What is wrong with me? Lazy? Depression? Hormones? Endocrine? I need to change my life but I don't know how

The Coffee Shop
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Endocrine? Hormone? Depression? Bone Idle Lazy? I don’t know what is wrong with me. I have no focus. I can’t seem to stick with anything anymore. I can’t seem to change. I am about 75 pounds overweight. Barely working. Can’t seem to make decisions for myself.

Ten years ago I was focussed on my career. I was working full belt at my job, doing well. I was really good at what I did. The environment was stressful and I relieved that stress by taking classes at night – anything from Ground School for my pilot’s license to computer programming to wood carving. I was up early every day and out the door early. Always first or second in the office. Always one of the last to leave. In a word, driven. It didn’t matter what it was, I went at it all out. But I was 40 years old with a body fat of >40%. Complete couch potato. I could run about 20 steps before starting to wheeze. On the fast track to a heart attack.

Joined a gym. Got a personal trainer. Started getting in shape. Stumbled into triathlon (had to Google it the first time I saw the word triathlon). Work was getting crazy stressful. I took it out in the gym. My very first intro to tri (half of a sprint tri) I was hooked!! Huge smile was plastered all over my face. Couldn’t remove it if you tried. Spent a year doing every sprint tri in my local area getting fitter and fitter as I went. A friend did an Ironman that year. I had never heard of Ironman. Wow. Big challenge. Huge! No way I could do something like that – which was all it took for me. I wanted to do it. Needed to maybe. Signed up.

Did my first Ironman the next year. Signed up right away for another. This is great. I love this stuff. Body fat is now around 15%. I am fit. I love this feeling. After two Ironmans in two years I signed up for two the following year. People said I was nuts but I loved this!! In three years my life has completely changed!!! I loved that I could swim or ride or run “forever”. I wasn’t fast or anything but I was in the top quarter of my age group at Ironman. Even had a few podiums at shorter distances. More importantly, it felt so good to just be out there being active!!!

But something happened. After that second year doing the Ironman race, suddenly I couldn’t seem to do the workouts anymore. I would get changed into workout clothes and then just sit staring at the door. I started gaining weight again. This went on for about 6 months. During this time I tried different depression meds. None of them helped. I fought back, dumped the drugs and got back into training, lost the weight I had regained and did the two Ironman races that year but on the second one I had to really talk myself into showing up at the starting line. By the end of that season I was so down I didn’t really care about anything anymore. I was in a dark place.

I don’t give up easy. I didn’t know what was wrong. I signed up again for the Ironman for the next year. Training and racing was the one thing that made me happy. I started back on different depression meds. I trained for the race. There were no big gaps in my training, but it was lacklustre. I could feel something was missing. I did the race but it was slow – even for me. I came in about the third quarter of my age group. There was nothing there.

A month before the race I was let go from my job. Downsizing. I was secretly thrilled. I wasn’t enjoying it. Of course, I wasn’t enjoying anything. After that I didn’t work for a couple of years. Tried various meds – nothing seemed to work. I couldn’t seem to get motivated to train. I couldn’t get motivated to even look for work.

That was a couple of years ago. Right now I am off meds. I am working now. In debt up to my eyeballs from not working so long. I keep trying to train but can’t seem to train with any consistency. I am back up at about 45 to 50% body fat!!! I can string some workouts together but then it falls apart. At the beginning of the summer I started out with 20 min walks as a workout and over the course of the summer worked my way up to some 2 hour runs this fall!!! Yay!! Really slow runs, but I told myself the speed would come back as I got fitter and started losing the weight. Then it stopped. Again. I am back to walking. This is so sad.

I keep trying to regain my fitness. I keep trying to motivate myself to take back control of my career. I can’t seem to keep any sort of focus. It has affected every aspect of my life. It makes me so sad to see what has happened to me. I have lost all sense of confidence in my ability to do anything – career or fitness. I am a complete and utter wreck. I am mortified of failure. Terrified I will be found out to be a fraud.

