Well the plague finally caught up to me. I'm not sure what others experienced with it, but for me, it certainly wasn't the monster that had to be hid from. The worst part of it was the isolation I think. Being stuck in a room makes a fella feel useless. Although it wasn't a crazy bad experience, it did have one impact that took a long time to bounce back from....fatigue.
I have been getting up pretty early as most people who read this know. I will do a 20 minute calisthenic type work out, brew my pour over coffee; do some creative writing exercises; then this blog and hopefully finish with a few guitar scales before my kids wander up stairs. In order to do that I have to get the right amount of slumber. I really start to wear down if I don't; so that means that it's early to bed for me. The virus messed with my routine. I just couldn't get up in the morning, and even when I did I felt hungover.
I wear a Fitbit that has a sleep tracker in it. I don't know exactly how accurate that is, but it does give me a decent baseline for me to track how well I have been sleeping. Any sleep score over 80 is classified as good. Under 80 and it gives a score of fair. Typically, I use how I am feeling in conjunction with this app to determine if my sleep hygiene is on point. In the last two weeks, I had my alarm set as per usual but each morning turned it off. In the end, I would sleep 8 hours and still get a score of Fair. That lined up with how I felt as well. It just seemed that I could not catch up on the rest, despite the fact I lay around binging on Peaky Blinders for a week straight.
Just this past week I woke and everything seemed to feel "normal". Slowly I started winding back the alarm and happy to say...I'm back. I actually missed my morning routine. For anyone who doesn't have one, like me for the entirety of my adult life, I would recommend starting it. Get up a little earlier and spend some time on you. Maybe just some light stretching, some journaling, meditation, a walk....just something where you get some time with just you. It seems to set the day off right. It does impact your evenings. You will be tired earlier but it's something that can just set your day off right. If your days are good, that means your weeks are good. If weeks are good, then months, then years etc.
I haven't experienced waking up before the sun throughout the summer, and I am looking forward to that part. This morning birds are chirping, sun is pouring into the windows, and I am just finishing this blog off on time. The coffee is still hot and my guitar is calling so I am set to enjoy the day. Thanks for checking back in here...."See" you tomorrow!