If there’s anything my illness taught me, it was to pace myself and know when enough is enough, and that all will be ok, even if I don’t always do what I planned to do. About an hour ago I was sitting in a cafe plugging away to prepare for my Dare to Automate teleseminar tomorrow, and I ran out of steam. So I stopped. I felt my body say, “OK, that’s it Joan!” (Have you noticed greater atunement to your body too?) I packed my stuff and came home.

And, then I remembered I told Rosalind I’d post tonight. So I sit with my laptop back on my sofa and write what’s on my mind and share what’s going on at this moment rather than craft the message I had planned.

When your body says “no more,” do you pay closer attention than you used to? I’ve learned that needs tending will be there when I’m ready, and some seemingly pressing commitments often fall away.

Joan

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One of our basic tenets in Women, Work and Autoimmune Disease: Keep Working, Girfriend! is that it’s more difficult to get back to work once you leave for any period of time. Your skills are likely to become obsolete, you will have taken yourself off any career path you may have been on, and you may not be taken seriously by some. Plus, you’ll be older!

The author of the magazine article, Rebecca Berry, in briefly sharing a couple of the stories, mentioned the following “success” factors:

1. Confidence in your ability to be successful
2. Networking to meet people who can help (when you’re ready to go back)
3. Ask for introductions from your friends
4. Volunteer first; then start looking for a job
5. Do whatever you can to be involved in extra-curricular activities to combat isolation during the time you’re not working.

Can the above success factors also apply to women who had to stop working due to illness? What’s different about our situations? I think you might agree that factors 1-3 can certainly be applied, but I’m less certain about suggestions 4 and 5. It’s certainly not easy to volunteer or engage in fun activities when you can barely walk due to pain, fatigue or diminished physical capacity, but would factors 4 and 5 be good bridge-builders once you feel well enough to make social commitments, but before you’re ready to get back to work?

As I write this I remember that, even when I wasn’t feeling well and couldn’t do a lot of things that required any amount of physical exertion, I sometimes attended seminars I was interested in. I brought my soft cozy blanket with me so that the air conditioning didn’t aggravate my symptoms, sat in an aisle seat near that back of the room and let the course leaders know I might have to take more frequent bathroom breaks. I also didn’t attend anything that started too early in the morning.

If, in caring for your health, you have been out of the workforce and are feeling discouraged, you might get inspiration from Emma Gilbey Keller’s The Comeback. You can also check out an action-oriented job finding book, Get Hired Now! ™ by C.J. Hayden and Frank Traditi. it will guide you to identify your “stuck area,” to select projects to help you get unstuck, and to create an action plan of your own design, that can help replicate the success factors above.

Joan

P.S. Last week Rosalind wrote a great post about our invitation to discuss what you agree with and don’t agree with regarding our posts. I ditto that!

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It happens to all of us, doesn’t it? You’ve said you’d get something done and you realize that what’s going on with your body is creating mush in your brains, making it difficult to fulfill on an intention. You can perform where you absolutely have to, but try to push when you’re tired, and it’s practically painful.

It doesn’t happen often, but last night some low level grade of worry kept me from really getting to sleep. I think my body eventually won the battle with my mind at about 2:30 am.

This is my week to post and today was the day I’d planned to write my post. However, because of other projects and appointments on my schedule today, and my mush brain, I simply had nothing to write. I couldn’t find my inspiration nor did I have the capacity to do some research to uncover something current and relevant. That happens some times, right?

Thank goodness I have a partner here. I sent a short note to Rosalind and admitted my complete lack of thought about what I might write about today. She made a couple of suggestions, including what I’m writing about here (the other two ideas would have taken too much brain power).

How does any of this tie into our book, or the challenges of living with a chronic illness? Sometimes we get really, really tired! And, being the good soldiers we are, we may push and push and push, more committed to the external promise than honoring what’s going on with our bodies. If I’ve learned anything from those times when my body just wouldn’t support my lengthy to-do list, it’s been to stop pushing. And, to stop trying to be so compliant. (I didn’t send my newsletter out today either, though I meant to.)

In my coaching business I work with self-proclaimed perfectionists. I smile when they tell me this. I know the tendency well. That’s another thing my illness has taught me; to stop being quite so concerned about what others will think. It’s really hard to “look good” when prednisone gives you a moon face, or you forget your words, or you’re running to the bathroom several times a day!

Like I said in the subject line, too tired to post … at least much more than the truth of today.

Joan

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There are so many questions to answer to make such a determination. Today, I offer you some things to think about if you think this might be a good solution for you.

Let’s start with the health stuff:

-Do you have the energy and mental functioning (I know what some meds can do) to be up and out of bed several hours a day?

-Do you have some reserves in savings, someone else in the household to handle the bills while you ramp up, and/or access to a loan to get you up and running?

- Do you have access to health coverage if you don’t work?

If I were to put forth my opinion, I think you have to have sustainable energy to get started. It takes a lot of consistent effort to get something up and off the ground. A good financial base would come second as the last thing you need is more stress.

Now, put your health aside for a moment:

- Do you have a dream to be independent, or have an idea that is better implemented out on your own?

- Could you, eventually, make more money on your own than at a job?

- Do you have a skill or talent that would lend itself to success in a particular business?

- Are you someone who is generally optimistic when the going gets a little tough?

Some people fall into self-employment, and some deliberately choose it. One of my very favorite clients is what I like to call “an accidental entrepreneur.” She became quite ill (prior to us working together) and in order to keep working, started working from home. She’s a mortgage broker so it was fairly easy to conduct work this way, and her employer was understanding. After tasting the freedom of working from home, she decided she liked it, and made her independence a more permanent arrangement.

This woman I describe would not have thought she had it in her to go out on her own, and may not have if she hadn’t become ill. She would probably have told you that she didn’t have all the skill an entrepreneur needs to be successful. Truthfully, that was her misguided view of herself. She is committed to customer service, has very high standards of integrity and excels at putting together good loans for people. She was most definitely trustworthy. So, she had the right stuff; she just didn’t know it. I still remember her asking me if it was ok to make her own rules about how she ran her business. You bet it is!

Like all things new and different, it eventually requires a leap of faith, one you take when the pull to give it a try is strong enough. I did it over 7 years ago, and it’s not always been great, but most definitely worth it. I’ll not go back “inside.”

What about you? Would you like to? Have you already? (I know some of you have.) If you have, how did you decide?

Joan

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