I knew that this week was coming. It’s a big project at Dotcomm and the roll out was scheduled for November 11th. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that I’d be working more hours this week.
Now there’s no way that I could do the 16 hour days of yesterday. That just wasn’t going to happen. But I figured there would be 10 hour days and missed lunches. The question was, how was it going to affect my pain plan.
Monday was Veterans Day so that was a scheduled day off. Since it was the day before the “Go Live” for Google email, we decided that we should come in and make sure everything was ready to go. So I came in about 8:00 and stayed until 2:30 to work on documentation. So that day was fine. Not a big deal other than it being Veterans day and I had places to go and things to do!
For the rest of the week my boss said to plan on 9 hour days. Starting at 7:00 am. and ending at 5:00. Yesterday I came pretty close to that. I was here at 9, worked through lunch and left at 5:30. Not the kind of day that I had planned. I ended up cancelling my evening plans so I could reset up for today.
And with that schedule I also skipped my walking and doing hardly any stairs. So I was setting myself up for failure. To top it off, we had a lady up here with the Linus cloud of perfume. Chemical Sensitivity and allergies were on the war path. My limbic system was on full alert. Thank fully an email to my favorite Physical Therapist at the Pain Management Program helped to get me settled down.
So what are my take-a-ways?
1. I can challenge myself but don’t forget the system. Keeping the pacing program in tact is what will make tomorrow a better day.
2. Be mindful of what I am doing to myself. Don’t catastrophize when your testing your boundaries.
3. Be aware of others. If you are in a situation different than normal it’s likely that others are facing changes too.
I don’t mind doing the long hours as a one off. But this isn’t for me for the long term. I’ll have to keep that in mind as I consider long term goals.
s