Tag Archives: flu

Sick day

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Well, it got me. Despite my flu shot and doing my best to eat well, take my vitamins, get enough sleep, and stay healthy, I caught a cold this weekend. It started with a tickle in my throat Thursday night. I could feel my body fighting it on Friday during my conference session, and while I thought I got the better of it on Saturday, it proved to get the better of me on Sunday. Even taking Tylenol cold night time medication, I had a horrible sleep, waking up almost every hour completely congested and/or needing to go to the bathroom. I finally surrendered fully to it and booked the day off at 3am.

I’m not usually someone that can sleep in without getting a head-ache, but I didn’t even get up for breakfast until after 11am. The good news is that I think I’m over the worst of it. I haven’t had to pump more cold medication into me for almost 8 hours now, and I can breathe easily, with minimal sniffling. I’ll be sure to take some meds tonight before bed, and I should be (almost) back to normal tomorrow.

Reflecting back, I think it has been over a year since I’ve been sick with a cold. It has been a good run of staying healthy, and as I recover today, let’s hope I start a new healthy streak.

The need for sleep

The last few months I’ve needed more sleep than usual. It’s not a surprise, between covid in November and an awful cough to start the year, I have mostly been in recovery mode for a few months now. I can usually get between 6 and 7 hours of sleep a night and consistently feel refreshed. That’s not enough right now and I’m letting myself sleep longer. This is a good thing… I know how important sleep is and I don’t think I get enough of it.

Back when I started my career I used to live on even less sleep. I’d go 3-4 days with 5 hours or less sleep, then catch up with 6-7 hours, and do it all over again. One very tired day when I was running on too little sleep my buddy Mark said to me, “Dave, you’re burning your candle on both ends, you are killing yourself… you’re going to die 10 years younger if you keep doing this to yourself.” The following night I sent him an email at about 1:30 in the morning, it read, “Yeah, I might die 10 years younger but I did the math and if you live to 80 and I only live to 70, I’ll have been awake longer than you.”

While the math was correct, and it’s kind of funny, there is a lot of research around the importance of sleep and I don’t tend to get as much as I should even now. I used to wear ‘I don’t need a lot of sleep’ like some sort of badge of honour. But sleep is essential, and I’m hoping that I can figure out a way to get more without feeling like I’m taking away from my day.

I don’t think I’ll ever be someone who sleeps 8-9 hours a night, and in fact I start to develop a headache when I’m in bed that long, but I hope to make 7-8 hours the norm with only an occasional 6-7 hour night. That would be dreamy. 😜