To think that some people need more downtime/rest or am I just lazy?

[The99th]

I have always been someone who seems to get overwhelmed easily and needs a lot of time to recover and rest from things - something like commuting twice a week to the office will have me exhausted and needing a PJ day at the weekend to recover. Even when I was a child I remember needing half-term to have lots of lazy days to recover from school. In primary school I remember that I hated if I had a classmate's birthday party on the weekend as that was my time I needed to relax at home (lol).

On the other hand, one of my best friends is constantly on the go. I don't know how she does it. She will rarely spend a day or evening at home. Last week, for example, she was out every evening after work with various plans - work leaving drinks, meals out with friends, staying at her boyfriend's house, staying at her Dad's house, then her Mum's house. Then she went away for the weekend, got back late last night and has started a new job today. In comparison I would have needed all of last week and the weekend to be quiet/chilled so I could mentally prepare for starting a new job...

I'm starting to wonder if maybe she has the right idea of things, and that maybe I spend too much time thinking over things, and maybe I need to stop thinking I need all these quiet days to 'recover' or 'prepare' - but the fact it's been since childhood may mean I am just wired differently to my friend?

Do you think some people do genuinely need more mental downtime (excluding neurodiversity as I know they do genuinely need more time to recover)?

Neurodiverse people often need recovery time after social situations, I'd say consider this as a possibility

No, it isn't about introversion. I'm pretty introverted, in that I need a lot of alone time, but that doesn't mean I have to be sitting on the sofa staring at the wall. I could be out for a run, or doing a beach litter-pick, or at the farmers' market shopping, or at an exhibition. I mean, it doesn't affect my energy level.

And yes, that's a good question -- what do people mean by spending a day 'chilling'?

Definitely. Everyone has to try and make things work for them without feeling guilty about it.

I'm pretty low energy but I love company, so I'm a bit of a contradiction. Sometimes I have to force myself to make the effort to go out because I know I'll enjoy it and feel better for it.

For me chilling at home usually means lots of time in bed or pottering around the house. Usually a nap. Reading/journalling. Light chores. I've often wondered if I have chronic fatigue as I'm very easily tired out. But no doctor has ever found anything.

I do have PMDD and ADHD so I wonder sometimes if it's part of living with those conditions.

I need a lot of downtime but I just accept that about myself now.

I should add, I used to be the person who went to the gym 4 times a week and came back into the office the next day after a holiday with jetlag feeling fine. Its like I burned through all my energy and I'm shattered now!

I think it's really good to have time staring into space not actually doing anything.

I don't always build this into my day but say, if I have a chance to not sit and read or listen to a podcast or play a game on my phone or organise something, say, when I'm on a train, walking the dog or waiting for an appointment it can be a good thing.

I find it beneficial to just drift off into my thoughts sometimes. Particularly for peace of mind, imagination and creativity. A bit of boredom, it often starts off with my thinking "Gah, this is boring, let's use this time to..." then I think "hang on a minute" and a few moments later I've gone into my thoughts and I'm not bored at all.

There is so much pressure not to waste time and to be always doing but I actually not doing to be beneficial. Sometimes I think of a solution to a problem at work, sometimes I reflect on a dream or think up a book plot. It gets my creative juices going which feels important to me.

We are all different and I think that comes as such a surprise to so many people, I'm not sure why?

I'm busy all week but I need time to myself. My husband is not so busy and he moves at a slower pace. We kind of meet in the middle and that's fine for both of us.

hairybrush, how rude you are to refer to anybody as 'dull'. People may think of you in less than glowing terms but hopefully they'll keep it to themselves.

I need recovery time after socialising so I'm more of a classic introvert, but when I was dehydrated/not eating very well/exercising regularly I could have written your post word for word. Not saying that's you, but my energy levels and ability to cope with 'doing' a lot has changed in a way I really didn't expect.

This thread makes me think of the one that turns up occasionally where it's someone complaining that their friend is too busy to meet up unless you book in weeks in advance - they think it's rude, I just think some people.like to be a lot busier than others and others need more downtime. Both of which could result in a decline to an invite for coffee!

I could never be constantly on the go. I'm amazed that people do exercise classes or the gym, or socialise in the evenings, and still manage to get up for work the next morning without feeling exhausted. At the weekends I make plans to do nothing, so if we have lots on I'll make sure I fit in a slow morning or keep Sunday afternoon free to wind down.

It's probably all out of habit but I'm also the sort of person who would nap every day if I didn't have to work, so maybe I am just a sleepy person.

Gosh how kind and thoroughly helpful of you.

I think I'm lower energy than lots of people in some ways. I was chatting to a mum who works full time as does her husband, she was saying how with doing all the housework and life admin in the evenings they rarely sit down before 10pm. If I had to do that I'd need to be medicated.

