Overdoing It

I wrote my blog last night in a strong but tired state of mind.  Then, I signed off my laptop to fall asleep. And waited.  And waited.  And waited some more.

Actually, I waited a loooong time before even coming close to sleeping.  Despite the chilly 67 degrees setting on my air conditioning, I was flushed.   I kept changing pillows to find anything resembling the normal coolness that soothes me to sleep.  No relief.  My skin felt like it was truly hot to the touch. Feverish, almost.  My head throbbed. Eventually, I trudged into the living room and tried to crash there -- with an ice wrap on the back of my neck and the cool leather of the couch providing some unlikely help.  That barely helped.  Whether it was waking up to readjust on the couch, use the restroom or drink water, my exhausted body just couldn't turn itself off.

I've really never had that happen before.  Even my heart rate felt elevated.

I'm not quite sure what heat stroke feels like, but if I had to guess, this was it.

And I had nobody to blame but myself.  In hindsight, yesterday I shattered the line between breaking new ground and breaking myself in the process.

After about four hours of fairly awful sleep, 8:30 a.m. sounded off on my alarm with all the charm of a drill instructor banging pots.  There was no way I was going to be productive today at work, so I used a sick day and just stayed home and rested.  I caught up on some extra sleep only to be rudely awakened by Trudy and Bam-Bam using their condo as a jungle gym once again.

I swear I'll have my revenge on them one day. (In a perfectly legal way, for any lawyers reading.)

Overall, I feel better now.  I tried to do too much over the past week and my body decided to send a formal letter of protest.

Message received.

I should be more even-paced over the next few days, which will help.  And I've once again learned a valuable training lesson: Intensity is not always the best substitute for duration.

There will be many more challenges during the next three-plus months march toward the Ironman.  Hopefully, I'll approach those challenges with my usual smarts and ease back on the bravado.

Easier said than done!

103 days and counting.