I don’t know what is wrong. I am at that age for women where hormones become an issue - but my doc says my hormone levels are fine . He is focused on depression. I know I feel down, very down, a lot of the time but I have tried depression meds – a bunch of different ones and they seem to help a little at first but then the good affect fades and I am left with blah. I get the same good affect for a little while when I stop them. I can’t seem to focus. I don’t have the relentless drive that I used to have. I want so much to change but can’t seem to. That sounds so incredibly pathetic. Sigh… I don’t know what is wrong with me.

Any ideas of what to do? How can I dig myself out of this pit I have crawled in to? I want so desperately to change.

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Here’s how I would attack this:

  1. Make sure you get a full physical from your doctor to rule out every possible medical reason for this situation you’re in. Make sure he checks your iron, B12, thyroid, etc levels.

  2. See a nutritionist and come up with an eating plan. Our bodies change as we age and we need to eat differently. A good nutritionist will help you with this and eating properly all day long will boost your energy levels.

  3. Don’t set your previous activity level as the goal for your new life. Realize that things have changed and adjust your expectations. Commit to being active for one hour 5 days a week. Even if that’s just a walk, do something 5 times a week for an hour. Also think about finding new challenges, like rock climbing, mountain biking, pilates, etc.

  4. Think about speaking to a therapist. Yes, it’s expensive, but it can really help you sort through what’s going on in your head and it’s worth the money, IMO. You are certainly not a failure. The fact that you state that so openly in your post tells me that you need to talk to someone. Even if you go once a week for 6 weeks, I think a good therapist will help you make some progress.

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After cancer my fitness, motivation, and depression yo-yo’ed a lot. If I couldn’t run fast I didn’t want to run at all. One thing that helped me was picking something non-triathlon to get back in shape. That way I didn’t have the pride issue of being slow. I became a master of elliptical machine. bought “insanity” and p90x videos that I could barely do. About six months later I was in good enough general shape to feel like I was actually running and not shuffling. And that made me more confident at work! Motivation and depression are tricky stuff so what works for one person might not work for another, but it might. good luck.

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Thanks Dawn. I currently get B12 once a month. But a complete physical would at least help me wondering about what might be wrong. I will book one today.

I have been seeing a therapist. Very expensive -especially when you aren’t working! I am full of motivation to change for about an hour after we talk but then like everything else it fades… But it is helpful and something I didn’t stop even when there was no money coming in for so long.

I need to work on eating better. Definitely. I know that will help. I just can’t seem to stick with anything…

I need to just HTFU I guess. That is something I could do in a heartbeat before… I specialized in going the extra mile.

I will keep trying. Thanks for taking the time to read and reply - it was quite long…

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i don’t know the answer, but i sure hope you share it with us when you find it. i struggle with the same myself. a few thoughts:

-i’d double the suggestion about a medical, especially the thyroid check. i’ve got thyroid disease, and in the past, thyroid problems have manifested depression, fatigue, frustration, etc.
-sounds like a lot of your self-identity/self-worth has been tied to your achievements/work - that can be healthy but can also leave holes. maybe it’s time to pour some energy into something like volunteering?
-this isn’t popular to say on slowtwitch, but (and i’ve said it before!) there’s a big difference between fit and healthy. people can be very fast and relatively unwell, at least for a while. and although triathlon training and racing can be very good for you, i frankly don’t think ironman is. especially if you’re not allowing HUGE amounts of recovery between races. exercise is a form of stress, and you piled that on top of work stress in big doses for a long time.

good luck with the journey. you’ll dig yourself out, for sure. keep us posted!

-mike

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“I need to just HTFU I guess.”

Nope. I don’t agree. You have a problem. You are possibly depressed. You need to work through this problem just like you would with anything else. It has nothing to do with you not being tough enough. Stop putting yourself down. You have done amazing things in your life and you are going to do more amazing things in the very near future. You just need to deal with this problem, so you can start living again.

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Hey wonder,
Hah… I bought P90X. Didn’t do it, but I have it!!! You are right… Maybe something new where I am supposed to have a learning curve would help me get back in shape. I always wanted to cross country ski. I don’t know if they make skis for people my shape (quite short and incredibly overweight).