Not to your extreme but yes, I do need to.
I tend to only plan a max of 1 evening/ weekend event a week, and maybe one daytime meet apart from work. If we were out on Saturday, we probably wouldn't do anything Sunday.

DD is almost 5, and has just started school, she was insistent that she was having a lazy day Sunday. So we did. TV, colouring, a game, baking. That's full enough.

Oh, and at the minute, I'm sleeping 9-6/6.30 most nights. I stayed up til gone 10 last night and I'm yawning while working now.

I have to do this though, because genetically my neuromuscular junction gets damaged by activity and needs lots of rest to heal it. When I over do it I simply can't send messages from my nerves to my muscles so they don't work.

I am lucky to have recently found this out. Before that I judged myself harshly too. I expect lots more people will learn about themselves as scientific understanding of invisible conditions increases

Just because someone has less physical ability than another that doesn't mean it is a moral failing or lack of determination, it could be quite the opposite, that even the little they do takes huge determination

I have ADHD and go from being completely on the go and can keep going endlessly, but if I stop I can’t start again. If I go out socialising I need a good chunk of time afterwards to just ‘be’. However even if I’m sat on the sofa my brain is continuously shouting at me that I am lazy and need to do XYZ. And that’s exhausting in itself. My diagnosis definitely helped me understand I’m far from lazy
That's exactly me too. I'm always buzzing, multi tasking, on the go, doing quantity of things at twice the speed of others. I walk, talk, think fast.

But once I stop, usually at home, that's it for me! I just want to crash and not talk to anyone. I want to hide in a hole, undisturbed. Home for me is the place to do that.

My OH is always on the move from the time he wakes up to going to bed, but he does everything much much slower than I.

Well quite, but when the OP said she's excluding neurodiversity, I took that to mean she's excluding all other medical conditions too.

Maybe I was wrong to assume that.

I feel I'm busy really at weekends. I'd love more downtime (i.e. a three day weekend) and always manage to fill it. I do the weekly shop, have a good clean, sort veg patch, exercise, walk dog and do some sort of activity and frequently have family over too. I still don't feel these activities are 'my' time as they have to be done or are centred around the kids needs. I enjoy not having to work, but I don't feel particularly refreshed from them either.

I'm glad to sit down on Monday as I'm tired, which is the opposite of what it should be.

I couldn't be like your friend though. I'm not particularly energised by chaos and other people, which is why I spend much of the weekend sorting things out.

Of course they do.
Other people are hell.

I went out on Saturday and I'm still recovering from the public 😄

But my point is - I lived for other 40 years not knowing I had a medical condition that explained my struggles, and many others may be equally oblivious.

My DM is like this. Spends all her time sitting in bed reading and doing word puzzles, and dreads ever having to see other people. When she does socialise she can be absolutely charming, but afterwards she has to go straight to bed, and she complains for days afterwards about how long it all took and how exhausting it was.

I’m hardly the most energetic person in the world but any time I tell her what I’be been up to she rolls her eyes and says ‘my GOD, I just don’t know how you can stand to be so busy. Your life just sounds absolutely exhausting.’ Or makes sarcastic comments about how I’m such a social butterfly. I get really sick of hearing this when all I’ve done is meet a friend for lunch for an hour.

There are definitely high and low energy people. There are also people who are happy to go with the flow and cope with changes to schedules well and others who don't. My dh seems to need 48 notice of jobs doing and gets stressed by changing plans. Physical work seems to tire him out too. He's a planner. His parents and brother are exactly the same.

I am quite chaotic in comparison, on the go lots, long commute, long days, high energy and high stress job. Get twitchy if I'm in the house too long without plans and will find jobs to do. Impulsive, last minute. I take on too much then get overwhelmed and that can floor me energy wise for ages. I also don't see that coming until its hit me. I'm pretty sure I've got adhd.

I do think it runs in families. Sometimes you will get a 'poor fit' of energy within a family e.g. a kid with loads of energy in a low energy family, or a family that are out hiking miles every weekend, or playing high level sport and the kids not interested & the parent cant understand it. That's were the issue starts!

I actually agree with @hairybrush that that poster's husband did sound remarkably dull if his idea of a weekend day's activities was mowing the lawn followed by several hours of sitting down to recover from the exhaustion of it all. (Assuming the 'lawn' isn't an estate the size of Blenheim.)

And if he has two small children, he needs to consider that their needs may extend far beyond watching him put up a shelf and then watching TV for the rest of the day.

My friend who was this low-energy is now divorced, and being even lower-energy now that he can. His ex-wife is, I think, much happier single, even though she didn't initiate the divorce. Having young children with such a low-energy person must be absolutely depressing, and, all things being equal, is an appalling example to children.

This is interesting. How was it diagnosed? If you don’t mind sharing.
I completely shut down physically after I get exhausted. I’ve always been told it’s depression!