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We walked four miles yesterday. But it was at the halfway point, stopping at a café for a latte, that my energy levels first collapsed.

Ever since my return home in the afternoon, I have been overwhelmed by the most extreme fatigue, begging me to sleep all day.

Others would say to me, “This is highly unusual. You need to get it checked out.”

But for me, it’s just part of the cycle. I’m a week off my next injection. I am in the trough at the very bottom of that bell curve, waiting for my next top-up.

If this doesn’t sound very satisfactory, you’re right. It’s no way to live your life.

I’ve told my GP that I believe the spacing is all wrong, the effects waning at the eight-week mark, leaving me to languish unnecessarily in a pit of melancholy and lethargy for another month.

To me, it’s like the difference between a 4G and 5G signal. I’d much rather small doses regularly than this long wave which causes a crash every two months.

Still, it’s better than no intervention at all. It’s in these moments that I recall my undiagnosed youth, when everyone used to say of me, “I don’t know what’s wrong with him. He just won’t get on.”

God bless my wife for her patience with me through all these years. As for my employment: I thank God for the comforts decreed for me, enabling me to work more-or-less undisturbed.

I could never have made it up there, where I find my peers and siblings. But what we have is sufficient for us, alhamdulilah. By God’s great mercy, we have all we need.

This lethargy can feel suffocating at times: this exhaustion and pervasive melancholy. It’s difficult to explain to those around me who have never experienced anything like it.

But I don’t blame them. It’s difficult to suffer a friend like me. God bless those who have been so patient.