And while I was hungy, I had had a small fruit salad less than 2 hours before, so my blood sugar can't have been that low.

I'm constantly cold. And while I could attribute this to our flat being cold, I'm cold even when the heating is on, and no one else is as cold as I am. I can only type, or read, for short periods of time before I need to sit on my hands to warm them up. I hold a warm mug or a jar candle while I read online articles to keep my fingers from going numb with cold.

My recovery time from exercising has lengthened, and when I get tired quicker when I am exercising. It's third day since my Bodypump class, and my thighs are still so sore and tense (despite stretching and hot showers) that I find it hard to walk normally.

I am tired all the time, and the shortening days and constant rain are making it worse. I wish I could point to an easy culprit for my symptoms, but I do regular exercise, walk everywhere, sleep minimum 7 hours a night (and usually find it hard to get out of bed with anything less than 8) and eat a fairly healthy and balanced diet (and I only say 'fairly' because I succumbed to buying a pack of biscuits this week...).

Could this be just the lack of sunshine, or stress? I really don't know.