So, there are a few things to catch up on...
After taking my Tramadol, I went into a bout of hypomania. Hypomania and mania has a long history of leading to crashes in those with bipolar. Imagine a cocaine high... What follows? The next day I had absolutely no energy, as just the night before I had decided to bleach the downstairs bathroom floor and do thirty sit-ups, after having cooked dinner. For someone without fibromyalgia, this might not sound like too much, but I certainly paid afterward. Also, the hypomania caused an overall upbeat mood, more energy, and higher heart rate, all of which aided in the eventual crash. That next day, I thought I was going through a depressive episode (though I really had more of the physical symptoms than the psychological - my psychological state was more exhausted and confused.) I napped for maybe and hour or two (and I always say that napping is a MAJOR sign that something is off, since I am almost biologically incapable of sleeping in any way without the aid of a good deal of sedatives.) I could hardly get up to do anything and just wanted to lay down and sleep all day.
The next day, everything was fine again, but my pain started flaring. It's been raining the past several days and rain tends to bring out all my aches and pains, at least to a degree. I felt like a machine that really, really could use a gallon or two of oiling. It was like my joints were rusting and grinding against each other. However, I do still find rainy, windy days to be my favorite. I still managed to go for a walk, even if it was only one lap with pain swiftly following... more than before. My body also had been aching due to the activity two days before from that Tramadol high. ((Side note: I feel compelled to say that I'm not saying I was high off of Tramadol anywhere near the 'illicit' level - it was only one prescribed pill, and I can take two; people with bipolar just tend to be a little more sensitive to dopamine rushes and, sadly, do often go to drugs to get the dopamine when it's not biologically available, and I probably had an inevitable, but milder, hypomanic episode coming on that the Tramadol just slid me into express-lane style.)
Today, it's been raining and pouring with persistent wind gales, and my aches and pains haven't been letting up. However, despite this, I still went for a walk. This was a bit of a breakthrough, I think. The rain was more of a dribble and the wind more of a breeze by the time I got out there for my nighttime stroll. The wind and rain caused my hair to be so defiant I had to just let it out of the ponytail, and now it's a frizzball. But I started walking. Instead of thinking about how painful it would be, I focused on the magnificent weather. There's something fantastical about the suburban area at night with a light rain and light winds, with no one outside and the orange glow of the streetlamps streaking across the wet, black ground. It's calm and quiet, and it smells nice. The trees sway, it's nippy but not freezing, and it feels like no one else exists... except for the cars that drive by on the main streets on either side of ours. However, I don't really think of those cars as even having human beings in them. To me, the world is still person-less and I'm alone in tranquility.
I relished in the weather and thought intently as to what I would write about for this post. I was having a one-sided conversation with myself in my head as I walked. I don't know which aspect, if any one thing, caused for this miraculous event (I may be embellishing it a little), but I managed to walk three laps. The past week probably averaged just under two laps a night and I managed to reach the goal I had for the end of the week... on a Thursday! Apparently, I set my expectations even lower than I had to... though I still think it's better than setting them too high and pushing myself to hard. But I reached my end-of-the-week goal with a few days to spare. I knew I was going to go to the mall on Saturday and wanted to be able to walk at least a fair amount without dying. Now, I think that isn't too unrealistic. That was the primary reason I set the goal of three laps. Three laps is equivalent to walking around a whole block one-and-a-half times, assuming our block was square, which it isn't. I Google-mapped it and it's apparently 0.6 miles of walking, or about 3170 feet. Again, this sort of activity may not seem like much to someone without fibromyalgia, but for me it's somewhat of a feat. Maybe by the end of next week I'll be able to get that to a whole mile! Maybe that's wishful thinking. Who knows - maybe I'll fail miserably with that goal, or maybe I'll surprise myself again. We'll see.