After cancer… wow… makes my self-imposed problems sound pretty lame. But I am glad you made it through and you are here to tell the tale. Congratulations!!!

Thanks for the ideas!!

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I’ll agree with the medical suggestions as well as the therapy. DON’T let the doctor simply say “Yep you’re depressed, take these and call me in a few weeks…unless you feel like killing yourself, you have nausea, diarrhea, cramps, headaches, dry mouth…then call me…and I’ll give you something else.” In my personal opinion drugs without some level of therapy, for most, is simply a crutch, putting a band aid on the problem. Yes there are occasions where there is strictly a medical condition to blame, I think that is the rare case however.

My own experience has been that life is not simply about “Pushing yourself” thru things. I think we live in a society that simple EXPECTS people to do, act and live a certain way. Some are completely happy and easily fit that “Societal mold”, others, well not so much. Worse yet, few if any fit that mold perfectly.

I think it’s easy to push yourself thru life for a while. I think the pattern may even be typical as illustrated by your experience and the stereo typical “Mid life crisis”.

People see that they are supposed to be what is expected of them. This “Expectation” may be from parents, friends, family and or society as a whole. Often this means “Work hard”, “Become successful” and the “Successful” part can mean anything from money to good looking. We end up “Pushing ourselves thru” to meet all these expectations…many of which are not our own expectations.

So we spend the first 20 or so years of our adult lives “Pushing ourselves” thru life to be “What is expected of us”…and then we start to realize that we aren’t doing anything that is indeed who we REALLY are and aren’t living the life that we REALLY want to be living. That’s when the wheels start to fall off.

Some people never hit this, some people are actually living the life they really want to be, or simply close enough that they never hit this wall. In some ways this makes sense as likely these “Societal expectations” are the result of the “Norm of society”. Some people simply suck it up and continue to “Push on thru” and then others hit the wall like it seems you have and what I have experienced.

For me the answer that I found was two fold, rather simple to state, EXTREMELY difficult to implement.

First, simply accept who you are. You are who you are, you’re at the place your at for a reason, you feel the way you do for a reason. In the end that’s all that really matters. Not what society thinks, not what family thinks, but what you think.

Second getting out of this place is rather easy as well. Simply find out what your “Purpose” in life is. Find out what it is that you REALLY want to do, where you REALLY belong…and go there.

Again, very easy things to say, very difficult things to do and for some, maybe impossible.

For me I started at a place where I had really spent most of my life concentrating on “Societal” expectations so much that I really had no idea what I REALLY wanted to do and or where I really belonged. None, zero, nada. It took me a very long time to even figure that out and a longer time to have any idea what I really want to do.

In a lot of ways I feel like I’m 18 again trying to figure out “What I want to be when I grow up”, except this time I’m being guided by “What I REALLY want to be when I grow up” rather than a HS guidance counselor saying “Well gee you’re good at math…here’s your list of shit you should do when you grow up”.

~Matt

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I guess I went from being overweight and unhealthy to being fit and unhealthy. I can see that I was never really healthy… well maybe a little in the middle. But yeah - too much stress and I suppose I crashed. Big time. I need to find a middle ground that can work for me.

Thanks Mike. Will let you know if I find the right formula.

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Thanks Dawn. I am tough enough. I know that. I have lost my way. I am hopeful I can get through this, it is just that I have been trying for so long. But I keep trying. Thanks so much for the encouragement!!

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Get to the doctor. Get full blood work done. About a year ago, similar things started happening to me, I was still working out and in great shape, but could hardly get my ass off the couch to do anything else. Everything suffered - work, family, etc. I was thinking at first it was depressions, so I got in immediately for a checkup and found out my thyroid had basically shut down. On synthroid now and feel 100% better. Had a 180 degree turnaround in about 60 days.

I am not saying that is what is wrong with you, but my guess is that the root cause of your issues are chemical, which has then led to some behavioral and mental issues (basically - feeling shitty about some new bad habits as a result of your body being off kilter). Get to the root cause first, then address the other things.

