Happy & Healthy

Why you get sick on your day off

Like a bear out of hibernation, that's how it felt when I woke up on my first free morning. And as a bonus upon waking, I got a little flu. I shot up, with a runny nose and well-filled sinuses, straight up in bed. Noooo, not on my vacation. Not. Sick. On. My. Vacation. Please, go bother someone else with those idiotic germs. I threw in a hefty cocktail of paracetamol and vitamins to send the advancing pathogens back to where they came from. And I'm on the mend. Flu versus Adeline: 1-1.

Did you also experience this in your hard-earned vacation? That could be, because then you suffer from the reverse-Kortjakje syndrome aka vacation sickness. You know, Kortjakje is always sick in the middle of the week but not on Sundays. In this case, Kortjakje is not your middle name, because you get knocked down on a Sunday. By a spectacular migraine show or a refined flu, just like this lady here. But how is that fair? You’ve worked hard and are looking forward to that free day or vacation, and then they ruin it for you. Literally. Well, you’re normally always so up and running that it only shows when you’re at rest. Goodness, I’m doing it to myself too.

You have two forms of this misery, because either you get flattened, or you keep running around in circles in your free time like a pumped-up adrenaline rush. By the way, the latter works the same as staring at the ceiling after a breathtaking busy day. Finally lying under the covers, after three hours of staring, you’ve analyzed all the pits and holes in the bedroom ceiling. And it’s really ridiculous high time to put a brush to it and freshen up that corner. Oh no, sleep. Such a story.

But back to Kortjakje, the other way around. Here’s the thing. When your stress level goes through the roof on a workday (there you have it again), you don’t allow yourself to get tired or sick. Hello, you don’t have time for that at all, do you? And by ignoring all those screaming and howling signals, you produce adrenaline. Adeline, adrenaline; that ancient joke about my name is really getting to me, I must say. But the moment you switch to relaxation mode, it’s one big coming-to-get-ya story. The horror.

Don’t worry, there’s a remedy. Or rather, possibly something that might help. This sounds a bit too uncertain to me, but okay. It seems that if you really go for it on that first free evening at the gym (I’m just talking about exercising, nothing dirty with the fitness instructor), that release helps to channel all that excess energy properly. Uuuuh, but didn’t we agree that I would hit the weights after my vacation? Nope, that has to happen before the zen mode. You understand, I really went for it at Pilates last night. Not really the ideal class for that, because you tense up just as much as you relax. But this time I went more for the strenuous moves (my powerhouse took a beating), a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do. All to ensure my two and a half weeks of utmost relaxation, of course. But then you know, if you feel a bit of pain or a hint of flu… Off to the gym. Or do something about your balance between running and standing still, but we’ll talk about that another time.