First of all, let me begin this post by saying I feel like a total fraud. A phoney. A fake.
Why? I named this blog page ‘Active, Healthy, Happy’ because that’s generally what I am! However if you were to define ‘healthy’ as ‘not sick’ then I have not been ‘healthy’ at all lately. Based on recent months, this blog should really be titled ‘Trying to be active but keep getting sick’. I have not been this sick, this often for years!
Several weeks ago, I wrote about getting back into exercise and how I had been on-off sick since I returned from my European holiday. My health issues had been constant but minor over this six-week period, nothing took me out of action for more than a few days. If only I knew what was just around the corner….. this week I have been hit by the mother of all colds and flu’s. I’ve barely left the house in days! I have had hot/cold sweats, a killer sore throat, severe coughing, muscle aches and completely lost my voice. I hadn’t been hit with the proper ‘flu’ for years and can’t say I am happy about it!
Obviously my immune system is severely weak and I’m currently working with my naturopath to get back on track. What caused this to happen? I can only guess, however I believe the stress I was under juggling a lot of different balls around the May/June/July period simply wore my body’s defences down. Even though I have put measures in place to combat this recently (see ‘Stress Free Sunday’ blog post) I think the last six months is catching up with me now! My body is telling me it’s time to rest and I need to listen.
Which brings me to the topic of sleep. Sleep and stress are linked and both have conflicting views in society. While is widely acknowledged that sleep is important to our overall health, there is also the public perception that people who sleep too much are ‘lazy’ and ‘undisciplined’. The same with stress. Again, people know that too much stress is bad for them, however it’s cool to be ‘busy’ and you see many people raving about how ‘busy’ and ‘crazy’ there life is like it’s a badge of honour.
All I know is when I get too busy, I get stressed and then can’t sleep. Or is it I get busy, then can’t sleep, so feel stressed? What came first the chicken or the egg?? While I am generally a very good sleeper, I know over the last six months I have not been getting enough due both to being busy and feeling stressed and anxious. Over time, this has accumulated and now I am paying the price.
Rather than write about the benefits of adequate sleep myself, I thought I would share a ‘TED’ presentation with you. I’m sure many of you are aware of the TED website and their presentations on various topics. They have some really great speakers that are worhtwhile checking out http://www.ted.com/talks In this case, they look at the importance of sleep. A beneficial 20 minutes!
On watching this presentation, I thought it was really interesting to see the culture of how people view the importance of sleep has changed over the years. From sleep being considered an essential process hundreds of years ago to more modern quotes such as this:
‘Sleep is a waste of time and a bad habit left over from our caveman days’ Thomas Edison
‘Sleep is for wimps’ Margaret Thatcher
‘I’ll sleep when I’m dead’ Bon Jovi
You see this negative thought process regarding sleep all the time in the endurance sports community. It’s like a competition, who can get by on the least amount! If someone says ‘I got up this morning at 4.30am to do a long run’ then somebody else will go ‘Well I got up at 4am!’. Those who sleep later are deemed ‘soft’ and those you get up in the middle of the night are lauded hero’s and ‘inspirational’.
While there is nothing wrong with getting up that early if you have given yourself an early night and had enough sleep, generally people haven’t and end up digging themselves into a hole. I have found over the years that if my sleep patterns are well adjusted and I give myself a ‘sleep-in’ every week, then I stay healthier. I am then able to string together weeks and weeks of continuous, consistent training, rather than getting sick all the time. Some may call that ‘soft’ but I am able to train harder and go faster than when I was living the lifestyle of extreme early morning starts four or five years ago. I’m happier too 🙂
Anyway, after a few years of prioritising sleep and staying well I must have thought I was invincible and fell back into the pattern of burning the candle at both ends around May. Ironically I had more hours available to me in the day, however due to lack of sleep I was inefficient in what I was doing. Long term, this has come back to bite me in the bum and my health is now suffering. I have made significant changes in the last couple of months, but it has been too late! My immune system is seriously depleted and I think it only took this long to come out and manifest as I eat very well.
Insufficient sleep over the long term can lead to chronic illness as well as mental burnout, I am lucky to get away with ‘just’ the flu. Don’t think it won’t catch up with you too, make the changes to get adequate sleep now and reap the benefits down the track!
Hopefully next time I write I have had a full eight hours as at the moment I have a hacking cough that is keeping me awake!
Good night 🙂
Michelle
Active, Healthy, Happy 