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You sound overwhelmed. I meet a lot of people that simply cannot focus or stay organized therefore they accomplish nothing and feel like failures. There have been a lot of good ideas above so I am going to add something simple. Each morning make a list of what needs to be accomplished. Divide that list up into 3 areas, must do, good to do, no big deal. Complete the must do section first. Do NOT get sidetracked. You need to turn your life around and that starts with baby steps. Build your self-esteem up one day at a time. Most of us have been where you are at one time or another. Hang in there.

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Wow! Mid life crisis??? It never occurred to me. But… maybe… yeah… it does kind of sound like that. When I discovered triathlon - my first race - it was like a light turned on. But at 40+ I suppose it was a little late to become a real triathlete.

I have no idea what I want to do. Last year I did the whole career counselling/interest survey thing… Nothing jumped out at me. I really don’t know what I want to be when I grow up.

I am not happy now so I need to figure it out. In the past I got through things by just putting my head down and working hard. Crazy hard. That isn’t working any longer. Maybe I need to find my bliss. I agree with you… easy to say… Insanely difficult to do. I spend a lot of time worrying about what is right for everyone else. Time to think about me. What I want.

Glad you figured it out or are on the road to figuring it out. And thanks for the thoughts. They struck a chord with me.

Good luck with your journey Matt!!

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He did check thyroid a while ago. He said it was a little low but within normal range. But I am making another appointment to see him and get everything re-checked. It can’t hurt to check again.

Glad you are better!!! Thanks Skippy!

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Yes definitely overwhelmed too. Almost to the point of stopping me dead in my tracks. Lists are good. I do make lists. But the idea of splitting them into groups and working on the must do first sounds like a good plan.

Thanks so much!! I am going to go make a list right now!!

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He did check thyroid a while ago. He said it was a little low but within normal range. But I am making another appointment to see him and get everything re-checked. It can’t hurt to check again.

Glad you are better!!! Thanks Skippy!

Do your own research on thyroid, the range values on standard blood test forms don’t account for individuality. What was “a little low”? What was low, and what was the actual value?

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Lots of good advice here. After the Dr. visit. Start digging out of your pit one shovel-full at a time. Set new goals based on where you are now, not by what you did before. You don’t like the pit so stop digging. Good luck.

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x2 on the thyroid, my wife has been dealing with that for several years. Lots of good advice here, I would second the advice on charity work. It can be a nice break from career pressures, and lead to new opportunities.

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I probably shouldn’t answer this at work because I’m sure I’ll be crying by the end of it.

First, when you get your physical get your cortisol level checked. Extreme stress can cause it to get too high and the side effects are what you describe. Unemployment and financial instability are one of the most stressful times in anyone’s life. You probably haven’t recovered from that.

Now on to the hard part. I will share my own journey that I’ve just started in the hopes it helps you. I’m not trying to hijack your thread but I do think my experience will give you some guidance.

Matt gives exellent advice but he is right, it is hard to follow.

Seven weeks ago my husband left me. Our marriage wasn’t perfect but while I was committed to the vows we made to each other 15 years ago he was not. We haven’t seen each other since he walked out the door. The divorce will be final the first week of January.As you can imagine this has destroyed me. I was completely non-function up until about 2 weeks ago. I am finally able to make it through a whole day without crying. Not every day but it has happened.

The vision I had of the rest of my life is now gone. We had developed our own interests so my identity wasn’t completely dependant on him, or so I thought. My hobby was triathlon and ultra running. I was proud to call myself an Ironman and long distance runner. That was important to me. Turns out it wasn’t as much of me as I thought it was. My primary identity was as his wife and partner. My plans for the future were known and secure. I knew where I was going to be until I died, by his side. We talked about moving to a warmer and sunnier state. We talked about getting out of corporate America and simplifing our lives. We talked about renting an RV and driving all over the country together. Now none of that is going to happen.

This has left me at a complete loss as to how I am going to live my life. I am restarting at the age of 42. But, I am slowly coming to the realization that the plans we made I can still do on my own. I don’t need him to move to a warm and sunny place. I can simplify my life without him. I can even take a solo crazy roadtrip across the US and finally meet some of the great people on Slowtwitch. I don’t need him to do that.

