At the end of my rope

I'm having a hard time. I've been working hard and grading everyday non-stop, and I was on campus all last week and will be all this upcoming week, and today -- with a big pile of grading that must be done by tomorrow by administrative fiat -- I just can't make myself grade the damn pile.  I'm not ignoring work, by any means.  I've done a zillion other things that needed to be done.  If I did ignore work, perhaps I'd actually be getting myself in balance and feel in better shape.  No. I feel shaky and low.  I'm just having trouble digging into this pile.  I'm just overworked and unable to take any time off, and I hate this.  Just hate this.  I don't have time to mourn Paris or any of the other cities being terrorized.  I don't have time to be with my partner and son.  I've sequestered myself off, and here I am blogging instead of grading. 

Long ago, when I was in grad school and working on my dissertation, I used to waste a lot of time.  I thought of myself, essentially, as lazy.  I still think of myself as lazy, though I now recognize that this is a habit that doesn't have anything to do with reality.  Nowadays I don't waste a lot of time.  I still have trouble with transition points, but this quarter I've just pushed myself to go from one thing to another.  Still there are times I just can't push myself forward, and I recognize that these are times when pushing myself means getting sick.  Today, I recognize I desperately need time off and totally deserve time off and totally will not be getting any time off, and this makes me really really grumpy bitchy, which is not a good way to start a week where I have a ton to do and have meetings with people who I'd like to scream at for not doing their share and letting it all fall on me.

Now, of course, I am playing the victim a bit -- and I need to learn to say no and let things get done poorly or not at all by others.  If I don't learn to say no then I'll be the one doing things poorly or not at all (unusual for me -- but getting things done poorly in order to get them done?  check!).  But I can't say yes from now on because I'm going to get ill and stay ill and it's not worth it.

I have some plans to talk about all this with my chair, but none of that will address this pile in front of me.  I have to remember what a joy it is to read student work.  And I don't have to grade the writing of anything I'm reading, which is also a joy.  But I do have to do it.  And I still feel like shit.  But I am NOT staying up late to get this shit done.  So I better get started.

This helped, sort of.