When Illness Throws Off Your Workout Schedule

00:00Real quick, the only ask I could ever have of you guys is to help spread the word so we can help more women lose body fat, build muscle, reach their goals, and feel insanely confident. And the only way we can do that is if you rate, review, and share this podcast. So the single thing I ask for you to do is if you could leave a review. It will take you 10 seconds, and it will mean the absolute world to me and may change the world of someone else. You know, if you're out for a week, and you get back to it, and you're consistent with it, and you're consistent with it over a period and elongated time, you're going to get the results that you want. But if you're somebody who's like sick, and then doesn't go back for two months, and then goes back for two weeks, and then bounces back off for another month, you're not going to get where you want to be.

00:42What is going on, you guys? Welcome back to The WarriorBabe Show with Nikki Stott, co-founder of Warrior Babe. And on this podcast, we talk about mindset, methodologies, and tactics that will help you lose body fat, build muscle, be strong, and feel insanely confident. I am your host, Nikki Stott, and welcome to today's episode, episode 129, where I want to dive into just a personal experience of what I'm experiencing right now that I feel like resonates with a lot of you guys that may have gone through this slash are going through this.

01:23And that is being sick while you are trying to, you know, develop momentum for yourself, get into a routine, get after your goals, stick to your nutrition plan, stick to your workout structure, and then all of a sudden, bam, life throws at you the sickness, whether it be COVID, RSV, the flu in my situation that I have been diagnosed with. So here's a little backstory, you guys. It's going on two weeks now. Literally, I am on two in two days, there'll be a two week marker that I have had the symptoms. And this is honestly, the longest time that I have been sick. And it is, there's a lot of emotions I'm experiencing. There's a lot of challenges that I'm experiencing. And I, you know, that's why I just want to bring this to you because it's just like real raw and honest. Like I go through this too.

02:22Like you guys, if you follow me on social media, you've been following me for years. You know, I get into the gym, I do the thing, I do the work. And then like, this happens though, too. Like I get sick. I don't, I haven't worked out in two weeks. But like, I want to what I want to like, not only share this like personal story with you, but also, like help you guys understand that there is myths to the fact that like you won't lose all of your progress during this time. Because some people think, oh my god, I haven't worked out in two weeks. Or like Nikki hasn't worked out in two weeks. Is she worried about losing progress?

02:57There's myths to that. And then I want to like, I want to share with you. You know, in the time that I've been sick, how I've been approaching not working out how I've been approaching my nutrition, how I have been approaching the mental side of things, right? Like, so I just want to resonate here from a human to human level connection on this podcast right now to let you guys know that I go through it too. And there's some things I hope that come out of this podcast that help you if you are going through this or have gone through this that will support you and, you know, in the next time you are to get sick. So yeah, two weeks ago, right, I was I went to Miami for a conference. And I came back with having this cough that then progressed into a little like low grade fever that then progressed into congestion.

03:51Sinus congestion. And I let that go on the worst thing was the cough. I let that go on for seven days. And I just I felt like I was in the world during these seven days. Like it was it was rough sleeping. It was my appetite finally caught up where I lost it probably like five days in of the first week. And, you know, all of like all these things like I was just I was sick. Okay, these are the things these are the symptoms that I was experiencing. And then come day seven, it was Sunday.

04:27Last Sunday, you know, as irrelevant when I say like last Sunday when it was because this podcast can air in a couple weeks, but it was a Sunday and I was like, all right, I'm pulling the trigger. Like I need to go to urgent care. Like there's only so much I can do. The things I was trying to do were obviously not working. I was trying to take like I took DayQuil and NyQuil for a day. Like usually I don't do that kind of stuff. But like I caved and I had to try it. It didn't work. I know you're supposed to take a little bit longer. But like, I wasn't getting relief from it. So it wasn't even touching my system.

05:00And then I was taking throat lozenges and honey. Oh my god, I was probably I was like, I was downing honey. And I felt like I was going to turn into honey. You know, I was I was trying that and it wasn't working. So I was like, okay, I need to go get the drugs. I need to get the pharmaceuticals. And it's always like the last end of the rope, you know, line for me, I will always try my best to try and just rest recover. You know, little tiny things like the DayQuil, NyQuil, Adivil if I need it, Tylenol, X, Y, and Z. But it wasn't working. So I was like, okay, I'm going to go to urgent care and urgent care closed in like 10 minutes. I felt so bad.

