Tiredness

One of the limiting factors in rebuilding my body is tiredness. The pool work a couple of weeks ago combined with stresses relating to a big social event have kinda finished me off this week. Half the time I don't know if I'm actually overdoing it or not on the exercise-front. Do I need more rest perhaps ? One article I read offered this interpretation of one type of muscle fatigue: ".....I call it body shock. The body is a holistic unit and hard intense training done for long time periods has a cumulative effect. After a while a uniform sense of overall fatigue is experienced manifested by an overwhelming sensation of tiredness. This tiredness envelops the whole body. When in the throes of body shock it seems as if you are moving through water. In my experience this type of fatigue is a direct result of an accumulation of intense workouts." (Link)

At the moment, I seem to be experiencing extreme tiredness. A few times this week, including today, I've given in to the overwhelming need to sleep in the afternoon. Went to bed for an hour. Yesterday, I'd made myself stay awake through the afternoon but it was a struggle and clearly didn't help.

It's very hard to know if my body is needing recovery time and thus less muscular strain or if I should actually persevere and ignore the intense tiredness. Tuesday, I took the 'ignore' route and did 15 mins on the exercise bike combined with hip and shoulder physio exercises. The bike work felt fantastic and I was chuffed to bits to manage it. However, I was soon overcome by overwhelming tiredness and slept in the afternoon?!

I'm skipping the pool work again this week. Hoping that the break will reduce the tiredness.....we'll see.

What now?

...finished the NHS course of 6 sessions of hydrotherapy. I've been advised to continue with the strengthening exercises in my local pool for another 6 months before moving on to gym work! Well, I did my first pool session today and it really wasn't very enjoyable. The water is way too cold for standing around doing exercises (I kept getting cramp in my feet) and there's no bar along the side of the pool to hook my feet under to do the 'leg press' type exercises. I tried to improvise but it didn't feel great. Plus, there are other people in the pool wanting to get around me. I stayed in for about 35 minutes, 10+ of those were spent walking backwards and forwards making use of the water resistance. The shower afterwards was cool, yucky and not much more than a trickle. All in all, I'm not sure I really want to keep it up for 6 months - might be way too depressing.

However, the upside is that it does provide strength training without the added pain and wear/tear on joints. That is a significant plus point, even if the water is chilly. At the moment, my left hip is really problematic with sharp, intense pain deep in the joint on foot strike when walking. I'm guessing it's a muscle knot/trigger point or inflamed bursa. In the water, that isn't a problem. My left shoulder/arm is worse than it's ever been and my GP is referring me to a shoulder specialist. I know the root of the problem is severe deconditioning causing instability but there might be something that can be done to alleviate any inflammation/strains caused by doing the strengthening exercises. Anyways, I digress....

This afternoon, I've felt overwhelming tired. Went to bed for an hour and actually slept. I still feel wiped out so whatever I did this morning, it worked something. Hopefully, it wasn't just the fact that I was on the brink of being 'cold' throughout the workout!

So, what next? Do I focus on the positives of water work and just grin and bear the cold, the inconvenience to other swimmers, and the yucky, rubbish showers? OR, do I find an alternative way to work out - gym ball, gym equipment, something else?? Whatever it is, it needs to be a full-body strength training programme for use with no muscles, lol.