Mono/glandular fever

[Toby]

As I alluded to in another thread, I'm pretty sure I've come down with mono. My wife's had it for a good while now (months?), and I've had swollen glands for the last 4 days. I never get sick and if I do get flu or a cold it passes in a day usually, so I'm pretty pessimistic right now. I haven't done any lifting or anything for 4 days, skipped a HIIT session and MA and I've been working from home. I hope it passes quickly, but I'm resigning myself to a month off training. Sucks, because I'm addicted to exercise.

[Vash]

That suxors balls.

Get well soon.

[Toby]

Thanks mate. At least I can empathise with your former forced layoff.

[Vash]

Indeed. That **** suxord dead donkey balls.

At least now I can brag that my elbows are healing. If there feeling even a tad better, I'm gonna get back to pullups. if not, oh well. I can still do hella much legowrk and karate without focus.

*rubs health in Toby's diseased face*

[IronFist]

I had mono for 6-12 weeks in high school (I can't remember if it was 6 or 12, but it was probably closer to 12 before I was completely recovered).

They say the older you are when you get it, the worse you have it.

It sucks. It basically feels like you have the flu except it doesn't go away.

Keep us posted.

[Toby]

Don't be saying 12 weeks Iron. Web articles say 2-4, but most of those are targeted towards young whippersnappers (<25). Being an old ****, it may hit me harder like it has my wife. Also, I'm willing to keep training through it, but I personally know 2 people who developed chronic fatigue, which is often related to mono over here. So it's probably best to rest. I don't want to stop MA training, but it'd be pretty unfair if I gave it to any training partners so I might have to give that a break too.

[Vash]

At least you'll be able to be on KFM even more.

I plan to post the word "asshattery" on every thread which uses the word "real."

Case in point.

[Toby]

Originally posted by Vash
At least you'll be able to be on KFM even more.Like I don't hang out here enough already :p. I just noticed I forgot to circumvent the censor in that last post. Heh.

[Mr Punch]

Bad luck mate.

It hits everyone differently, but I'd have said 6 weeks is a minimum and it's generally more like 8-9: that's what I was told, and I had it for that long (I was 16 at the time)... Anyway, the worst part is after the main symptoms have died down (the glands the size of footballs: and not even the fun glands...! :eek: , the not being able to swallow your medication, the fever... etc) you feel like you're fine but you have no energy to even sit up for long without a very supportive chair... and then you get skullbuggeringly bored. I learned to crochet and crocheted blankets for the Famine in Ethiopea Appeal. Call me gay, but one day I might need to crochet my way out of a tight spot...!

Whatever you do, don't be tempted to move before you are better... you'll probably fall over and feel worse again! Also expect to be knocked out for three days with swollen glands every time you get a cold for the next two years or so.

Sorry but that's how it is!

[Simon]

Crap! Hope you and your wife get better quickly. :)

... what Mat said, though I didn't even have the energy to get bored when I had it :p

[Toby]

:D

Thanks guys. I'm still vainly hoping it's flu, but considering now one son's probably got it, my sister-in-law probably has it, my mother-in-law and my wife, it's a pretty slim hope. I'm ready to exercise, etc, but I know it's a bad idea so I'll hold off at least for a couple of weeks and see how I go. Simon, I'll be back in on Monday so see you then. I'm glad you've had it already - I'd hate to pass it on.

[Simon]

I'm ready to exercise, etc, but I know it's a bad idea so I'll hold off at least for a couple of weeks and see how I go.

must be killing ya! :eek: do hold off as long as possible. I remember both alcohol and exercise both prolonging my time in bed.

catchya when you're feeling better. :)

[Ford Prefect]

Sorry to hear it Toby. I came down with something this week too and have been completely inactive. I love have a teacher wife... She's like a walking WMD bring home all the bugs that the kids have.

It really depends with the mono. Some people get it bad and are laid up for months. It can cause your spleen to swell and make it very succeptable to bursting if struck, so I'd lay off any contact sports at all. Definately see the doc about it.

How old are you? Mono is caused by the Epstein-barr Virus and most people stateside are exposed to it in one form or another by the time they are in their early 20's. It's rare to see any cases past that.

[Toby]

I've got the next best thing to a teacher wife - a kid in kindy. I'm 31, so I expect to get hit pretty hard. I guess I didn't get around enough in my teens/twenties :eek: :D. Funnily enough, neither did my wife obviously. She's been feeling like **** for months now - since at least mid-year. Probably not all mono, but that's been the culprit for the last (at least) couple of months. Before that - who knows? Docs couldn't find anything wrong.

Contact sports? I do CMA, so no contact for me :D. I'm mostly worried about passing it on, so I'll avoid contact. My wife got a +ve blood test to glandular fever, so I'm not gunna visit the doc and I'll just assume that's what I've got, but I'll watch my spleen. It's gunna be hard not to lift or anything, though. I may head back to class after a couple of weeks if I'm feeling better and just ask to take it easy for a while.

[IronFist]

Get a lot of good books to read, but if it's mono you won't feel like expending the energy to turn a page.

You might want to try that "visualizing the lift" stuff. Remember that study where the one group of inactive people thought about lifting for a little bit each day and the other group didn't, and the group that thought about it had less strength loss than the group that didn't, or something like that? Yeah.

Is your wife out of work? That's going to suck if you both are.

When I had mono it fvcked up my eustatian <sp> tube in my ear, and ever since even when I get a cold I still get it in my ear and it really sucks. I would swallow, and my throat was sore, and the pain would travel from my throat up that tube into my ear every time I swallowed. It was one of if not the most miserable things I've ever had. At one point the pain in my ear was so bad I ended up going to the emergency room because I thought my head was going to explode. Oh yeah, I was also coughing up blood at the time. The cool thing is that I guess it was just pressure because when she took my temperature in my ear something popped and the pressure went away. It was such a relief.