05:39But I was like, I just, you know, I need to go get it. I need to go see what's up. So went in, they did a chest x ray. She's like talking about pneumonia and bronchitis. And I'm like, Oh, here we go. And then she was like, let's do a code. Do you want to do a COVID RSV and flu? And I was like, they're all in one test. Anyway, another, another, another thought process for another podcast. So I was like, sure, like, let's just whatever. Let's just do it all. Let's just get some answers. I'm just here for some answers. And she had asked if I had been around people that were sick. And I was like, you know, I was in Miami traveling. I was with some friends at a conference. And one of my friends was sick. And I was like, you know, they gave her prednisone. And, and I think that was it, maybe something else.

06:26Oh, Z-Pak. And she was like, Okay, well, now I'm going into like this whole story on this. But she was like, Okay, well, it sounds like you know, your sinus and you're also congested, like your chest is congested. So like Z-Pak is only gonna work one way. So, you know, we want to try and treat both. So she gave me doxycycline. Hold up on that thought. Because I was, I was like, I'm not an antibiotic person. I hate antibiotics. It's just my personal opinion with them. I know they serve a purpose. And if I ever have to take them in a dire situation, I will. But this, this, this, I did not end up taking that. But she was like, you know, we got to treat both. And I'm like, Oh, my gosh, okay. And then we got the chest x ray, chest x ray was good. But the one test that took three days to get results was the COVID, the RSV and the flu. So she also gave me inhaler, she gave me prednisone, she gave me these like little cough pills.

07:18Um, and she gave me the dikos, the doxy antibiotic. And she was like, you know, save the antibiotic for last resort, take the inhaler, take the prednisone, take these cough little things. I was like, goddamn, that's not a medicine. But alright. So I took, like three doses of the inhaler, I did not like it. Um, I took the prednisone all the way through. And I still have this cough. Okay, so all in all to say, this is what I ended up with. I ended up finding out three days later, which the doxycyc wouldn't even be treated. So thank God I didn't end up taking that.

07:54Hey, hey, just want to drop a huge appreciation to you guys listening to the show. It means a lot. I hope you guys are enjoying it. And there's so much more to come with it. If you are enjoying it, hit the subscribe button. I'd appreciate that tons. And also it would help this podcast reach others who need to hear these messages too. But I have the flu. I had the flu B. I had the strand flu, the flu B. So really, it's just like rest recovery and like let it pass. And just this nagging cough that I hope goes away soon because it's highly, highly, highly annoying. So anyway, during this time, right? So first week, my appetite, like I was saying a little bit earlier, I had an appetite.

08:39I was good on my macros for the first like five days of coming back from Miami. And, you know, then all of a sudden, my appetite just tanked. I was not hungry. I was not working out. I haven't worked out yet in like two weeks. And so I just at that point kind of stopped focusing on hitting macros and just making sure that I was getting good quality food. That is so important. You guys actually, let's just dive right into like the nutritional aspect of it. The importance of proper nutrition. And I cannot stress enough the importance of having at least somewhat of a proper nutrition routine, even if you're not following macros, but like, you still want to give your body what it needs to support the immune system and aid in the recovery process, right?

09:20So I may not want to have been eating enough on the days I didn't have an appetite, but I still prioritize healthy foods and trying to at least get my protein in. I think, hands down, if you're ever sick moving forward, that is definitely like you may not it's okay to not be hungry. It's okay to also not force feed yourself to try and get your macros in because you're on a plan. I need you to know that life happens. And when this life situation happens, you don't need to abide to the things that you, you know, said you started on January one, like this is, uh, and I'm going to talk about this in a second.

09:53But like, this is a period of which it's actually really important to just recognize that like the goals you're going after are long term goals. And right now in the short interim that you are experiencing being sick, it's okay that you have you kind of have a step back from that focus because the focus is so long term. So, uh, just doing your best to just eat what you can that's going to be still like, it's not like what I'm trying to say is a quality food, like, don't go and have burgers and ice cream and chips.

10:24And, you know, all of this trash, it's just going to probably kill your immune system even more or your body's going to have to work harder to digest that kind of food, the calorie dense things. It doesn't make any sense. So just try and give yourself, you know, proper nutrition during that time. And that's exactly what I did. And I have been doing I haven't been as hungry. I have also lost five pounds because I haven't been working out and I've been getting my 10k steps in on a daily basis. So that's one thing I have been keeping movement in a little bit because it's just it's important to the for the body to not just lay flat all the time all day long on the couch, especially for two weeks.

10:59But so I lost yeah, I lost five pounds, but because I'm not eating as much and I'm not, you know, going in and working out as much. And, and that's okay. I want to I want you guys to know that's okay. So like, I'm not burning as many calories throughout the day anymore. Right now I'm probably, I'm probably like a 400 calorie difference of what I normally burn, or maybe even more 500 600 what I normally burn when I work out and I'm, you know, doing all the things I normally do. So not having a ramped up appetite is okay. And then not force feeding yourself is okay. Just giving your body what it needs during that time, which is quality food.

