Sometimes Pushing Your Body Is Refreshing

My schedule has been pretty busy lately. 

In the last several weeks, I have started two internships, which means working 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., four days a week.  Being a chronic student, I have never really had to work a full-time schedule before.  So having a more traditional job is totally new to me.

Before I started interning and I had a little free time, I decided to push my body physically, and walked at least 10 miles in a matter of two days.  It was sort of planned and sort of not.  I went a little overboard. 

When it comes to work days or activity days, I don’t always feel it until I stop moving.  Like I can go, go, go, and the minute I stop, it all hits me. 

But even with that, I forged ahead.  Call it stupidity or tenacity or whatever word you find appropriate…

Of course it’s only good until your body bottoms out, which I knew it would.  But it took an entire week before it all hit me, and then I felt like I had been hit by a truck.

I was of course reminded that life isn’t as it used to be. 

And that my go, go, go and never stop attitude and behavior that I really prided myself in before I got sick doesn’t really work anymore.

It is nice to be able to push my body, to see what it can and will do…and what it won’t do.

I think it’s really interesting how we move through different phases of life and how we have to figure chronic illness into that.

In terms of pure physicality, I’m still learning my limits.  Obviously some days are worse than others.  I’ve also learned my limits in terns of social activities, which has taken a long time (which is the subject of another post).

And now that I am working a full-time job, there are new issues to deal with and balance (also another post).  Of course, I am fairly exhausted, so one of the first things that always seems to go is my exercise routine.

I’m still trying to figure out where and when exercise comes in, so I’m kind of glad that I overhauled it before I started working.

I think the only way to know your limits is to test them.  I really wasn’t sure what my body could handle, so I threw as much as I could at it.  And ultimately, I sort of regretted it.

But on the other hand, pushing it was kind of refreshing.  It made me realize I could do more than I thought I could, and it actually took longer than I expected for everything to come crashing down.

This is not something I plan to do all that often, but it is a good way to assess what my limits are at any given point in time.