Weary to the bone

The last few days have been pretty rough. My company had a 2-day seminar for visiting clients, and Wednesday was spent setting up for it. Actually, all week was spent setting up. Thankfully, I only worked at job #2 on Monday night, and I don't have to go in until 4 tomorrow.

Seminars and trade shows are grueling for normal people, but for those with chronic illnesses, they can be torture. There's no getting around a profound lack of sleep, physical exhaustion from overexertion, and worry about food. I need a minimum of 8 hours of sleep in order to be able to function nominally, but that rarely happens when you have to be somewhere before 7am to set up.

For this seminar, I slept in my own bed (even though it required a 45-minute drive at ungodly hours). I had the option of staying at the hotel with one of my co-workers, but I am terrified to share a room with someone. I never sleep well in hotels, and I like my suggested roommate too much to subject her to my high maintenance. Sleep for me almost always requires some kind of medication, and it doesn't always work when I'm in a different place. And if I don't sleep, I try to read or surf or watch the Weather Channel until I knock out. Not really conducive to someone else trying to get any rest.

And then there's the food thing. I would have been mortified if I had been in and out of the bathroom all night. Food is always dodgy at these things. Breakfast is usually pretty safe (bagels, fresh fruit) but lunch and dinner can be scary fried things off of the buffet. Add a few drinks to dinner or after dinner and it's a recipe for disaster. The best part of this seminar is that, other than the cocktail reception last night, I was not required to stay or entertain for dinner.

After helping pack everything up this afternoon, and taking a colleague to the airport, I was able to get home by 4 this afternoon. I went right to bed. Every joint in my lower body aches, and I'm completely exhausted. So exhausted, in fact, that I'm having a hard time sleeping now. I should have asked H not to wake me up at all, but I was afraid that if he didn't, that I would wake up at 2 am starving and eat something horrible.

So, how do people with Crohn's survive at trade shows? Pain killers? Not eating? Not drinking? I just have to grit my teeth and get through it. I do have a theory about the diarrhea, though. There have been many times, and this week was no exception, that I was extremely stressed out and having a flare. However, I didn't have any urgency or embarrassing moments while I was in public. Of course, when I got home, all hell broke loose. Oddly enough, I wasn't even really crampy. Was I just so distracted that I didn't obsess over it? Is my colon so well trained that it only wreaks havoc in my house? I've noticed the same phenomena when I am on plane flights, regardless of the length. Does adrenaline play some part in slowing the process?