A Dangerous Thing

Life's been hard work recently. It sometimes feels as though everything is going to over whelm me and that scares me.
In July I started voluntary work at a friends cattery. It had to be voluntary because after checking with the benefits helpline it basically worked out that until I can work more hours I'm a bit stuck. So I'm doing 2hr 2 afternoons a week.
It started great I had loads of energy, went swimming before the cattery, went to WW and was losing weight too. Then I came to the wall.
I got a bug that lingered and now it feels as though Ive been ill and struggling for nearly 2 months. I'm exhausted. I cant sleep, I'm head achy, near to tears (although not sad) and generally feel rough.
I'm really pleased that Ive kept up with the cattery and haven't phoned in sick. In fact there's only been 1 time I had to leave early because I felt so ill.

The thing is keeping that going means that I cant cope with other things. Obviously in my mind the cattery is the most important thing because I want to go back to work and building stamina over time until I can work enough hours to be viable is the only way I can see that happening.
In that respect cutting back on the 'fun' things makes sense.
The problem I have is that I haven't cut back. Ive tried and tried to keep everything going, pushing myself until now when I feel like I'm on the edge of a crash.
Diet wise has been a total disaster recently. OK Ive only put on 1.5lb in 2 weeks which isn't bad in the scheme of things. The problem is the more I concentrate on dieting the worse I get. I count points but find myself not using the points for sensible food but saving them for treats, I did core but again you have a points allowance which meant that faced with 3 points instead of having bread for lunch I saved them for chocolate at night. Of course that meant that I got hungry, shaky, sweaty and light headed mid afternoon and had to eat something sweet like sugar or chocolate and then had way more than 3 points.
So my plan there is to not think about what I eat. I will eat 3 meals a day, if I'm hungry I will have a low GI snack like oat cakes or fruit and if I really want it I will have a bit of chocolate but I wont let myself get to the 'shaky must eat chocolate stage'.

So then we move on to card making.
Its just not been happening recently. I have no inspiration and everything I do make looks awful to me. I want to make cards, I get an idea it just doesn't go together and work. Again thinking about things Ive been promising myself a card making day and then when something happens like I'm too tired and ill to do cards I get frustrated. So I guess the answer is to just do cards when something occurs to me rather than 'because I must'.

Then there's the swimming/gym stuff. Last year I worked my level up to where I could do about 15 minutes on a treadmill walking. Doesn't sound much but for me that's a huge achievement. Recently though I haven't even managed to get myself to the swimming pool. Again thinking about it I realised that I was planning a whole gym trip with so many lengths and stuff like that and then because I haven't had the energy felt frustrated. So again I need to relax and not try to do everything at once.

I wouldn't mind but Ive had ME for nearly 10 years now. I KNOW the answer is pacing myself but every now and then I go completely over the top and want to do everything now, all at once.

That's the real reason for this long and rambling post. By writing it down it kind of imprints it in my mind for a while so I can 'pace' myself better.
I wont do all the housework until I'm a sweaty shaking aching heap....no I will hoover and then rest and another day dust etc.
I wont try to get fit in one session I will accept it wont happen
I wont try to lose weight in one week it took me nearly 9 years to gain 6 stone so having lost 1 in a year that gives me time for the other 5
I wont try to use every piece of craft equipment I posses or make all my Christmas cards in one go I will not stress about it I will have fun and if I have to buy cards for people.....tough!

I guess maybe the main thing is that maybe just maybe I wont THINK so much because when I do I start writing essays of where I'm going wrong and how to put myself right. That's when its gets boring and people wont want to look at my blog just in case there's a huge huge post of rambling thoughts to read.

That's where things get dangerous of course. Too much thinking can lose you friends