Three Lessons From Being Sick

Being Sick Is Awful

It’s been a long time since I’ve been sick.

As a kid, I used to get sick often, about once every 2 months. It used to come like clock work. Some of it was self-induced (imagine giving yourself stress headaches in the third grade…) . I got used to the idea of sickness. I had methods and a plan. By the time I got to college I had a “sick kit” always ready. I walked with Dayquil at all times.

The Change

In the last year or so since I decided to eat better, I stopped getting sick. In fact, before this week, the last time I remember getting a cold was early last year, January of 2015. I ended up getting confident. I threw away most of my medicine. When my roommate was sick, I didn’t care. I used to laugh, because he made light of my decision to not wear a coat this winter and swear I would catch a cold. I would just watch him get sick at the usual rate.

Well, my ego caught up with me and I caught it this week.

I forgot how debilitating it is.  When you are in the middle of the worst of it, it feels like a mental and physical block. Your reserves are done. You can’t think. You are in pain.

It sucks. I learned something.

Three lessons

• Ego gets you no where – I was a jerk to hold that over my roommate. What did I gain from that?  He might have helped me this week if I had helped him when he was sick.
• Focus is the ultimate key – Being debilitated forced me to think through what I wanted to do.  I accomplished some things (kept my altMBA assignments in order) by annihilating everything else on my schedule (even this blog in some respects – using my altMBA assignments to fill in)
• You can’t appreciate recovery without being sick – Like the yin and the yang. I don’t appreciate change if I am always the same. The best part of life is the dynamic. I was sick but ultimately I get well, and my immune system is stronger.