no good

Where have I been? I’ve been going crazy…let me tell you. But really, I’ve been sick. Super sick. For the first time in two and a half years I got full blown sick. Have I felt worse before?, yes. But being this kind of sick after feeling so “healthy” for so long, I swear that I felt I was a weak prisoner in my own body unable to do the things that I would normally be doing, like working out.

I think it all started last Sunday when I did STRIKE!, my first big cardio workout after the holiday break. After class I went home and took a two hour nap! I understand that for most people this isn’t news, but for me it is a huge. I never take naps, ever. In fact I can probably tell you the last time I took a nap, prior to this one. It was October 2003. I was home in Albuquerque and went to the Balloon Fiesta in the morning, and was planning to drive back to Denver that day. After getting up so early in the morning and coming back home I was tired, and thought it be best if I take a nap before beginning my 6 hour drive back to Denver. So that is what I did. And that was the last nap I took prior to last Sunday. The whole sleep during the middle of the day thing just never really appealed to me.

Anyways. Monday was 50/50, no big deal. I think I started actually feeling ill on Tuesday, but convinced myself to go to Barbell Strength that evening since it’s only an hour of weights. Wednesday the pain began. Sore throat and body aches and chills. Combine the body aches with all over body soreness from 3 days of intense working out and I was hurting from head to toe…literally. Specifically my arms and legs, and my hands, and my head…ok well all over really. Everything hurt. So Wednesday I went home early from work, came home took another nap and went to bed early. By Thursday afternoon I thought I was on the mend. The mornings are always the worse, and by the afternoon with drinking lots, and sucking on cough drops, Thursday afternoon seemed good. I thought about doing some cardio at the gym, but I also knew that doing something intense as STRIKE! would just about be impossible. When I got home, my couch was calling my name just as it does every afternoon, but this time I gave in. I was hoping Friday would be even better, since it seemed as though I was making headway on Thursday. No such luck. Friday was the worse. I went to work in so much pain. By this time I have the body aches, the sore throat, headaches (which I rarely get), runny nose, and hot/cold flashes, with the overall feeling of weakness. I get to work and people notice I don’t look too hot. I call the doctor because I know that going on day 3 of this thing, I need some drug to kick it, and get rid of this sickness once and for all. At around 10:30am I speak to my boss, and go home. I come home sleep for two hours before my doctor’s appointment at 3pm. Dr (Nurse Practitioner, anyways) feels my throat and says “does that hurt?” I respond, no. needless to say you can see the left gland of my throat poking through my neck, and I didn’t even realize it. They check me for strep, negative. Nurse says I have a “strep infection” writes me a prescription for an antibiotic.

At this point I have it in my head that I’ll be feeling 100% by Saturday night…24hours after being on the antibiotic. Friday night I go over to R’s house (more on him later, he’s the flavor of the week) who is also sick with a bad cough…I’m thinking we got sick together over the New Year’s Eve weekend.

Ever since I’ve been taking the antibiotic I’ve been improving. The mornings are still the worse, and I’m still sleeping a lot…although no more naps. Because of my large glands in my neck, I can’t take a full deep breath or swallow yet without some pain, when I can do that I’ll definitely be doing some cardio! Instead I did get back in the gym tonight (finally) and did a super light workout of the treadmill and some weights. But wow, did it feel good to be back in the gym and sweat! I felt missed, and I saw a handful of friends I haven't seen since before the holidays.

Starting off the year with a whole 6 (count ‘em SIX) days without working out, I’m already concerned about how I will make up these days. And how I am going to get in my 20 workouts for this month. The fact that this is the first month, and this has happened has me freaking out. A coworker says that I should do 2-a-days …two workouts in one day, a morning and a evening. I could see this happening, just not in the winter months with the days so short. I know that I’ll be fine, and that I shouldn’t freak out about it, but I do. I can’t even remember the last time I went 6 whole days without working out….probably sometime in 2008 I imagine. Being truly sick, and physically unable to workout as made me appreciate the times in the past that I have worked out for the simple reason of the fact that I can workout. And will no doubt motivate me in the future when I don’t want to workout. I just need to tell myself that I’m going to workout because I can, because I know that there are people out there who want to workout but can’t.

If anything I miss my gym! The last full week I had at my gym was 4 weeks ago…I miss seeing my friends and I miss my workouts so much! Going through being sick, and seeing that my number one priority to getting better just so that I can workout, shows me that my life has changed. Again, all of it such a weird concept to me, because I just figured I would never be this person. But I’m happy that I am, and am looking forward to getting my life back pre-strep infection!

treadmill 35min
chest