How Everyday Activities Can Affect Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: Waxing

In the past few days, I've been having off days… but today's was a different kind of right-off.

Today I set out with a small task to make life easier for myself, and that was to wax my legs, so I don’t have to shave them during each bath (I struggle with baths).

A couple of weeks ago I purchased a wax set. I didn’t shave for a couple of weeks as this allowed the hair to grow in preparation for waxing. This morning I decided to get the wax set out and start waxing.

I spent most of the day doing it, as once I started it I wanted to finish it, but after 5 hours on and off, I gave up. I couldn’t physically and mentally continue - the fatigued had creeped up on me and hit me full on, I realised too late that doing this should have been an easy task, but alas, for me, it wasn’t. It has caused me acute pain, intense fatigue, e.g. a crash.

This is the challenge with my chronic health conditions. Anything I do takes so much longer than otherwise…and most things I try cause me pain, fatigue and anguish. 

This evening I am now in absolute agony, my back kills, my body feels like I it’s being crushed, every little movement I make quickly reminds me of my chronic illness, and reinforces that I have to live with acute pain, and I now have huge limitations on what I can do and can’t do.

Why was I waxing at home? I am attempting these tasks to simplify my everyday life, but I am finding simple tasks designed to make life easier actually make my life harder. And it is so depleting….it’s heart-breaking - it's a kick in the teeth and it reminds me that my body is broken; I am disabled and I am never going to get better.

As I am sitting here in acute pain, I am angry with myself as I didn’t notice I was pushing my boundaries – I missed my baseline before it was too late and I had most definitely crossed that line. All I did was sit and attempted to wax my legs. I look back and reflect on why this simple task had caused me to have a crash… ?!

Chronic illness is really hard. It takes over me and my life, it's really controlling, and it is really painful. I'm angry with myself for not being more careful - I should have known that waxing my legs was going to be harder than just writing them off as a simple chore that I can do later. Today is a lesson learnt, I have to listen to my body, and I must take more notice.