It's 3pm. I realize that I should have eaten lunch two hours ago and haven't. I don't feel hungry, but I go and get a glass of water, and wander over to the fridge.
I stared at the fridge, unable to see - despite it having plenty of food in it - anything to eat.
I opened the pantry. Same result ... there's food there, but I can't see anything to eat. I nibble a few pretzels, but they aren't lunch-type food.
I wander back and sit down again, as standing is hard. Finish my glass of water. Then I remember lunch ... "I really should eat something, I guess" ... and get up again.
This time it's the stove that distracts me, it's sufficiently dirty it's about to grow legs, so I wave a sponge at it for a few minutes. Now it's cleaner. At least, I can see in spots that it's meant to be white.
Too much standing up, so I sit down again.
Now it's 3:30pm and I still haven't had lunch.
Needless to say, it's hard to look after yourself when you're like this. It's not that I'm not trying, but by the time I'm hungry I'm brainfogged and my blood sugar's low and I'm exhausted and in pain. Not surprisingly, my brain just won't latch on to the idea of making food.
I've been thinking of ways to cope with this. One is to keep ready-made food around. If I can open the fridge and see a pastie, or a sandwich, then I'm more likely to pick it up and eat it.
Another is to keep a list on the fridge of things that can be made in under 5 minutes. My list includes "tomato and ham sandwich", "two minute noodles", and "an apple". It might seem elementary when you're writing it down, but you'll need it later on!
On some days, I've been known to call up my mother, who lives 15 minutes drive away, and say "Help, I need some food!". Being the wonderful person that she is, she made chopped chicken sandwiches and sent them over with my eldest brother. On other days, my friends turn up for dinner bringing enough takeaway for all of us. I'm lucky to have such a great support network around me.
Do others have ideas they can share about how to cope with those times when the brainfog's stolen your mind?
Oh, and in the end I forced my brain into gear enough to get myself a peanut butter roll. I hate peanut butter.
