When everything is on your shoulders
Health problems often bring a whole host of decisions to be made. There’s choosing doctors and treatments, sure, but there’s also having that whole future you imagined lit on fire and having to cobble together something new and without the false certainty we once had.
Last summer I had to make a bunch of decisions at once. The kind with major repercussions. And I reached the point where I could not make other decisions.
I was overwhelmed and when faced with any options my brain shut down. If it wasn’t going to matter ten years from now, I didn’t care.
It made me realize just how many decisions I had to make every day. And how stressful that is.
What decisions are weighing on you? Do they have to be made? Can they be automated?
Your energy is limited. Use it wisely.
PS. Do you know someone in the US who’s on disability and would like to get back to work, but is afraid of losing benefits?
There’s a little known program designed to allow people to go back to work part-time or try it out and see if they’re really ready, without risking losing their benefits if it doesn’t work out.
It’s called ChooseWork’s Ticket to Work and they have counselors to help with job placement. Apologies for the super judgemental name (do they not understand how disability works?) but the folks I’ve met who actually work with the program don't appear to have the attitude the name implies.