The crash

On anniversaries and a not-so-mysterious case of missing energy

Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

I had a different post planned for this week – on age gaps, as paying subscribers will know from this week’s discussion thread.

But then I crashed.

This happens from time to time. My energy just vanishes. Collapses. We tend to talk about energy in metaphors of air and liquid: feeling deflated, punctured, it leaked away, evaporated.

But if I really think about how I feel this week it’s as if some internal scaffolding has come down – fluttering into flat uselessness like a knocked-down house of cards.

And, in the space left behind, it feels amazing to me that all of that inner confidence, drive, motivation – whatever – was apparently so flimsy.   

It’s easy to put these periodic crashes down to the usual: not enough sleep, hormones, taking on too much, the terrible, terrible news cycle.

Except, I had a gloriously relaxing weekend. I’m not especially underslept. Hormones? Could be, but it’s not a perfect fit. It’s about a week early for that to be a solid explanation.

It is, though, a year since our fifth miscarriage.

I hadn’t really thought about it, until this inexplicable slump. Maybe I should feel guilty about that.

I could, perhaps, have seen it coming though. From the way, for a few days, I’ve felt the presence of emotions I’m not sure are actually mine – or, at least, they don’t relate to my here and now. It’s like a haunting: ghosts of dread and anxiety.

In this state, everything starts to feel over-stimulating, too. Noise is too noisy: I can’t seem to escape inane jarring chatter. Dan, Edward, the radio, podcasts I normally love…it all scratches at me.

Another tell I should recognise by now is that I start to feel over-exposed. I notice myself worrying too much about whatever I’ve posted on social media. I second-guess every comment-reply or attempted joke about tomatoes or how my inner 10-year-old girl still remembers when it’s Geri Halliwell’s birthday.

I’ll probably worry about this post, too, once I’ve scheduled it.

Anyway. It’ll pass. It always does. And these kinds of apparently irrational crashes are fewer and further between than they were in, say, 2018.

I’ll do all the things I know I should do. I’ll tick the boxes. And I’ll remind myself – for the eleventy-first time – that I really should read The Body Keeps The Score. (But I probably won’t).

One way or another, I’ll restack the house of cards and, by next week, it’ll be like it never happened.