Status:
I wouldn’t say today was a crash exactly but it had some of the symptoms of a crash. Mostly the fight-flight bullshit of feeling like there’s a threat everywhere, which is the normal CFS response to being exhausted. But at the same time it’s not as severe as it’s been and I’m not incoherent or physically wiped out. So I’ve done 3.5 days of pottering which has resulted in a milder than usual crash. Also I’m aware of what’s going on and what I need to do to mitigate it - breath in such a way as to trick my parasympathetic nervous system into rest-and-digest mode. I’d say that’s progress.
Overnight listening:
- Alvin Lucier: Sounds unheard - If there’s one piece of art that, once I’d experienced it, helped contextualise everything I’d done before and informed everything in my subsequent art practice it’s Alvin Lucier’s I Am Sitting In A Room. It ticks so many of my boxes so this hour long programme about his background, influences (Fluxus, of course!) and then playing the whole piece uninterrupted, is divine. It makes me want to make space-specific work again.
Music:
- Low, specifically the last two albums, Hey What and Double Negative, which I realised I’d not spend as much time with as I might have. They are, of course, marvellous.
Reading:
- My maddening battle with chronic fatigue syndrome: ‘On my worst days, it feels almost demonic’ - I got a lot out of this personal account of having ME/CFS by Hermione Hoby (a veteran of The Awl, so OK in my book) with a scary amount of recognition of the various stages and symptoms. The “brain retraining” stuff is interesting as it relates slightly to the advice I’m getting from the NHS, albeit with significantly lower expectations and way less wellness woo, for which I’m grateful. Whenever I’m exhausted my brain think’s I’m in danger and triggers responses that are exhausting, and I’m stuck in a feedback loop. Since the brain is just another lump of meat in my skin-sack it can be trained to do the right thing, right? Anyway, recommended for people trying to understand CFS, theirs or others, even if her ultimate conclusion is “illness is meaningless, random – it happens to all of us, to varying degrees, and it simply sucks.”
- Fix Your Hearts or Die - “The path to liberation for lonely men is feminism."