One of the joys of living in Africa, is you never quite know what is wrong with you and what is affecting your body on any given day.
The last few weeks I’d been feeling very lethargic and had a hard time getting through the day without a nap. I was accounting this to a number of things in my head; the heat, living where I work, getting up earlier, exercising more, and also assumed my iron was low again. Yesterday I decided I best go get my iron levels checked because by 11am I wanted a nap.
So off I go to the clinic with a laboratory close to my house to get a blood test. Surprise, surprise, my iron is low. After telling me this, the lab tech throws in “You are also sick.” Umm, what? I just look at her. “Well, your white blood cell count is also high so you are fighting off an infection.” Ok. What sort of infection? “Just take antibiotics.” Care to tell me which ones or give me a prescription? Why am I being stared at like I’m mad? Uh, I have Cipro at home. Should I take that? “Ya, take that.” Great. Thanks. So now, I’m on a round of Cipro. We’ll see how that goes and then I’ll go back for another test.
Sometimes I can’t help but wonder how mental these things are. I didn’t feel sick. I just felt overtired. Now today I feel sick. I went on a run this morning. Made it a mere 3.55km and cursed running the entire way. Now its 9am and I feel like sleeping again, even after a big mug of coffee.
Lets be honest, running here generally tends to suck anyway (this is my cry baby session – you can get out your violins). It’s bloody hot, so if you don’t go early, you don’t go at all. Or you do, and feel like you want to die. The elevation affects you too. Lilongwe is at an elevation of approximately 1050m (3445ft) while my beloved Toronto is only 76m (249ft). Running performance starts to be affected at around 1,000 meters altitude. I’m going to feel sorry for myself for that extra 50m today. But then again, there are arguments that training at an altitude is why Kenyans and Ethiopians are such good runners. This means when I go home, I should be an amazing runner in Toronto. Every day I also start to doubt whether or not I will be able to train to run a marathon alone. Since my Running Room days, I am a big proponent of group running. It is the only way I ever was able to run the distances I did. Training alone is hard. There is nothing but your iPod to drown out negative self talk. Kate and I are running several days a week together and it makes a huge difference on those runs. You run, chat and don’t even notice the km’s go by. Also, we’re both so busy it makes time for us to see each other and catch up. Last night we went for a trail run at the Lilongwe Wildlife Centre where Kate works. It was a nice change from the hazards of the road. Had some Verbit Monkeys run next to us in their cage. We made a special trip over to see Bella, the one eyed lion and ran up and down the side of her cage with her following us for a while. She loves any company and is like a big domestic cat, loving a good back scratch. It’s a pretty cool trail run when you get to stop and give a lion a little back scratch in the middle of it.
No exhibitionists, or street dogs on my run this morning. Just a UNICEF SUV ran itself off the road and had to swerve back on because the driver was too busy staring in awe at the silly mzungu running with her dog.
Off to eat, take some pills, and then maybe . . . a nap. I have a squash game tonight to rest up for.
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