Happy birthday

I completed yet another revolution around the sun. This one, actually, was not particularly kind one. I was diagnosed and came face to face with a an invisibly crippling condition. I also faced some hard truths about the bad decisions I made previously in my personal life. Some things just keep hounding you back. For a long time. Very long time. I hope not a very very long time. I took some time, despite the shortness of my attention span lately, to reflect the series of bad decision that led me here. Needless to say, it a was source of much misery.
I am also scheduled to be betrothed in the coming year that brings a lot of uncertainty. A friend recently noted that I held unhealthy amount of cynicism for a guy decided to enter the nuptials. It came to me as an unhidden revelations. One of those things you always see but never notice. I don't know if that's good, bad or ugly.

Happiness

Sometimes I think I just don't WANT to be happy. And there is nothing anyone can ever say or do change that. I hear a lot of 'you should be happy', being happy is cure of all diseases', why are you so sad' or just 'cheer up' or some variation of the above. But as easy as it sounds, it does not cheer me up. Something just doesn't feel right when I am happy. May be I can guess but I am not sure. I am tired of pretending to be happy. I feel more at ease when I am sad but not quite because I am not happy. This kind of reminds me something I seen a few years ago.

Everything hurts

I have pain in the muscles of my body I have never heard the names of. Everything I do, hurts something or the other. There are times, like these days, lifting a bottle of water feels that border-painful stretch in the biceps and triceps. Sometimes, just typing on keyboard is painful from the elbow and below. The wrist joints hurt with anything that puts pressure on them. I cannot stand 5 sec without having pain in the quads and hamstring and few seconds later in calf, Achilles, shin, sartorius. ALL the muscles in legs start to hut as I begin walking. I don't even know the names. After 10 minutes of walking, I feel so exhausted that it feels as if I have been running for hours and just took a break.The neck and shoulder are perennially stiff and painful. There are spots that are painful to touch spread all over my back from the neck to the hip. Sitting on a chair for longer than few minutes gives that uncomfortable nagging pain in the lower back. The daily activities that used to take effort, now seem like a challenge. I have to wait and be wearing dirty cloths until I feel strong enough to do the laundry for myself. (This involves walking up and down the stairs with a few loads). I have been cooking a lot less. I so much like to cook my own food but this is a challenging activity now.

Perhaps the thing that I fear most is that I am finding it harder and harder to focus on something. I don't know if there is something wrong with me or I just lost interest. I feel I have to make a lot of effort sometimes just to follow a conversation with someone let alone read a paper. I have been so unproductive at work.  Days pass by and I hate myself for the amount of work I have done. I am afraid that eventually I am going to run out of patience and good-will of my employers and not be wanted for the the level of (un)productive work I perform.

From being so full of energy just an year ago when I graduated with Ph.D. to this. I miss so much the things I used to do. Not to mention the people I loved before I moved. I cry so often. Thankfully not as often as few months ago. But there are still times when I am trying to do something simple and it starts to hurt, and start by asking why, how and then a stream of negative thoughts bring tears eventually. Sometimes I go to the men's room at work so that no one can see me. In short, life has just changed so fast within an year. I do not like my new life. But I think this is what living with fibromyalgia might feel like.