I’ve now entered the second month with this cold.

I’m much (much!) better than I was, but still have the occasional cough, runny nose and husky chest (channelling my inner darth carolbaby). And a Giant cold sore (second of two Giant cold sores). And cuts and nicks all over my hands which are taking an age to heal. And my skin is horrifically dry. In essence, I’m falling to bits.

GAH!

I speculated during the week that stress is manifesting itself physically, which I guess is preferable to being a mental wreck. I don’t actually feel at all stressed, but perhaps I would if I was not ill.

Rather than wallow in it, I’ve attempted to do very gentle things to slowly improve my health. Last Saturday for example, I took a gentle 45 minute stroll around the neighbourhood. This felt glorious during and after. Unfortunately the next day my cold symptoms returned with a vengeance – so perhaps even gentle strolling is too much.

killer slow stroll last weekend

Possibly allergies to pollen and such? I’m giving it another week before I head to the doctor.

I think this inability to recover is what I get for ever-so-slowly letting exercise fall by the wayside. First I abandoned running, then weekend cycling, then the daily 100 pushups|situps|squats, then cycling to work, then yoga, then the exercise bike, then walking to work. You get the idea. That and my formerly quite disordered eating have left me much (much!) less healthy than I realised.

Last week Vincenzo and I recently re-instituted a health and wellness challenge in our team and dragged out the template we used from July 2016.

A sample of my activities from one of the weeks:
+ Run > 5km
+ Bike ride > 40km
+ 100 push-ups

You what now? My mind, it boggles – 3 years later and this level of activity seems completely inconceivable.

My sole focus for August is to become well! And perhaps ramp up to some gentle activities in September.