I’ve been constipated for at least two weeks. There has been lots of pain and bloating, noxious flatulence and interrupted sleep. Last week I didn’t work more than half a day.

My GP has prescribed lots of Movicol to soften my output, paracetamol as an analgesic, lots of fruit and lots of non-caffeine fluid. The Movicol is working, the paracetamol helps somewhat, heat-patches help to some extent and the fluid is passing through.

This week I worked some of Monday morning, then gave up: my head wasn’t working and my innards were hateful. On Tuesday morning I went to a routine appointment to do with our forthcoming 6-month cycle-trip. I burst into tears: I felt drained physically and emotionally – just a useless tosser* – and I was so sick of being ill and worrying that this would hamper our plans. Fortunately, the person I was meeting pointed out that I was doing fine otherwise – and that this too will pass.

*I know logically that I’m not useless!

I realised that I needed some endorphins – I’d not cycled or spun for over 2 weeks, so after some shopping, Lev and I headed west on the A8. I like this road – it’s mostly flat, the potholes aren’t too bad and passing the slip-roads to and from Edinburgh Airport is always a rush.

I had almost no acceleration and didn’t get above 23mph (that was with a following wind), and took 102 minutes to do 18.7 miles. But it worked – I felt much more human when I got home.

Yesterday I went to work but didn’t achieve much writing – instead I planned what I needed to do for an event I’m running in March. There’s a scary amount to do! I arrived late at spinning, still feeling bloated and in pain. However, then the Lifescycle magic took over! Andy’s music and routines (a fair amount of jumps, quite a bit of fast sprinting between climbs), spinning next to Elly, a great bike and a need to do something to beat my condition all conspired to produce and adrenaline-filled, super-sweaty high! Thank you to all involved – it was just what I needed. I couldn’t keep up with all the runs, especially towards the end, but I kept going (mostly) and felt pumped all the way through.

Today I cycled to Napier around lunchtime, worked a bit, took part in a conference call, worked a bit more and called it a day a little after 6pm. I’m home, enjoying heat-patches and Shrek, and looking forward to being horizontal.