In Sickness and in Health

Saturday I rode Death Machine for 3:18 and then did a little running afterward.  It was cool out, 50's is all.  I have the gear to ride in weather like that, and I was completely comfortable.  When I was done, though, I seemed to have developed a dry cough and the beginnings of a sore throat.  I attributed it to the cold weather riding.  A few hours later, I also noticed my entire patootie was sore, dumbass, you don't just ride a new MTB that long and not expect it!  I may need to get a different saddle for him.  But I digress.

I went to dinner with some friends, and we had a rollicking good time.  2 I hadn't seen in quite awhile (yet more people I inadvertently alienated last year while depressed), and then Lori.  I thought maybe she would get sick of me because this was 3 weekends in a row we'd spent time together!  We had a great dinner of sushi.  I had beer, the rest had wine.

When I got home, my throat felt worse.  I'd already started on the Zicam drops, but that night, I was barely able to sleep because my throat was so sore.  I'd planned to ride with Blane on Sunday, but that was clearly out.  Sunday I spent the day being completely miserable, barely able to do anything much except lay around and watch TV.  When you are in heavy training and the bottom drops out and you can't do it, you don't know what to do with yourself!  Kind of like a taper.

I began pumping in my usual medicines--Alka Seltzer Plus, cough syrup (I had Vicks 44 laying around), and cough drops as needed to help with the throat.  My throat improved on Sunday and I no longer wanted to off myself.  That was the worst sore throat I have ever had in my life!  I began asking around to see if this was the "going thing," and indeed it is.  But that doesn't help me any.  I'd already planned to take Monday off from work, and now I would be sick.  At least on Sunday I managed to make the muffuletta that I'd bought ingredients for a few days earlier:

Work has been very busy as many of us are working on HIX customers, and it's a series of daily calls for status checks, ensuring the customer's issues are being worked well, tons of email, making sure everyone is happy (such as it is), and it's generally high pressure because this stuff is very visible.  While I had a colleague covering for me yesterday, I still wanted to attend the 2 primary calls just to stay up with my customer.  That's how it goes when you do the job that I do.  Sometimes.  Usually I can just be gone and not think about things.

Well, I joined the first call and tried not to talk, as my voice was pretty much kaput--porn star quality, though!  Over the weekend, things had blown up somewhat, and I really can't go into detail here, but I wanted to be sure I made a statement as to the disposition of that particular issue.  So I did, only I didn't realize a certain person was on the call.  Nonetheless, I didn't say anything that hadn't already been sent in a public email, but the dude I didn't know was on the call said, "We are already spending fucking tons of money."  Yay!  My first F-bomb on a customer call!  Luckily, I am the queen of the MUTE button on my phone (I use my land line for these toll-free conference calls because the quality is unsurpassed and I know nobody can call me while on there), and it was all I could do not to laugh hysterically.  I got support from my colleagues on the call, and we carried on.

After that call, I had a doctor's appointment, because I just wanted to be checked out in case I had something bacterial, and also I'd decided I wanted an inhaler just to keep my lungs in tip-top shape.  I've done this before, and the reason is that when I was a child, I had repeated episodes of bronchitis, and it has scarred my lungs (it shows up on chest X-ray), so I'm a little vulnerable when things move into my lungs.  The doctor checked me out and pronounced me OK as far as lungs, throat, ears and nose, told me it's viral, and then she obliged me by writing the script for the inhaler.

After that, I made a trip to Toys 'R Us to look for various things, and found 2 new friends for Iron Man:

They were having a special buy one Iron Man 3 thing get the second 40% off, so of course I got them both!  They make quite the crew, don't they?  Then I stopped at the UPS Store to mail some things to my friend, William, who had recently sent me some T-shirts from his coaching company, a Rudy Project winter hat (I LOVE Rudy Project), and an articulated HULK!

Finally, I picked up my inhaler at the drug store and headed home.  I wasn't feeling too too bad, except I was all jacked up from the combination of drugs I'd taken.  My body is very sensitive to antihistamines and ephedrine and norepinephrine, and I was a bit jittery, my heart was racing a bit (at the doctor my BP was way up and she was alarmed but I explained why), and I had a whopping headache.  I decided that I was well enough to terminate everything but the inhaler.

I attended one more call from work, and then I needed to lay down, which I did, and probably napped a little bit--not really sure.  I really needed to mow my lawn, so around 5:45 I finally went outside and did that, and the gasoline fumes made me choke, but I got it done.

The headache was pretty bad, but I knew it wasn't sinus based on its location.  So I finally got an ice pack and iced my head!  That helped a lot.  I got a good night's sleep last night, and while I still have a bit of a cough, my nose is no longer running like a faucet, and as you can see, I am up early again.  I decided to take today as a sick day, although I will probably participate in some calls at work.  I also am going to try doing a light workout, as I am beginning to feel creaky!  I need to move around, even if it's just to walk, but I think I can at least jump on a bike on the trainer and spin for a little bit.  So I definitely am on the mend, I am through the worst of this, and hope to be good as new by Thursday so I can get in a long run and then of course, the weekend's long rides.

I had several well-meaning friends try and tell me to take this or that for my illness, and while I appreciate their input (because some of the things I forget like get my usual vitamins), I know my body really well and that I can't really put too many foreign substances in there because I do have pronounced systemic reactions to them.  Typically when I contract something viral, I can do full-strength medicine for one day, and then I have to taper off because the reaction I have to the drugs is worse than the disease.  It has always been this way for me, and my Dad was the same way.  I had to take something initially just for symptom relief.  And this time was no different.  Sunday--all the drugs.  Monday morning--all the drugs, but then I cut them out mid-day.  Today, just inhaler as needed.

The only GOOD thing about being sick is that when you feel well again, it feels AWESOME!  So I am looking forward to that, and I think it's maybe a day or two away.  In years past, I might have tried to push it in terms of working out, but I know that would be suicidal at this point, so I am just rolling with it.  Next week is a planned rest week anyway, so I guess I'm doing an early taper!