As I am learning from a first person perspective, stress-related physical damage is REAL. Due to the combination of me not suiting my work at MPSS and MPSS not suiting my skills and abilities, over the past eight months the overtime and the tremendous struggle of trying to stay afloat took its toll.
Even now, after a month of spending over half of my time away from MPSS and doing something that is much more suited to me and that which I am much more suited to, by midday my voice is shot and my hearing degenerates along with my voice so things get muted.
I was really hoping that time away from MPSS would help but not yet. In fact it isn't just at work now. Whenever I enter a stressful situation of any kind the above symptoms return. So it seems that my body has picked up a new memory to dealing with any stress and that is for my voice to go, my throat to feel like it is coated in something and my hearing to be diminished. I guess it's going to take a little longer. Patience, Cam. Patience.
Speaking of patience...
Recently Hiroko has been telling me about patients who come in with throat-related conditions (no names) and how some of them have developed tumours that are not likely curable. So now I have begun thinking as of today that maybe I should go and see the ENT doctor in my 'hood this weekend and have him take a deeper look than the last time he diagnosed me as having acute pharyngeal laryngitis.
I first noted the voice loss around early December so now we are going on for almost four months.
On the weekends when I am away from work and there is no rise of stress levels this absolutely does not happen. My voice is clear and strong and my hearing remains sharp. It just comes out under duress.
Also due to work it has been about four or five months since I have been able to go to the gym more than once a month. And my muscles have definitely disappeared, my body has shrunk and weakened, and I can feel that if I'm not careful my back may go out. That hasn't happened for about a decade, or just as long as I have been working out and doing strength exercises.
This work has really taken a toll on my overall health. It has to be the most difficult work to date. And so I am really looking forward to the June and July travels and I sincerely hope that the body will start to regenerate itself and heal because the lack of strength and the constant fatigue really has me worn out. I am ready to go to sleep by the time I get on the train to go home! And that is certainly not me.
I know that I will get through this and be stronger for it but at the moment while still heading downhill (internal visceral body fat is back as well as the tire-ette around the waist) is certainly a bit of a disheartening challenge. Maybe from April when I'm not working at two companies anymore I will be able to get out on time? I just have to get past the tremendous fatigue..... I really do feel like all those other burned out Japanese businessmen on the trains!
I still love me!
P.S. All the plegm buildup in my throat and nasal passage due to the cedar pollen is only exacerbating the problem especially because I am not in a position to expectorate it out (on the heads of the people around me) and it doesn't seem to want to move anyway.
Cam
Cam, I can definitely understand where you're coming from there. I had a dreadful situation with work stress a few years ago. It started in 2009 and I wasn't really sure what was hapening. All I knew was that my energy levels were down to a point where I needed so much more sleep than I had hitherto thought necessary. Over the coming months it got worse and I found that I was getting other symptoms: migraines and bowel problems. I was in a pretty dreadful state.
ReplyDeleteThen I had the long summer holiday and within two weeks of its start the symptoms cleared up. Within days of returning to work that Autumn, I was ill once more. My doctor did a stress ssessment and it showed stress was the most likely cause. I took the opportunity of redundancy and a move to a less stressful job. However the damage had been done and my body had learned to respond to stress by reproducing that pattern of symptoms. So at the new job, even mildly stressful situations brought out the full range of symptoms. The only way I could deal with it was resign and take several months from all work to reset my system. By the Autumn of 2011 I was pretty much recovered but over all it took a hell of a lot to get through.
I hope, Cam, that you are luckier than I and are able to recover more quickly.
Isn't it amazing how the body works?
ReplyDeleteI love you and yours!! Spare tire and all!
xoxoxo
Tez - that pretty much sums up what is happening to me. As Stefnee said, it really is amazing how the body works. Currently it's not quite working the way I'd like it to however it will come back to harmony and balance if I just fucking listen to myself instead of that part of me that is so willing to sacrifice myself in order to help others! God damn me!!
ReplyDeleteI really do hope that June and July help the body and mind to reset. The work I have been transferred to is a lot more to my skillet however the body is still reacting to it. Which tells me that no matter how much better it may be this time around I need to look at the situation from the bigger picture. When I injured my abdominals at the gym I wasn't able to work out for six months and it took an entire year to actually heal.
People keep asking me every Monday if I feel better now, but it isn't that simple. On Saturday and Sunday I felt great, yes. But back in the stressful situation and by the afternoon it's all back again.
Thank you for taking the time to share, Tez. I love you!
And as for YOU, young lady.... Let me just say this: I fucking love your flat white ass!
:) Hee Hee Hee
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