11:38At the end of the day, and then most important hydration. So please stay hydrated, especially when your body is trying to fight off some type of illness. Um, so Ladies, are you feeling frustrated with body changes you're experiencing during menopause? It's time to take control. If you're between 45 and 65 years old and tired of struggling with body fat and muscle loss, warrior babe is here for you.

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12:42That's warrior babe.com forward slash apply. All right, let's get back to the show. Pulling it back here a little bit. When, within this time frame, right? So like I was saying at the beginning, I've experienced tons of like emotional challenges, right? I'm so used to going in, working out, getting, doing the work, like feeling really good from a workout afterwards. And because of this time, like a lot of people would try to push through and go and work out and go and try to do all the things while experiencing being sick.

13:22Like, and I need you and I want you guys to understand, second to already what I have said, but understand your body given this time. Like, your body needs to have rest and recovery. It needs to slow down and it needs to heal. And if you don't do that, first of all, when you do do that, it's not just passive, but it's an active part of the healing process where your body begins to repair and strengthen itself. And then if you don't do that, if you ignore the fact that your body needs rest and it needs to slow down and it needs to heal and it needs to go through this whole process, you could end up worsening your condition.

14:02You could end up prolonging the recovery time or even, you could even cause long-term damage. So let that just kind of like sink in, like listen to your body, like tune into when you're sick and you're not feeling good and you have this cough, you're not sleeping well and you can't breathe because your sinus congestion, you're just experiencing all this congestion. Slow down. That is your signal to stop. That is your signal to not work out. That is your signal to take time. That is your signal to allow the healing process to really start to, uh, to really start to make, do its work.

14:41Right. Um, because think about it. Like if I had tried to push through when I came back from Miami and gone and work out that week, when I started to experience all of these things, because I was like, I have to get back into the gym because I was just in this conference and I didn't work out. It's like, I could have prolonged this to be a three week, a four week thing. Right. Like I just had to accept and it's hard guys. Trust me. It's hard. Like, I'm not saying this is easy. It's hard to be like, I'm, I can't work out today. It sucks. I want to go move my body. It gives me a heightened sense of joy. It gives me, you know, a sense of accomplishment and to not be able to do that.

15:15It sucks. So I hear you. I know it's frustrating. However, I know how important it is to slow down because I don't want to prolong me being away from something I love doing. So if it's, if it's a short amount of time of which it could be, because if I, you know, if it's only two weeks and I can get back in, my plan is to get back in tomorrow. Then that's two weeks rather than being four weeks. Right. So what I really do want to dive into right now is just talking about the, the myth of this, like Nikki, cause I get this a lot.

15:49Like I've seen this on my Q and A's on my, on my Instagram story. I've gotten this in DMS. I've gotten this inside of our warrior babe community. And, you know, people come to me and they're like, well, Nikki, can I, can you, will I lose progress? I've been sick for two weeks. I've been sick for a week. I've been sick for X amount of time. Can I lose progress during this time? Will I lose progress? I fear of losing progress. You know, maybe you've been at it for the first two weeks of the new year, three weeks of the new year. And then bam, you get sick.

16:19And then you're like, oh my gosh, like now I'm moving backwards. Like, am I going to lose all that progress? So I want to just kind of dive into a little bit of science here with you guys. There's, within sports medicine, there's this research that indicates that fitness loss does not occur at a uniform rate. So the rate can vary based off of different factors. Like, you know, you're the individual, like you and your initial fitness level, the duration of the break, the type of fitness that you are doing, whether you're doing cardiovascular stuff, whether you're doing muscle strength.

16:52But for the sake of this podcast, because a lot of you guys work out and lift weights, I want to talk to more of the muscle strength and the mass. And I want you to hear me loud and clear. Because I want this to, you know, you get off this podcast and maybe you're sick in a couple of weeks. I hope not. But maybe that happens because life happens. And you're worried about the progress that you're making. I want you to know that muscle strength and your muscle mass on your body are way more resilient to breaks than cardiovascular fitness.

17:25So there's a ton of research that shows a significant muscle like wasting away doesn't generally start until about like three weeks of inactivity. But even then, you guys, even then the rate of loss is relatively so freaking low. So because muscle memory, okay, we've you've probably heard that being tossed around the industry talks, people talk about it on Instagram, people talk about they're sick on Instagram. Muscle memory plays a significant role in helping you to regain strength and mass once you resume training.

