Adrenal fatigue.
The medical community considers “adrenal fatigue” to be a fake, pseudo-scientific concept. Well, they can believe whatever they choose to believe, but I happen to subscribe to the belief that adrenal fatigue exists. Many of the symptoms associated with the concept are prevalent in my life right now.
Excessive tiredness, cravings for salt and sugar (the latter of which I normally never crave), trouble falling asleep, trouble waking up, the need for caffeine throughout the day. The only symptom I don’t really have is unexplained weight loss. That sucks, of course, as it’s the only one that I might actually welcome.
Even if adrenal fatigue is a fake illness and not accepted by the medical community, whatever I have right now mimics it closely. I bring this up because I realized a few things about some of the root causes of my imbalance right now.
Last night, as I lay in bed not falling asleep (again) I decided to meditate to see if I could calm my mind and slip into slumber. I had already taken a very long, very hot bath to relax so I thought I could easily fall asleep. Not so.
I allowed myself to center and drift off into a familiar meditative space and simply let images and thoughts flit by and dissolve. One persistent thought, however, kept coming back. I finally realized that I was hearing something important.
Fear.
I simply breathed into the concept for a bit and realized that I have been operating with a pervasive, subtle, deeply-rooted sense of fear for weeks now. This is not the “fight or flight” kind of feeling. It’s like a long, slow, smoldering burn. But fear on any level impacts the parts of the brain that deal with “fight or flight” so on some level I have been swimming in a very quiet, very subtle, pervasive pool of fear-based hormones for weeks.
As I pondered this, I then felt a sharper more immediate energy. I felt a rush of adrenaline and it woke me up out of my meditation.
Anger.
Bingo! I realized that I have also been dealing with intense anger for weeks now, but I have been suppressing it and trying to pretend that I’m somehow so spiritually evolved that I am “better than that.” Bull. That’s just plain old spiritual arrogance. In my decades working in the spiritual self-help realm I have run into so many narcissistic, spiritually arrogant people that I recognize the symptoms when I see them.
Ugh. I hate when I realize I have been acting or feeling like that – even to myself. Maybe especially to myself, now that I think about it.
So there I lay in bed – mulling over the concepts of fear and anger. Both of them have similar effects on the body – brain, hormones, glands, cardiovascular system, everything. For weeks, I have been on a slow burn and all of that seeping of dangerous hormonal energy has slowly eroded my energy to a point where I finally have felt almost “shut down” recently.
The seemingly endless time in quarantine coupled with the utter unknown of where things are going is part of it. The horrific way that people are acting so selfishly and hatefully in certain parts of the country right now is another trigger for me. Fear, anger. It is nearly impossible to figure out how to let them go.
Still, I have identified at least two of the major culprits of my malaise. Now the trick is – what do I do with this knowledge? My sparkling isolation feels like it’s gone quite flat today.
It’s only Quarantine if it comes from the Quarante province of France. Otherwise, it’s just Sparkling Isolation.
Sparkling Isolation – Day 118