No matter how long I sit here, waiting for the lightning bolt of inspiration to strike me, it's just not getting any easier to figure out where to begin for tonight. I've spent most of the day finding the idea of enthusiasm or emotional interest too exhausting. I've run out of give-a-damns. It's really just regular fatigue, most likely, but this time it took out my will to care. There's run-of-the-mill pain underlying everything too. Such is the life with chronic illness. This is my normal.
It's not nearly as late at night as I've been staying up lately, but it feels like it's about four in the morning. I have always had this weird reaction to being up in the middle of the night (which, I repeat, it is not). My ears ring extra loudly. The backs of my hands and forearms feel weak. My tongue feels slightly electrified. My whole body feels like my blood is chunky with glass shards. And I feel like I need to go to the bathroom even when I seriously do not. Do people who don't live with chronic pain get like this? I absolutely want to know. I can remember staying up all night finishing my truly horrible science fair entry in, I want to say... fifth (?) grade, and having this sensation settle over me around three or so in the morning. That was the first time I remember it. Every late night study session, last minute term paper, or all night cross-country drive has resulted in the same feeling.
I wish I could find people who are good at characterizing the pain they feel, so I have something to compare to. I don't want to get into a contest. I just want to know how other people experience it. I've said things to family and friends about how I live through pain, and they look at me like I've just admitted that I have a collection of real human heads I keep in the closet (I promise I don't). Is it that others don't pay attention to it long enough to create good descriptions? Or is it only because pain is a constant companion to people like me that we have time to kick the tires and pick it apart into components? It's not schadenfreude either. I don't want to celebrate that other people hurt too. I'm just intensely curious and looking for new sources of data, wherever I can find them.
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