Struggle Finally Over After 4 Months

Do little something, and then I keel over for days. Get back up and do little something again, I keel over again. It's been almost nonstop struggle for 4 months and the longest, if not the worst, PEM I've had.

The crashes started on 12/20 when I started skiing hard just as the novelty effect expired after 3 weeks of skiing. (The novelty effect from moving to NYC in 2017 expired after 3 weeks and so was the lift from starting to bike in 2018.) I was done with skiing for good after 3/2, but I still kept keeling over. 2 km walk or 3 mile biking would put me in the pound for 3 days.

I would've gone on a trip, to SF or somewhere, to lift me out of the struggle. But the whole country is under a lock-down for Covid19, and overnight trip has been out of the question. So we went on a daytrip to Lodi and Galt on 4/15 instead. I've been meaning to explore the local cities and this was as good an excuse as any.

San Joaquin Valley is not exactly Napa. But it was surprisingly charming. We drove through the vineyards in Galt to Lodi downtown lined with shops. It wasn't unlike Woodland downtown, perhaps a bit larger. We walked half a mile from Elm Street to Lodi Ave and back.

The daytrip did not lift me out of the PEM struggle and I conked out for 4 days after that. I've written before about daytrips, unlike longer overnight ones, not being effective for ending a PEM struggle. This was another data point.

Fast forward a week, and I seem to have gotten out of the struggle finally. I walked almost 2 miles on 4/21 and then walked around the neighborhood in the afternoon the next day. Yesterday, I was able to run errands in the morning and then bike 4 miles in the afternoon. Today, I did the grocery shopping in the morning, walk a few blocks in the afternoon and took care of paper works. No crapping out despite up and running for 4 days in a row. I'm feeling as well as I did last November when I was up and running fine after returning from the trip to NY/NJ where I took 20,000 steps every other day. It sure feels like another recovery.

So, what lesson have I learned? No more season pass, that is what. I'll just buy day passes a few times next year and stick to green slopes. But then, that is what I said last year and yet I did what I did. Will the crash of 4 months teach me a lesson this time around? Stay tuned.