Hello darlings!
I was diagnosed with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome last year, but I’ve been suffering from it for about two years now. I run my own business and this condition has definitely had an impact on my work.
Running a business with a chronic condition is like running two businesses at once; the business of your body and your actual business. You're running on a treadmill and yet, somehow, you’re still running out of track (okay, perhaps a running metaphor isn’t the best when addressing those with chronic fatigue).
This blog post is part of a three part series; fatigue management/business practice, planning and my current setup. I've split this post into two parts, fatigue management and good business practice, going through the basics that I wish I'd known when I was first diagnosed with chronic fatigue.
Fatigue Management
I'm starting with fatigue management instead of good business practice because you need to prioritise yourself otherwise you won't have anything left to give to your business.
Early in your fatigue journey, it will be useful to identify fatigue-slump triggers, if you have any. In order to do this an app is probably the easiest way (in this day and age!) to track your fatigue levels and find correlations. I have been using Bearable for the past year or so.
It's easily customisable so you can alter it to suit your own life, and there are lots of variables if you're struggling with multiple health conditions. Weekly reports help to keep track of your condition and you can also bring up charts of your daily activities and symptoms to identify triggers.
I keep track of my daily mood, brain fog and anxiety, daily routines, period cycles, symptoms, sleep and, of course, levels of fatigue. I haven't personally identified any triggers, but it's useful to see how often I hit a 'slump' and incorporate that knowledge into my plans.
On the same track, it's also useful to write down everything you do in a day- if you don't do this already and you have CF, you'd probably be surprised how much time you spend resting! I'm sure there's another app you could do this on, but I use a physical diary to write up my daily schedule.
I write down every activity I've done (whether that's personal or business-related) and how long for. After several months of doing this I was able to identify when I was most productive and what time I hit a fatigue slump in the afternoon. This, again, helped me when planning my days.
If you haven't heard of the spoon theory I would recommend reading up on it, especially if you're early in your fatigue journey, as it's a really useful metaphor that you can use to help yourself and also explain your condition to others.
I'll cover this a little more in my 'planning' post if you want to know how this theory can help with planning and scheduling your days.
Finally, in order to live a full life without letting your condition rule you, you need to identify the things that are worth getting fatigued for.
Early on in my fatigue journey, I didn't do anything at all, because I was so worried about feeling exhausted that I conserved all of my little energy and didn't leave the house. This made me miserable, which only added to the fatigue and the slumps.
Trust me, you will have more energy in the long term if you do more things that you enjoy. It's worth identifying these things; for me, going to the theatre, seeing my boyfriend and mooching around charity shops all help to invigorate and inspire me. So, although these things do take energy and may result in less work being put into your business, it is worth it. Because after all, you have a chronic condition that isn't going to go away- what's worth getting fatigued over?Â
Now that we've covered the basics of fatigue management, we can move onto...
Good Business Practice
There are so many different types of businesses that I'm sure things that have worked for me won't apply to yours, but I will try to keep this advice relatable and ambiguous.
First and foremost, communicate with customers and collaborators. You don't have to tell them why if you want to maintain a professional image, but do tell them if there's going to be a delay. I tend to bury my head in the sand when I'm fatigued and overwhelmed and customers lose interest and I miss out on orders.
A simple pre-written 'placeholder' message can keep your customer content and eagerly awaiting your next message (when you're less fatigued). Something along the lines of how busy you are and will get back to them shortly- you still may lose customers, but I think a message like this that you can write when you're not fatigued is better than leaving them with no response at all.
For those who deal with physical products, it's a good idea to look into potential passive income streams. I'm talking about books, tutorials, lessons etc. where you don't need a product to actively ship out but will consistently make you money in the background. Look into options related to your business and what is currently selling well.
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Hope this post helped and gave you something that you can build from! Next week I will focus on planning and some tips and tricks I have learned over the past couple of years to stay productive.
Until next time,
Aisha x
2. Planning
3. My Current Setup
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