Ironic Interventions in Exhaustion and Depression

Last night I wrote on Facebook an absolutely true situation that happens to me: "The best way to keep from falling asleep is to give up trying and go get ready for bed. Then...WIDE awake!"

It happens to me all the time. It could be that it takes me awhile and I am simply moving around. It may also be that I am acknowledging what my body is telling me. If there is something I absolutly have to get done, Ill take care of it and then get to bed. Otherwise, in spite of the temporary spurt of energy, go ahead to bed, especially if you know you really need it!

But if it is day time, and you have got to get yourself moving, a super easy thing to do is to drink a a tall glass of cold water straight down. (I takes keeping chilled water in the fridge, no ice, so you can down it.) I think quite often tiredness has to do with dehydration. The hardest part is to just remember this helps!

Other things that help with extreme fatigue, if I can make myself do them are taking a short walk and turning on some music that I normally love to dance to. Often just putting on Salsa music makes me actually get up and move around. Must be something to the idea of "getting the blood pumping."


These simply things often help also with depression. We here all the time about the mind-body connection, which makes me fee like I have to change my entire lifestyle,overwhelming when dealing with depression. But these few little tools can help in the short term.

In addition, specifically for depression, I notice at times that my visual focus has limited. Most obvious when driving, I may be looking straight ahead and not observing things all around me. Literal tunnel vision. By intentionally looking all around, it opens up not only the vision, but seems too loosen the hold of being overly internally focused that accompanies depression.

Try one of these. Let me know if they help. And share your quick and easy tools as well!

Heather J. Kirk
Art by Heather J. Kirk www.heather-kirk.pixels.com
Literature by Heather J. Kirk http://www.photographicartistry.citymax.com/Books.html

#depression #fatigue #exhaustion #rest #work #walk #water #dehydration #mentalhealth #physical #health

#Insanity – The #FitTest and then trying to get off the floor

Insanity Fit Test: My numbers were not too bad. Fairly close (though less than) what the actors said their first week's numbers were - that is until I got to the upper body, push-uppy kind of things.

See those guns on me?? Looks like my arms would have a t least a little strenght, right? All bark and no bite. Worthless! I actually wrote "10 LAME pushups". 'Lame' means that I did not dip more than one inch - seriously. Hopefully on my next fit test I can remove the lame, even if the number count is lower.

The fit test was so incredibly exhausting that I could not get up off the floor afteward for 20 minutes. Perhaps I never would have gotten up off the floor, except that the incredibly repetitive music that plays over the intro screen to each Insanity DVD would not stop unless I crawled at least to the remote control.

Shower. Bed. We'll see what comes next.

Heather J. Kirk