Energy Levels

Every time I go to the doctor and they ask me if I have any complaints, I say: "Fatigue." And they say: "Oh good, so nothing has changed!" I've been feeling tired for so long that I can't tell if it's normal or something I should worry about.

When kids were little and sleep was interrupted - it made perfect sense that I would feel tired most days.

When the pandemic happened and I was stressed out - it made sense that I would feel tired.

Kids are older now and many things are easier, but there is still a lot of anxiety (kid-related, work-related, life-related, health-related). We also have fairly busy lives (work, house chores, kid-related activities, making sure everyone is fed and clothed, etc) - but nothing too extreme. 

I just always feel  tired and sleepy. By 6 pm, I feel so completely drained and exhausted that I can barely keep my eyes open. Once I get to 8 or 9 pm, I typically feel slightly better. It just seems like I have some weird energy "collapse" around 6 pm. Which is a problem because a lot of kids activities are happening around then... 

I need to do something to improve my energy levels; I need to resolve both the 6-pm collapse and the general fatigue that I feel all the time. 

Maybe I can try and figure out a way to get more sleep. I mean I think I get around 7.5-8 h most nights but maybe that's an overestimation? I need to track this....

Maybe I could build in more exercise into my day (typically, exercising = going on walks) - hard to do right now because work is so crazy and then we've got the the usual cooking/cleaning/driving kids to activities stuff. But I need to try, even if it's 20 minutes of playing badminton with kids...

It could be age- and hormone-related. Not much could be done there except adjusting expectations.

I should probably get my thyroid levels checked.

Dear Reader, what's your energy level like? Is there anything special that you do to combat fatigue?