18:00You ever recognize when you get back into the gym after two weeks, three weeks, like I know that I may be a little weak the first couple of days, but within a matter of a week of being back, I'm going to feel strong. Why? Why? Because I have insane muscle memory and I have insane ability to regain strength because of the years I have been doing this, right? So the main thing I want you to know there is the rate of you losing any of your muscle mass you have put on or the progress you made is relatively slow.

18:33It can start at about a measurement of like three weeks or maybe even a little bit more or less. But the rate of the loss is so slow. Okay, and why? Why it's so slow? One of the reasons why muscle strength is maintained over those short breaks is due to the neuromuscular adaptations. So it's the connections between your brain and your muscles that are developed through you training and working out. So like I have developed these things over the last nine years of my journey and working out and doing strength training.

19:08And that helps when you have these connections between your brain and your muscles that are developed through training. They remain largely intact during these short periods of inactivity. And so this helps aid even more so backed into the reason why you're able to regain strength quicker once you return back to weight training. And so like that I just wanted to like throw that in there because I once you understand like, okay, this is actually a myth, but like, let's break down the myth and like why it's a myth and like what's actually really true about it, the flip side of that.

19:49And I hope that that kind of like reassures you that even though you're taking X amount of time away from a break, like if you're taking like two months, it's a different story. Okay. If you are somebody like me that like allows the sickness to kind of run its course, and then when I feel good, I'm going to get back into the gym. You will regain you have muscle memory and you will regain strength and think like to from a long term perspective, like I had just talked about a little bit ago, these short breaks have minimal impact. On your overall fitness journey, right?

20:21Your body's ability to bounce back is insanely remarkable. And most people can return to their previous fitness levels with constant effort after getting over a sickness, consistent, constant effort. It's like what I say. It's like I've said this in podcasts before. It's like you, you know, if you're out for a week and you get back to it and you're consistent with it and you're consistent with it over a period of long time, you're going to get the results that you want. But if you're somebody who's like sick and then doesn't go back for two months and then goes back for two weeks and then bounces back off for another month,

20:58you're not going to get where you want to be. Okay. So, but think about it from this is a short break. I have a long, I have a long term perspective on my whole entire health and fitness journey. This short break is not going to kill. It's not going to derail me. One last thing I want to say on like the break side of things is more the psychological versus like the psychological impact that we experience versus the physical impact that we experience. So it's often that the psychological impact of taking a break, like feeling like you've lost the progress,

21:31is more significant than the actual physical impact. It's crucial guys to address like this psychological aspect and to know that like it's more so in your head with the fear of losing the fitness progress that you've made. It, then it often is greater than the reality of like actually seeing the physicalness happen in your body. Okay. Does that make sense? So like, you know, I stood in the mirror this morning. I'm like, okay, you know, I'm a little soft.

22:01There's not much, there's not as much definition as I would normally see on my body. I look a little bit like skinnier, but that's okay. It's, it's, it's, but there's still muscle, right? And like, there's still like it, my, it's there. It's just a little soft overlay because I haven't been doing my normal routine for the last two weeks. Right? So I think that's really important to recognize that it's more what goes on in your head during this time than it is actually the physical impact. Of your body and the, and in you, like, you know, thinking that you're actually losing progress when you're actually really not.

22:37It's more so in your head than anything else. So with all that being said, you know, you guys, like, I hope that that resonated with you. It's, it, it's what I'm experiencing right now. And I just wanted to come and I wanted to share it with you guys on this podcast. Cause I feel like that's just a great way for me to not only like release how I feel and talk it out loud, but like, also I know it's going to help you guys. And I hope it does. I hope that the ride that I took you on today was, um, you know, it resonated. It's empowering. You have some tips. You have some now new understanding to not worry about the, the physical when you're sick and just let it run its course and really slow down and let the healing happen.

23:12And then it's more like, okay, let me just, you know, this narrative that goes on my brain when I'm sick, like, let me just like talk nicely to it. Like, let me just like, you know, everything is good. Self-compassion. I'm being kind to myself during this time. All right. Easier said than done, but I know you got it. Cause if I can do it, you guys can do it too. Okay. So I hope you enjoyed this podcast guys. And I will see you in the next one. Peace out. Real quick. The only ask I could ever have of you guys is to help spread the word so we can help more women lose body fat, build muscle, reach their goals and feel insanely confident.

23:48And the only way we can do that is if you rate review and share this podcast. So the single thing I ask for you to do is if you could leave a review, it will take you at 10 seconds and it will mean the absolute world to me and may change the world of someone else.

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors.