Slowwwww Down

Even though I did slow down enough to enjoy some tacos and the newspaper the other day, kicking it into high gear the next few days really did not help in my quest for balanced living. Friday morning, I woke up feeling kind of junky but I had all sorts of work to do so I pushed through the day, not stopping until 9pm. I reasoned that since most of my work was sedentary, it didn't really count. I'm used to my home visiting and nannying days when I was running around a good eight hours of the day. But as many of you probably already know, enough hours of sitting hunched over a laptop, employing all sorts of brain power will catch up.

This, I discovered, yesterday morning when I woke up with what felt like the worst hangover in my life. Pounding sinus pressure, a rocking stomach, chills, and complete disbelief that I had already slept for ten hours. Surely, it had only been fifteen minutes. I pried myself out of bed, the intensity of my headache increasing with every inch of elevation, put something in my tummy, and headed straight back to bed to sleep another four hours. In total yesterday, I managed a shower, a call to my sister, and a bit of email correspondence. Then, completely wiped out, I hightailed it back to bed.

And even though I knew I needed a very chill day, I found myself complaining to a friend that I hadn't "accomplished anything." Why is it that unless we are productive in the traditional sense (i.e. crossing things off of our "to do" lists, cleaning out the closet, responding to those work emails), it doesn't seem to count? Why couldn't I give myself credit for accomplishing a little self-care?

Because that's not really how American society operates. We go to work sick even though it means we will prolong our illnesses by days or weeks while infecting the whole office. We push through to meet personal obligations even when we are completely worn out and have no desire to do them. We tend to be impressed by the level of work produced by others and wonder what we can do to be more like that. So we power through the day by ingesting way too much caffeine, then wonder why we can't sleep at night, only to start the another day, feeling groggy, stressed, and unhealthy.

Ugh. Really?

Yes, in my opinion, really. Spending time overseas has made this more apparent, not only through my own observations but because I continually heard from Europeans, "You Americans are crazy with your work" or "I thought about moving to the U.S. but then I found out how you hardly have any vacation time."

Of course, I always argued that a lot of us don't have a choice. We have to deal with the fact that we only have two weeks of vacation a year and that we have limited sick days. Yet, that doesn't always mean we need to agree to another committee or another Girl Scout outing. And if we can't teach ourselves to slow down, our bodies will certainly do it for us. That's for certain. More Sudafed, please.