Train
Twizzle • 12 Jun 2024 •
In 2004, I was stood at the train platform waiting for the 16:45 to commute the hour back home. I remember staring into space, my head throbbing and my body feeling too tired to move. I wasn’t able to put my finger on the exact reasons for feeling so ill, but I just felt tired to my core.
“If other people felt as bad as this, they would be signed off work…” I remember thinking.
The train arrived and I climbed on finding a rare window seat. I put on some music and closed my eyes, settling my head against the vibrating glass. The music began to make me cry. Not big tears, wailing or howling, just a quiet welling up of emotion that overflowed down my cheeks.
I made sure no-one saw me in this state and by the time I was back home, I had returned to being the happy fatherly figure I always had been. The ill crying train man had been replaced with the outgoing, funny, helpful dad and husband.
It was depression. I just didn’t know it at the time.
I had a similar feeling today as I sat in Starbucks, squinting at my laptop screen, trying to muster up enough energy to work through a spreadsheet I needed to update. There were no tears this time, just an overall apathy and deep felt tiredness. Perhaps this is what burnout feels like, I wondered.
Can relate. I had similar episodes recently too during the burnout, and the lockdown years before that. Darn tough, and doubly so being a father. Take it easy, mate ✊