What a strange two weeks it’s been. When I say strange, I can’t exactly say strange in a bad way, but more so just strange in a… strange… and busy way. It seemed like every time I tried to sit down and write, and get some work done, there was something else to do, or I’d get a spasm of writer’s block after having revelating thoughts on the drive home. It wasn’t until I sat down and decided that I wasn’t getting up again until I at least wrote something down that this is even coming up. It seems like the more I write for the site, the less repetitive I want to be and the pickier I get about articles. Lately, I’ve probably written three or four articles just to scrap them upon editing.. It’s starting to get harder to continually write about the same ol’ same ol’ going on in my life that carry new themes towards sport and fitness, so the blog may be stretching out simply to just the living of life with disease. Let’s be honest, all of us with disease know that this part alone can be quite the challenge. Regardless though, sport and fitness, at least to me, are still essential especially with the added problem of chronic disease. This lesson I try to impart of making sure to include sport and fitness in your daily lives just so happened to hit me in the face this past two weeks.
I will be brutally honest when I say I can’t remember the last time I lifted weights. Between work and putting so much worth and effort into my soccer, I got way too into those two things that lifting went on the back burner. I will admit that I had been worried that if I re-started my weight lifting that the soreness I felt would negatively impact my performance on the field. I let that fear of failure stop me once again. But, like my Dad says, everything happens for a reason, because without that fear I wouldn’t have discovered the even greater link between weight lifting and my own health.
We’ve all heard the thousand reasons to incorporate fitness in our lives, so don’t worry, I’m not going to rehash them here. I’m sure if you don’t already know them, a quick Google search of “the benefits of fitness” will bring up a thousand other sites that can help you out. Instead, I want to focus on the disease specific benefits I have encountered. These benefits were things I took for granted, and took as a sign that the medications I was taking were working as opposed to giving the benefit to exercise. Well, my outlook on that has changed, and let me tell you why.
So like I said, it’s been a while since I lifted weights. Truthfully, probably since before I finished exams, so for the sake of this article, let’s say April. Now, that doesn’t mean I was inactive. Playing soccer two to three times a week kept me in decent shape, but I take pride in being in excellent shape and as the months went on, that started to deteriorate. I could, and still can feel the difference (in a negative way) of not lifting weights, and it began to show in my disease progression. By mid-June, my systems were relatively under control and I felt like a normal person, but as my wedding got closer, things started to get worse. My disease is known to get worse with stress, so even though I wasn’t overly stressed, I just assumed it had to do with the stress of the upcoming wedding and the introduction of more than usual unhealthy food (with all the wedding related parties and showers, eating healthy was thrown out the window). I had expected this to happen so I wasn’t surprised when my disease worsened. But as the wedding came and went, and the honeymoon passed by in a blink, the symptoms didn’t get better. There was a brief relief right after my monthly injection but then it got right back to it. Still, I thought it was residual stress or work stress or something out of my control. But it was last week that really opened my eyes.
Last week, symptoms reached a pinnacle. They were the worst they had been in a while and worse off, I felt weak and fatigued, and was at the point where soccer seemed to be a chore because my energy levels weren’t there. I felt more off than usual. I can’t remember how the idea came about, it may have even been from a podcast I was listening to that was discussing TRT (Testosterone Replacement Therapy) when I remembered a conversation I had a while back with a nutritionist whose father was being treated for colitis with TRT. So I began doing what I do best, researching. I had began to find links, a lot of links, regarding ulcerative colitis and low testosterone. Furthermore, the symptoms I was experiencing on top of my colitis “flare” matched with descriptions of low testosterone. My mind was going crazy, and then it hit me that weight lifting can increase the body’s release of testosterone, and it had been months since I worked out last. So alas, I’ve come to the theory that weight lifting is a form of treatment for my condition. It got me to think of all the other possible hormone related conditions. I thought about the benefits of weight lifting with diabetes, or even with something like MS. I have come to realize that sport (something I’ve spent most of my time focusing on with this site) has many benefits, but the fitness aspect cannot be ignored. There are multiple fitness benefits for many diseases, and my case is just one example. Yet, it still remains to be proven in my small sample.
For me, this means weight lifting is back on the priority list, and I couldn’t be happier. I’ve missed it, but like I said, I was worried about the negative impact in my soccer games. I see now that losing one soccer game, or at least playing poorly for one soccer game is one small price to pay if that means getting better symptomatically. I know very well that after that one game it won’t be an issue, but it was this strange fear of failure, even on a small scale, that held me back. How silly? Well, that’s not an issue anymore, and I will keep you guys updated on my theory and my progress as I go along with it. I’ll probably end up sharing my workouts as well.
One last thing before I end this article. I’ve got some things on the go right now with the hopes of helping to spread my message of hope with chronic disease. One of these things I can’t speak about just yet while the kinks are being worked out but an announcement will be made sometime soon. One thing I can speak about though is the continuation of Gaming Against Disease. Currently, I am looking into Twitch and getting the necessary equipment to once again start streaming various games while hopefully being able to hold live Q&As regarding disease, sport, fitness, gaming, or even just living with disease. I am also looking into getting some YouTube videos made, produced, and released. The channel is already live, just the content isn’t there yet. So stay tuned, and I just wanted to personally thank you all for your patience.