What can I stop doing that keeps draining me?

There is a difference between being tired and being drained, and I’ve learned that the hard way. Tired is something most of us understand. You have a long day, you don’t sleep well because you pushed yourself too hard, and eventually you get a chance to rest.

Being drained feels different. It settles somewhere deeper, where a good night’s sleep doesn’t necessarily fix it. You wake up already tired because your body, mind and soul never really got a chance to recover.

When Your Body Keeps Asking for More

I’ve been living with heart disease for more than 20 years. I’ve become pretty familiar with doctors’ offices and the procedures having an ICD require. From device changeouts to ablations, cardioversions, medication changes and the constant monitoring, I’ve lived through them all.

Then cancer added another layer to the equation. Radiation was followed by more treatment. More shots, more pills, more blood work, more scans and more conversations about PSA, testosterone and what happens next. Some mornings I look at the thirteen pills sitting in front of me and think, Lucky 13. (FYI there are 6 more pills at night)

There is something sobering about seeing your entire morning lined up on a table. Every pill represents another reminder that your body isn’t always going to cooperate with the life you want to live.

The frustrating part is that the things you’re doing can be the very things that leave you exhausted. Treatment has a purpose. Appointments and medication have a purpose, but none of that changes what it feels like to live through it.

Going to an appointment and sitting through another conversation about my health can feel like a full day’s task. Chronic illness doesn’t simply take energy from your body. It changes how you think about your time, your plans and even your future.

The Weight of Wondering What’s Next

Then there is the exhaustion nobody can see. Living with a serious health issue means there is always another question waiting somewhere in the background. What will the next PSA or testosterone level be? What happens when the treatment changes? Will everything stay where it is, or will something start moving in the wrong direction? Even when today’s results are good, the mind has a way of jumping ahead to tomorrow.

I’ve caught myself worrying about things that haven’t happened yet, and I know how much energy that can consume. You can spend so much time preparing for the next bad thing that you forget you’re living an ordinary day. I’ve allowed those thoughts to steal part of today from me, but I’ve learned I can get some of it back in other ways, such as writing.

When Relationships Leave You Empty

Health isn’t the only thing that can drain you. Relationships can do it too, especially when there are unanswered questions involved. I’ve spent far too much time trying to understand people who weren’t willing or able to explain themselves, wondering what I did wrong, replaying conversations and trying to make sense of someone’s decision to disappear or pull away.

When you don’t get an explanation, your mind has a tendency to become the detective, as well as the prosecutor and judge, all at once.

Eventually, though, you have to recognize that not every question is going to have an answer that satisfies you. I’ve learned that closure isn’t always something another person gives you.

Sometimes it’s a decision you make for yourself when you finally realize that continuing to search for it is costing you more than the unanswered question ever did. There comes a certain freedom in saying, I may never understand why. And I don’t have to spend the rest of my life trying to figure it out.

The Past Can Be Only One Click Away

Social media makes that harder. A photograph, a name or an old memory that appears in your feed can take you somewhere you weren’t planning to go. One minute you’re sitting in your present, and the next you’re mentally walking through a chapter of your past, wondering whether something meant more than you thought it did or whether there was something you missed. Wondering whether something meant more than you thought it did or whether there was something you missed.

I’ve had to remind myself that remembering somebody isn’t the same as choosing them. The past happened, and pretending it didn’t would be dishonest. People mattered, experiences mattered and some of those memories will always matter.

What I don’t have to do is keep looking backward for an answer that may not be there. I can acknowledge what I feel without allowing it to determine where I go next. That’s an important distinction because I don’t want curiosity, nostalgia or social media to become another source of exhaustion.

Resting Isn’t the Same as Repairing

For a long time, I thought rest was the answer whenever I felt worn down. Sometimes it is. There are days when the best thing I can do is stop, sit and do absolutely nothing.

I’m beginning to understand that resting and repairing aren’t always the same thing. Rest gives your body and mind a temporary break. Repair requires you to look at what is causing the damage in the first place.

That can be a much harder thing to do. If something continually leaves you anxious, disappointed or emotionally exhausted, sleeping eight hours isn’t going to solve the problem. You might feel better for a day, but eventually the drain starts again. At some point you have to ask yourself if you’re recovering or simply taking breaks between periods of being depleted.

Sometimes Saying No Is an Act of Healing

I’ve learned the value of saying no. I used to associate saying no with rejection, guilt or giving something up. Now I see that there are times when saying no is actually an act of taking care of myself.

I don’t have to keep having a conversation that goes nowhere, nor chasing someone for an explanation they’re never going to give me. I don’t have to keep checking something I already know is going to disturb my peace. And I don’t have to make myself available for every person or situation simply because I always have.

My energy isn’t unlimited. Neither is my time. After everything my body has been through, I’m finally starting to understand that protecting those things isn’t selfish. There is a difference between being there for the people I love and constantly giving pieces of myself away.

The People Who Help You Repair

That’s one of the things I appreciate most about the people who bring peace into my life. Living with chronic illness makes life feel like one long list of things that have to be managed. And it’s easy to start seeing yourself through the lens of all those things.

Then someone comes along and reminds you that you’re still just a person. When that happens, I don’t feel like I’m sitting across from another problem that needs to be solved. I can laugh, talk, be myself and think about something other than my health. That’s important to me. The people who bring peace don’t necessarily fix anything. Sometimes they simply make the weight a little easier to carry, and there is real value in that.

I’ve also come to appreciate the people who know when I need advice and when I don’t. Sometimes I don’t need somebody to tell me how to solve my problems. I need somebody who will listen, sit beside me and let me be where I am for a while. That kind of presence can be more restorative than people realize.

Healing Isn’t Always About Adding More

That’s the bigger lesson I’m learning. We talk about healing as though it always means adding something. Like another treatment, appointment, medication, exercise, positive thought or something we’re supposed to do better. Those things can certainly help, but sometimes healing requires subtraction.

I need to worry less about things I can’t control and stop checking, second-guessing and trying so hard to understand people who have chosen not to explain themselves.

I’m learning some relationships need more distance. Some memories need less attention, and some situations simply don’t deserve the amount of energy I’ve been giving them.

You can’t keep repairing yourself while continuing to pour your energy into the things that keep breaking you down. Eventually, something has to change.

What I’m Learning About My Energy

I’m still figuring this out. There are days when the physical exhaustion wins, when the medications hit harder than I want them to, not to mention when the next appointment starts taking up space in my head before I’ve even gotten there.

Plus, there are still cancer and heart questions that I’m not going to pretend positive thinking can make disappear.

What changed is that I’m becoming more aware of where the rest of my energy goes. I don’t want to spend whatever time I have left constantly managing things that leave me empty. I want to write, laugh and love.

I want to make memories with Maya and the people who matter to me. Not spend my time dissecting memories from the past. I want my life to contain more than doctors’ offices and things I’m afraid might happen.

The question isn’t how I can repair everything that’s broken. It’s much simpler than that. What can I stop doing that keeps draining me? That question doesn’t require me to fix another person, predict the future or understand everything that has happened to me. It only asks me to pay attention to what my life is telling me.

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