no spoons here

This morning I had a horrible feeling of heaviness to my body and a slowness in my mind when I woke. This is familiar... but thankfully not too common.

It signals that I am in a low charge state. Despite the expected overnight recharge function of sleep, supposedly the body's chance to recuperate from whatever energy expenditure I put it through yesterday, a good slumber for eight hours or more has not worked.

It's as if my charging cable, like those I plug into my e-reader and phone for an overnight top up, wasn't connected properly, and failed to supply any new energy at all.

Consequently, instead of now feeling at 100% and raring to grab the day by the wotsits, I will head to the shower on just 15% energy saving mode, in the hope of some magical revival properties being bestowed by the stream of hot water and the curious and slightly magical smell of the coconut shampoo bar.

For me, the way I describe how the availability of energy feels to me is a logical metaphor that we can all understand, now we are all used to our smartphones and other devices that depend on a rechargeable battery for their continued functionality.

However, I see the term 'spoonie' all over social media, used by sufferers of sometimes invisible chronic illnesses, like my MS, to refer to the fatigue and lack of stamina that such diseases can have as a symptom, for anyone struggling to understand.

I have read the story about using spoons to try to explain energy costs of activities and finite available reserves to those who don't have these problems.

I've never gone with that one. It has always seemed a convoluted way of doing it.

As I understand the story, it was about the author having dinner with a friend, so perhaps I could go with the idea if the explanation revolved around forks better. 

Imagine the things you could say if it was forks.

• "I'm low on forks."
• "I am completely out of forks."
• "I'm sorry, I can't spare the forks for you right now."
• "Frankly, I don't give a fork."

That would be much more fun. Especially in noisy and busy places. 

But to be fair, smartphones - and people having to get used to daily recharges - weren't around at that time. It was in 2003, when you probably had an everlasting Nokia phone that you charged once at the beginning of each month, whether it needed it or not.

These days I generally liken the typical daily activities to apps, let's say the Outdoor Exercising, Gardening, or Go Out Talking to Friends apps, and will tell you these apps are obviously a lot heavier on the battery than some others, like the Sitting Quietly Reading, Listening to the Radio, or Having a Cup of Tea apps.

So you can probably see that, having woken up at 15% battery capacity today, there's no way I can make use of the high power requirement apps, like Going for a Bike Ride - which will burn through a full battery at a hell of a percentage per hour - until I get a good  recharge in, preferably back to 100%. I have to resign myself to bumping along in energy saving mode, using low processor cycle stuff like the Lying on Sofa app, with occasional attempts to start up the charging function via the Sleeping process.

The operating system will now dim the screen and lower the processor speed to make sure it can eke the limited power out for as long as it can, and hope that a working charger can be found very soon.