Bodywork repairs

 

Two weeks and two days after our adventures in the Strait (and no, I still can't remember what was going on immediately before and after my departure from the water ...) a few people have asked about the general physical and mental effects of such a day out.  Here are a few recovery-related surprises I've experienced. 

• Pain ... or lack of. I thought that I'd be in muscular agony after the swim, but strangely, that didn't happen. The day after the swim I had a little stiffness in my arms and back, and I was certainly aware of my shoulders, but I've been in more discomfort after some of our training swims. After Chopper in 2019 I was barely able to move my arms enough to dress myself for two days! On Saturday two days after swimming my legs ached a lot and felt very heavy. The best solution was 'legs up the wall' (Yoga with Adriene) and a kick set at the pool. I had some twinges, but essentially, arm and shoulder mobility were not much affected. The most pain I had was from one of the bruises on my shin. Five days after the swim I went to a regular morning squad session, and while my biceps in my left arm were randomly painful, I seemed to function quite well. I had a massage a few days ago, and the therapist commented that I must have done a lot of stretching and conditioning (hmm, no, just lots of swimming) because my shoulders, arms, back, and neck were in remarkably good shape. 'Your thoracic spine is like concrete  ... but that's swimmers for you ...'
• Hunger ... or lack of. Considering that insufficient/ineffective nourishment may have been my undoing, I'd expected to be starving hungry fairly soon after swimming. After Chopper in 2019  I was very hungry for about three days. This was different. For at least five days after this swim, I was aware that I required food but had very little enthusiasm for eating it. I suspect this was partly because my throat was initially very raspy and sore from the salt, and then it took a bit longer for the roof of my mouth and tongue to be normal again: I spent a few days eating only slippery food. It wasn't really until exactly two weeks after the swim that I was both extremely hungry and actually enjoying the prospect and activity of eating. Having talked to a few Ironman and ultra-marathon veterans, this doesn't seem to be an unusual phenomenon though.
• Sleep ... or lack of. After going to bed at around 3am after the swim, going to sleep at 5am, and then waking up apparently as fresh as a daisy at 7am, I was interested to see what would happen sleep-wise. On Friday 26 March I had a decent 10-hour sleep, but after that things were patchy, and while I sometimes felt rested, I'd also feel seriously exhausted at random times of the day. Quite often at work the floor would look like a pleasant and welcoming place to lie down and snooze. I think, again, it's only been this week when I've done normal sleeping. I bought some new magnesium tablets that also have some ingredients that promote better sleep: I'm not sure whether it's a placebo or not, but these really seem to work! For the last five nights, I've enjoyed consistent and sound 8-hour sleeps, and these have definitely made me feel far better about everything. 
• Concentration ... patchy, but again better this week. I've seen somewhere that hypothermia does have some short-term cognitive effects, and alongside tiredness, I think this has definitely been the case for me. Combined with a few days off work for Easter, most of the general damage has repaired. 
• Capacity for exertion. At my first squad session, five days after the swim, I was surprised to find that I could do everything we had to do, and when we did some 100-metre reps I managed them without any difficulty: a couple of seconds slower than they would have been pre-Strait, but I'd expected to be basically non-functioning. What was odd, however, is that I felt on auto-pilot when  I swam: my body and brain were in two separate rooms, and it almost seemed that I was watching myself in the pool from somewhere else. Weird disconnection. It took a few days for that to go away. My lungs were also a bit affected by the big swim, feeling for a few days quite crackly and raspy, almost like the beginnings of a respiratory bug.
• Desire/need to swim. I've been back at Tuesday and Thursday squad for the last two weeks, and while it's not been easy, it's been difficult in ways I didn't expect (see the previous point). However, now I feel more connected. I've also had some lovely swims with friends that are just fun. On Tuesday three of us had a little afternoon swim at Oriental Bay, and on Wednesday another group went over to Worser Bay to do a lap to Seatoun and back. These swims have felt therapeutic as if they're putting my body back together again. I'm still a bit slow in the water, but feeling more normal generally. Yesterday I did 5.8km in the pool, mainly chasing Eliza. We did some nice sets, and I was able to switch off my brain, let her do the counting, and just enjoy moving through the water.
  I certainly felt no need to take a complete break, as one symptom of recovery - to alleviate aches and pains - has been to move, rather than seize up. In the first week after the swim, I'd start to feel really twitchy and uncomfortable if I had to sit in one place too long, even on the bus coming home. So getting in the water provided the antidote. I'm also doing a 4.6km swim in Auckland next week, so felt I should keep myself in some sort of working order for that.