Thursday 21^st May 2020

I’m ill currently.

Luckily this isn’t Covid but relates to a long running medical condition.

I need to be ultra careful what I eat. I can’t process fats properly so if I do eat even a sensible amount of fat, I start retaining weight a day or two later. That’ll go on for a couple of days, and then I’ll have a stomach upset and drop a ton of weight. If I don’t combat it successfully then those booms and bust happen more often and I feel worse.

This might not sound too bad but the fluctuations really impact me.

My weight tends to trend upwards even with just eating sensibly, but the biggest problem is the impact of the massive fluctuations. If you think to the last time you had a stomach upset, you probably ended up feeling drained. I feel like that with each weight drop and if I’m not careful I’ve not fully recovered before the next drop occurs.

Exercise helps me, but even then I need to take preparations. If I’m doing a tournament, I prep for a week before, lowering weights and upping calorie intake slightly. I will then have a week of recovery during which my physical capability drops 10-12%. During this time I’ll just feel mentally and physically exhausted.

Stress compounds the issue. It’s a multiplier that I have to actively mange so it doesn’t tip me into a downwards spiral.

As a result, the odd bad day or restaurant visit doesn’t take too long to recover from, but if I’m not careful it can build up

With lockdown, I’ve been unable to see my nutritionist nor go to the gym. We had a couple of weeks where meat was hard to find. As a result I ate meats that don’t agree with me – pork, lamb and some beef. I’m a comfort eater so I didn’t do myself favours with a few carbs to lift my mental state once or twice a week. Nothing crazy but with my diet I have to be perfect; really good isn’t enough.

As a result the regularity of feeling drained has slowly crept up and up. Like everyone I’ve gained covidweight, some of my muscles have tightened up through atrophy (such as hip flexors), and I’m spending a lot of time at my desk.

A quick fix for me can be an energy drink. I keep to sugar free, but they can sometimes get me over a hump if I’m feeling a bit ragged. I recently swapped to a new one that was a lot healthier but even then I was only doing it once or twice a week at max.

In the end it’s just been masking a building illness. I feel rundown and lethargic. I’ve little concentration or focus. That matches how a lot of people feel in lockdown but with the stresses of keeping family safe during lockdown, I think it just tipped me over the edge.

I have just no energy yesterday or today, no focus, and need a couple of days to just let things settle so I can build myself back up. If I can slow down the yo-yoing of my weight, I can start to improve.

It’s not going to kill me, and there are bigger worries in the world right now, but I hate feeling like this. It’s like having a really bad hangover. I don’t feel like doing anything and I need to keep busy for my own sanity.

Hopefully, this is the worst and I can start improving from here, no matter how slow. I hate flare-ups.