So now I need to figure out what it is I truely want to do. I have many supportive friends who are forcing me to get out of the house at least one day on the weekend and an evening or two during the week. That has kept me moving forward. That has also allowed me to see I have my own identity. I am being reminded of who I am through the conversations I have. When people ask me if I’ve been running, which I haven’t, or which race I’m going to do next I am reminded that I am an athlete. When people as me how my pets are doing I am reminded I am an animal lover. I have signed up for a Jog-A-Dog program at the local Humane Society as a way to give of myself, help save a dog and reconnect with the athlete in me.

I am taking baby steps and that is what you should do too. No one is suggesting moving across the country or quitting my corporate job just yet. I am not making any radical changes by my own choice. I refuse to suddenly do something that isn’t me like getting breast implants, becoming a cougar, moving to Hollywood and trying to become a star. Never wanted that so why would I now?

I know I love animals. I know I love running. I know I need to get rid of the chain that is tying me to corporate American. I know I can’t stand living in crappy weather and need to move to the desert. I know I love to spend time with people but also need time to myself. It has taken 6 weeks to reconnect with those and take my first step by walking into the Humane Society to ask them to let me take some dogs for a run.

Now, in week 7, I am starting to plan how to get rid of the house that is chaining me to my job (see my multiple home improvement threads). I am refinancing my car to lower the monthly payments to make it easier to affort to live simpler. I am starting to have a clearer vision of my life for the next 6 months. That’s as far as I can think right now, a year is too far away and too scary.

My advice to you based on the worst 7 weeks of my life is this:

  1. Get the right therapist. Without mine I would still be crying 10 hours a day and unable to get myself dressed and showered in the morning. I also have been able to see how I can get through this with her help.
  2. Think baby steps. You don’t have to solve everything now. You don’t need to be an Ironman next year. You don’t have to be an athlete of any kind. You have value without those things. Try to connet with the true reasons why you did them and find a way to plan to get there again, in your own time.
  3. Look around your home and see what you love. Is it a book on the shelf? Your cooking pots and knives? Is it art on the wall? Your old running shoes? Maybe a pet? Those are pieces of who you are. Pull the book off the shelf and read it again. Research the artist and find something else of theirs you love and get it. Take a cooking class. Buy new running shoes even if you don’t use them. Whatever works to get you to reconnect to those things.
  4. Forgive yourself. When you do you will see that you didn’t fail. Your life has changed whether you wanted it to or not. That is a fact and you cannot escape it. That doesn’t mean you have failed, it means you have a new path to walk and you need to decide where it will go.
  5. Spend time with friends. They will get you out of your own head and give you a break from all the demons that are playing around in there right now. You need a rest from that and they can provide it for you.

Mostly, know you are OK as you are. You don’t need to be an incredible athlete or a success at your job to have value. Value comes from what you put out into the world. It comes from your relationships, from putting your best self forward. It comes from helping others succeed and by extension you succeeding too, however you define success.

I’ve made 3 trips to the bathroom to hide my crying. That crying comes from my own recognition that I’m not following all of my own advice. Time to get on that.

I hope this has helped.

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Lot’s of great advice - all I have to add is that maybe you’re not really into running/triathlons/fitness anymore . . . that’s cool

Last summer I woke up one AM with a stomach ache - and late that night I was in surgery getting my appendix ripped out. After 4-5 weeks of not being able to bike or run I swore to myself I’d never miss an opportunity to ride or run again.

Then, when I did recover and could resume full activity - it was no I’m not really interested in that any more - - no more running shoes/shorts/ high tech fabrics - - - I’ve gone fully primal. long walks, quick sprints, squat thrusts and pushups and other calisthenics, sandbag ‘workouts’ and etc. - all in street clothes or whatever I’m wearing or wherever I happen to be and whenever I get the urge . . .

a few years ago I decided to learn how to sing (OK be willing to sing) and play guitar - music is great because you can play with others and there is no end in sight

I bet you will find something that gets you going - before then, seek the advice suggested by posters above.

Good Luck!!!