Life Changes When You’re Awake
I’m really glad that I finally went in for treatment of my fatigue problems. I used to be tired all the time. I think that it started at about the time that I started working in Chicago. The long commute and the fast food diet collaborated against me, and I started gaining weight. I went from my college weight, 135 pounds, to my current weight of 205 pounds within six years. You can see the transformation in our photos over that time span (“Hey, it’s Niagara Falls. That was back when I had a neck!”). The added weight caused a thyroid imbalance and severe snoring, which combined to create problems greater than the sum of their parts.
I didn’t want to get help. That would take time and money that I didn’t think I had. I had convinced myself that it wasn’t really a problem at all, I was just abnormally fatigued. Eventually, my boss at the University of Chicago suggested that I go to a sleep therapist. He noticed how tired I was all the time. After a battery of tests and sleep studies, I was diagnosed with hypothyroidism and severe sleep apnea. I got a prescription for thyroxin (artificial thyroid hormone) and a new CPAP machine to wear while sleeping, both of which I would come to rely upon.
Now life is very different for me. I don’t fall asleep during the work day any more, and I don’t have trouble staying awake during my commute. Related problems, like my elevated cholesterol levels, seemed to disappear. One major change is that I moved my work hours from 9-5 to 8-4. I could barely wake up in the mornings before, let alone an hour earlier, but it has been pretty easy now. As a bonus, I’m able to get home an hour earlier to spend quality time with Aiden. I have more time and energy to play with him now; we take care of his “bath, book and bed” before his bedtime at 7 o’clock.
My doctor said that I should be exercising more, so I’ve really made an effort to use our recumbent bike downstairs. The additional energy helps. I’m keeping a log of my exercise bike activities in an Excel spreadsheet (might put that online some time down the road). With any luck, I’ll lose weight now that I’m back on track. It’s not easy to cut calories, but dinner salads and Coke Zero are suddenly looking like viable options. I’m happy that my life has undergone these changes, and I’m looking forward to seeing what’s next.
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