I am truly blessed with my health. Outside of the occasional old man twinges, my body never hurts. I very rarely get sick and when I do it’s typically very mild. I can count on one hand (with some fingers left over) the number of times I’ve been too sick to get out of bed over the past 10 years. Now that I think about it, I’m really capital b Blessed. Or maybe it’s all caps (BLESSED).
So when I get the sniffles or a slight chest cold, it doesn’t impact my running. I’m still getting out there and knocking out my miles. I know you’re not supposed to exercise when you’re sick, but I ignore the advice. I’m not running hard workouts so my runs aren’t taxing my system too much. And I do what I can otherwise to get better (extra fluids, sleep). Basically, I just deal with things until I’m back to 100%.
Earlier this week, I went against my normal routine of ignoring not feeling 100% and cancelled my strength workout. I had started feeling rundown on Sunday and while I felt well enough to go into work Monday, I wasn’t feeling great when I got home. I wasn’t feeling bad, mind you. Probably like 90% of normal. I’m now starting to wonder if I was using that as an excuse to not workout or whether it was the smart move. In reality, it was probably a coin flip between the two choices and if that’s the case I probably should have just gone ahead with the workout. I’m still at the very beginning of my program so it’s only taking me about 15 minutes to do my 4 exercises. So not a major amount of stress to my body.
The other consideration is that I’m still so new with the strength training that it hasn’t become a habit yet. I was 4 for 4 on my M/W/F schedule before missing Monday. I ended up doing the workout yesterday so it’s not like I’m completely off track. However I’m heading to Florida for vacation soon where I’ll likely miss a couple more workouts. So it’s a bit of an uneven start for me here. I did have a great run last weekend before I got sick so I’m encouraged that these workouts will do what they’re supposed to do and make me a stronger runner. I just need to keep knocking them out.
How do you decide when you’re too sick to workout?