A while ago I wrote about the history of “spoons” – the metaphor people with fibromyalgia use to explain how people with chronic pain allocate their limited amounts of energy. Today I want to go into a bit more detail to explain the idea, AND tell you why it doesn’t really work for me.
The concept of spoons goes a bit like this (and I’m not a ‘spoonie’ so sorry if I get it wrong); different activities take different amounts of spoons, or energy, and in the same way that you only have so many spoons in your kitchen draw, you also have to decide how best to allocate your energy throughout the day. Let’s say an upcoming day looks like this (with the spoons you’ll need in brackets): shower (1); walk dog (2); write letter for work (1); emails for work (1); vacuum house (2); clean bathrooms (1); make lunch (1); write report for work (3); make dinner (2); watch TV (1).
On a good day, you’re going to get through all 15 spoons. On a not-so-good day, however, you might feel like you only have 10 spoons worth of energy – you will have to prioritize. You might decide work is a must, so those 5 spoons HAVE TO get done, so you lose some of the chores to make it happen. Or else, you might have organized people to come to dinner, so the cleaning and dinner prep are going to be what you keep, but you’ll drop some of the work elements and the dog might have to wait until tomorrow. Now imagine it’s a really bad day, and you only have 5 spoons to spend…
The reason why the analogy doesn’t work so well for chronic migraine is because migraine is a different kind of beastie… if you have a flat-out-almost-unconscious-with-pain style migraine, then you have NO spoons to use… and no forks to give when it comes to what should be a priority… you’re not getting out of bed for anything or anyone… you just can’t.
If the migraine is bad, but not super-terrible, then it’s still not about energy levels. It has more to do with various pain-triggers. Vacuum? Nope – too noisy. Walk dog? Probably not – the exercise is too much too soon. Make dinner? Ahhhh, no – the smells might trigger another vomiting attack, and besides you’re not hungry. Work for the boss? No can do – you’re not going to be able to sit in front of the computer and draw down on your cognitive abilities… yet. So, that leaves showering and cleaning the bathroom and maybe watching TV (assuming it’s not too loud or flashy).
So, you see, the spoons model doesn’t work too well for me as a way of explaining why my energy runs out faster than others – it’s complicated by the tongs and spatulas tangled up in the energy-drawer.
While reading The Brainless Blogger, however, and her post about productivity and chronic illness, I realized there’s another way. As the mermaid-haired-blogger points out – we all get 24 hours in the day. She explains the distribution of time in her own way, and it’s definitely worth a read, but here’s my summary of what’s going on for me…
A ‘normal’ person might sleep for 8 hours, work for 8 and use the last 8 hours to do chores, relax or do creative pursuits. All up, that means they have 2/3rds of the day to be productive, and 1/3rd to be at rest. A ‘sick’ person, however, needs the same 8 hours of sleep, but knows they can’t pull off an 8 hour work day, so they might aim for 4. Similarly, there are limitations on how many chores and other activities they can get done before they run out of steam, so again, they might aim for 4 hours. In between those up-and-about activities, they will potentially need to rest, nap, or just slow down. This means that the proportions are reversed; 1/3rd of their day is productive, whilst 2/3rds are required for rest and rehabilitation.
It means that even on our good days, we’re way behind others in what we can produce. It makes us sad and frustrated, but we’re doing the best we can do. What’s important to remember, is that if you are on the more ‘normal’ side of the ledger – we all have the same amount of AVAILABLE time, but you have access to a lot more energy, and therefore PRODUCTIVE time than we do – so, without sounding snarky; don’t take that productivity for granted and don’t judge us when we can’t keep up.
For those of you on the ‘sicko’ side of the equation – keep doing the best you can – you’re doing great.
Take care, Linda xx
The Mindful Migraine 
Leave a reply to The Mindful Migraine Blog Cancel reply