But yeah, I looked like a frog with the glands being swollen in my throat. When I was at the doctors getting tested he had an intern or something there and he's like "alright, do you mind if she feels for your glands and stuff, too?" I was like "sure." She goes "I don't need to feel them, I can see them from across the room." Haha. They also press in on your abdomen to feel your spleen to see how big it is because like Ford said, it can cause your spleen to swell.

Anyway, hopefully it's not mono. Good luck, dude.

[Toby]

Originally posted by IronFist
Get a lot of good books to read, but if it's mono you won't feel like expending the energy to turn a page.Honestly, I don't feel sooo bad. I could probably do stuff, but I know I shouldn't. My wife OTOH has had a pretty bad time some days. I'm just starting, so it may get worse.

Originally posted by IronFist
You might want to try that "visualizing the lift" stuff.No, I actually want to do the lift. But I don't want my spleen to explode, so I won't :). At least not for a month or so then I'll see how I'm feeling.

Originally posted by IronFist
Is your wife out of work? That's going to suck if you both are.Mate, she hasn't worked for 5 years now. She's got 3 kids under 5 to look after - that's hard enough. Actually, doing that has been pretty hard on her, because she can't rest and has to look after them no matter what. To top it all off she's been breastfeeding through it all which can't be helping her own system to stay strong and recover.

Originally posted by IronFist
Anyway, hopefully it's not mono.Yeah, me too. But it is. My wife had a +ve blood test like 2 weeks ago. Also, although she hasn't been letting me kiss her (dunno if that was because she knew it was mono or if she just didn't want me to kiss her :D), I did let her taste a glass of super-expensive wine I'd opened plus I used her shot glass a few times after making wheatgrass. Both within the last month or so. That **** wheatgrass! :mad: :p

[Reggie1]

Honestly, I don't feel sooo bad. I could probably do stuff, but I know I shouldn't. My wife OTOH has had a pretty bad time some days. I'm just starting, so it may get worse.

I hope it's not mono either, for your sake. I had it a few years ago, developed a sinus infection on top of it, and wasn't really the same for about 6 months. I know my first couple of weeks with it, I felt like I could still somewhat do stuff, but the last few weeks, the fatigue really hit me HARD. Just getting up and going to the bathroom would wear me out.

I think I was out of work for 4 weeks, and didn't get my full strength back for about 3-4 months. I also lost 30 lbs. because I couldn't eat much (due to the nasty sore throat).

Best of luck.

[Toby]

Well, the weekend's finished and I did do stuff. I did carpentry - built a rack for wheatgrass trays and did some work on my wooden dummy. I can't be that bad, 'cause I managed to burn out the motor on my 5mth old angle grinder. Obviously my body's in better shape than the angle grinder :D. Yesterday my mid-section was definitely funny all day, and today too to a lesser extent. Guess that's the liver and spleen making themselves known. So abdominal work is out, so is deadlift and squat. Heavy bench too. Pullups? maybe. Forearm work? maybe. MA training? I'm gunna so super slo-mo forms and stuff and try and concentrate on techniques/skills at home. I won't attend any classes for a while, but I might go in every now and then and try and get some technique updates.

Last night I had a coughing fit when I went to bed. I went late (11pm) which was a bad idea, but I coughed for about an hour before I fell asleep. I don't think I'm gunna visit the doc, since I'm 95% sure it's what I've got. Glands remain swollen, flu-like symptoms and my wife's +ve blood test are what's convinced me. That and the fact that I rarely get sick for more than a day (and rarely even that - once a year maybe). It's 6 days now.

This'll just mean more time for stuff I haven't done in a while. I usually train every night, so now I'll just read some books, tie some flies, make lots of juice, etc. Hopefully I don't get super bad like everyone tells me. Thanks for the well-wishing everyone.

[rubthebuddha]

toby -- i do have to say that if you get any bad tummy problems, go see a doc. i almost lost my brother due to mono, and even though he recovered, they thought his spleen was gone. a couple years later, they noticed something in a scan -- turns out his spleen sorta grew back. go figure.

anyhoo, get checked out if your midsection starts to do the dance de la ouch.

[IronFist]

What is this +ve test you keep mentioning? Some sort of mono test?

If I remember correctly, mono comes on slowly. When I got it I kept trying to work out at first, which at the time in high school meant pushups and situps, cuz I thought those were the only two exercises there were :D Or maybe I'm thinking of after I had mono and it took a while to go away and I was trying to work out too soon. I don't remember.

You can use this time to brush up on your American measurement system knowledge.

How many feet in a mile? :D :p ;)

[Mr Punch]

Originally posted by IronFist
You can use this time to brush up on your American measurement system knowledge.That would be the ENGLISH measurement system then...!

[Toby]

Originally posted by rubthebuddha
get checked out if your midsection starts to do the dance de la ouch.Just felt like DOMS a couple of days after exercise. Same today - weak, not so much sore, but not 100%.
Originally posted by IronFist
What is this +ve test you keep mentioning? Some sort of mono test?+ve == Toby's lazy way of typing "positive". Meaning she had a blood test and it came back +ve for glandular fever.
Originally posted by IronFist
You can use this time to brush up on your American measurement system knowledge.Hey, I'm calling it mono for your sake - that's enough for now :mad: :p.

I just rode my bike to uni. Took it easy, so probably 18min ride or so. It felt hard, but whether that was psychosomatic, due to not riding or exercising for almost a week, or due to mono I don't yet know. Definitely didn't feel 100% though.