The Socialization Muscle

I’ve always been an extroverted introvert. 

For those who aren’t aware, extroversion and introversion doesn’t have anything to do with shyness or the ability to get along with others, it has to do with how you receive and expend energy. Introverts expend energy when they hang out with large groups of people. Extroverts receive energy from being with others. 

I expend energy when with large groups. With certain people, I feel like it’s an exchange of energy. My very best friends in New Orleans (Natasha), Chicago (Charles) and Nashville (Patti) are all people that I can spend hours with and come away feeling like I’ve had a chill afternoon with a good book. (Unless we’ve been drinking copiously, but you get the idea.)

When I teach group fitness, there are some classes, some groups of people, where I walk away feeling just as refreshed as they do. And many where I walk away feeling like a need a nap and a shower. Usually in that order. I don’t know what makes one more like a spa and one more like an intense race. They’re not always the classes you would think, either. I think some just require me to give more in order to teach the class to it’s fullest potential. And I think in some, the students are giving just as much energy to me as I am to them.

Regardless. I’ve always felt like I knew how to manage my energy. 

When Dean (extrovert) and I started dating, we had to come to an understanding that he was free to go to as many social gatherings as he pleased in a weekend, but I was good for one large party only. I could potentially hand out one on one with certain friends the day before or after a large gathering, but one gathering was all I was good for. After that, I needed recharge time. 

Then came 2020.

I’m not going to rehash the anxiety we all felt those first few months of adapting. Even those of us who were excited about staying home were freaking out and unable to enjoy it. So let’s skip forward. Humans are very adaptable. We adapted to this over the course of approximately 14 months. Give or take, depending on your comfort level and vaccination availability. 

I find now that I have no idea when my energy is going to plummet. I can be seeing one person or three people, if I see any manner of people two days in a row, I’m on the couch the third day and hiding my brain inside a book for at least six hours. Sometimes I can’t even rouse myself to go for a run. Then I beat myself up, because what’s wrong with me?

You have an entire day out there! You just spend a year all penned up! You’re not hungover! You’re no longer broke! Get out there! Enjoy life!

But I’m so, so tired.

And I thought it was just me.

Dean left town for his first vacation last week. He went to Peoria to see his family and I stayed behind to continue to adjust to my new awesome job and be with the cats. My parents decided to come visit me during the weekend that he was gone and I was very excited to have the house to myself for the first time in over fifteen months.  Dean was excited to be taking a trip, to be seeing his family and to be seeing two of his friends who were driving down from Chicago to hang out with him for a day.

The first part of the week for me was pretty normal. He left on a Tuesday while I was working and, other than the kitchen being a lot cleaner, him not being around to clean the cat litter, and no video game noises, things weren’t that different. Yes, there’s the usual stuff you appreciate when you have some privacy; not having to worry about waking your sig other up when you turn the lights on at five a.m., not having to pick up after them, not having to explain why you’re leaving things in a certain location, etc. But really, there wasn’t the overwhelming sense of space that I was expecting.

I didn’t get lonely either.

There were maybe one or two times when I missed Dean’s presence. Once I woke up suffocating. I’ve written before about having laryngospasms. They don’t happen as much, and I pretty much know what to do when they do happen. (Nothing, just try and tell your brain that you’re going to live and you’re only going to feel like you’re dying for 60 -90 seconds and continue to try and suck in air.) But it sure does help to have another person there. It’s odd that I can go for years without them now and I had one while he was gone. There were other minor things, nightmares and no one to turn to, but for the most part, I was fine.

I had a video call with Dean the day that his friends came to visit him. I asked him to tell me all about it. He did, but said he was super tired and that hanging out with people really drained him now. 

Dean’s a notorious extrovert Sagittarius everything. If he gets tired after hanging out with people, then maybe it’s not just me. 

The interesting thing is, I don’t have trouble teaching classes. I’ve been doing that since June 2020. Yes, I had to wear a mask and social distance, but otherwise, it hasn’t been that different. That doesn’t drain me. Seeing my parents is fine. But we’ve basically been in a bubble with them since the early pandemic days. These are muscles I’ve been working.

Recently, my friend Patti asked me if I wanted to go rock climbing with her and another friend (whom I had not yet met) over a weekend. I gave it serious though and told her that at this time, no, because I was seeing her on Friday and I was seeing another friend on Saturday and I had been burning myself out lately. She said that was smart. 

The funny thing is, in the Before Times, that would have been nothing. A single party would not have put me in a catatonic state the following day.  

I put this out there, because I’m beginning to think that I’m not the only one. And if that’s the case, then I can’t be the only one beating myself up about not being productive on those down days. I can’t be the only one telling myself to get a grip and start living. And perhaps we all need to give ourselves a break.

We should learn our new limitations and work from there. And also recognize that everyone is going to have different tolerances. Some people, with large families and essential jobs basically had lives that didn’t change. They were still working those muscles. For the rest of us, we should probably accept that things are different now, and that we need to decide which kind of muscles we want to build back.