Lake Serene
I’ve been ramping up to this post for a while now. I just needed a kick in the butt, and today I got it. Today I had a hard hike. The actual hike wasn’t hard, but my body thought it was. This is the kind of stuff I want to write about! If you’ve read my welcome post, you’ll know that I returned to outdoor adventuring this year after a multi-year illness associated with autoimmunity. Getting back to outdoor pursuits is a big deal for me!
Today, I hiked to Lake Serene with my friend Helen. Serene is a quiet, hidden gem perched in a hanging valley just below Mount Index in Washington. As day hikes go, it’s not a big one: 7.2 miles car to car, 2000 feet elevation gain, switchbacks aplenty to keep the incline tolerable, and a plethora of hand-built wooden stairs to keep erosion to a minimum. At an amble, you can do it in 5 hours with a long hang-out at the beautiful lake.
I’ve done harder hikes this year and felt great the whole time; longer mileage, more elevation gain, steeper terrain. But today, I was a complete mess. “What gives?” I asked myself as I struggled to move my legs. I explained this to Helen: I was unable to exercise for years due to my autoimmune illness, and prior to that, was a pretty rad mountain athlete who could trail run 1.5 to 3 hours a day above 10,000 feet, six days a week. Yes, I have a high pain threshold when it comes to training. I used to know how my body would respond to exertion – how much to eat on a hike or trail run, how long it would take to recover, just how hard I could push the next day. I’d been doing this stuff for years, and it was all dialed in.
Now, I have no idea what my body is doing.
I love the grain in this old snag. How many faces do you see?
It’s like I’ve been body-snatched, and this model came with no instructions. All I have to go on is what I remember from before getting sick, and so far, that’s not doing me much good. The rules have changed. Post-illness, I don’t have a good sense (yet!) of how my body will respond to exertion, how much or when I eat, phase of the moon… My mind remembers what I used to be capable of, so I try it. Then I pay. Again, what gives?
Some clues… On Sunday, I rock climbed all day at Index Town Walls, including a steep hike up to one of the crags. On the hike up, I was thinking, “You’re overdoing it. This is a bad idea. You’re so going to pay for this!” but I was with a new climbing partner and didn’t want to be a stick in the mud. To add to the body stress, I got a wicked bad gut cramp from a snack I made with bad coconut shreds. I had a GREAT day, but I was toast by the time we got home. Monday morning I woke feeling great. Sweet! Yet an hour later I had to lay down for a nap. I don’t do naps. The rest of Monday I was mentally and physically useless. And… I ate more of the snack with the bad coconut… doubled-over gut cramp, episode 2!
More clues… Tuesday at 6 a.m. I had plans to meet a climbing partner at the gym, and despite my desperate desire to cancel, I dragged myself out of bed and went. Didn’t want to be a stick in the mud. Turns out I had the wrong day! I climbed a few routes on the self-belay anyhow… and then went back that evening to climb some more with my regular Tuesday night crew. On Wednesday, crack o’ dawn, I met my Tuesday guy, and we climbed really hard. Thursday I hiked to Lake Serene…
Can you say, “She’s getting greedy”?
So today, the hike up was hell. I overdid it at Index on Sunday, and didn’t give my body the recovery it needed before getting out and hammering a little more on it.
Today, at a rest stop where I sat in frustration, Helen and I talked. She started climbing and hiking in her early fifties after a career as a desk-bound attorney. She understood my struggle with not knowing how my body will respond. It was really good to talk to someone who was 1. understanding, and 2. patient with me for being slow.
The Road to Strength: Keeping it Real
This got me thinking. I’ve been after this outdoor stuff all year, and I’ve been carefully watching how my body responds to different activity, food, recovery time, etc. Although there are inconsistencies and mysteries I need to figure out (thus my rant about being body-snatched!), I see patterns developing and it’s time to take stock. Understand, I don’t want to be a weekend warrior. Settling isn’t my style. I want to be strong enough to take on the outdoor adventures of my dreams.
If we have to re-learn our “new” bodies after long-term chronic illness, what are the boundaries we need to maintain to assure the best outcome for our return to physical exertion? I want to share what I’ve learned so far, so that hopefully you won’t make all the mistakes I’ve made on the road back to strength.
1. One thing has been obvious to me for a while: Be mindful of how hard you push because you just don’t know yet where your envelope ends and the red zone begins. With autoimmunity, pushing too hard means you pay double in recovery.
2. Put your health first and don’t be afraid to say NO. I should have said no to my new climbing buddy when she talked me into hiking up to those last two climbs. I knew better, but I was trying to be “a good climbing partner.” But what’s good about over-extending yourself? When you’re in recovery, nothing.
3. Find adventure buddies who have patience with your challenges, and even better – personal experience with them. Set yourself up for support and success this way. You’ll be less apt to push too much, and in the meantime you won’t feel like a stick in the mud. And remember: Any adventure buddy who thinks you are a stick in the mud isn’t really a good adventure buddy for you.
4. Don’t get greedy! If you’re returning to physical exercise after a long chronic illness, remember – it likely took you a long time to become ill, and it may take you a while to get back where you want to be. The awesomeness of enjoying the things you love can light a fire in your heart to do more, but that fire is highly likely to burn much brighter than your ability level – for now. Be patient.
5. Even when you are frustrated with your seeming lack of superhero powers, be grateful that you are out there at all! When you are frustrated with yourself on the trail, stop and ask yourself: Could you have done this hike, ski, bike ride, boat paddle, climb, a year or two ago? Sometimes long-term progress looks like backsliding; keep your big picture in mind. You’re gonna have hard days and easy days. Be grateful for where you are.
Today I felt totally frustrated on the hike, but I needed the experience. I had not only over-extended myself physically but also had not respected my own limits (say NO!) and then got greedy and kept the demands too high on my body. Sure, the actual climbing and hiking this week was fun, the company of my adventure buddies is great, and I will eventually be stronger for the training, but… in the long run, I got a multi-day back-track on my energy level, and I was mentally shot for work.
Drive: Danger and Blessing
People like me get chronically sick partly due to pushing too hard. This was a keen reminder that I still have that element, despite years of bad consequences from taking it to an extreme before (the depth of my crash in 2008 had something to do with my drive and a high pain threshold for training). I have talked to a LOT of people with autoimmunity who were highly driven, self-demanding people before getting sick. Reality check. At the same time, this drive can be a blessing; it can power us through the hard healing times, and help us get back up when we’ve fallen down.
There is more to my learning curve with exertion, but I’ll save that for another post. It’s about how exercise, mental energy and recovery relate, and it’s motivated me to do some bio-hacking to figure it out. The fun stuff!
The final steps up to Lake Serene
