Currently my situation is not very good. I finished off my NCAA wrestling season about two months ago and got diagnosed with mono roughly a month weeks ago. I did not know I had mono and occasionally did a few workouts while I had it but I knew something was wrong. My first two mono tests were negative but my throat swelled up where I could no longer eat. I finally tested positive for mono but was told I probably had it for 2 or three weeks before this test came back positive. I’ve been out of the gym obviously and just very depressed since I’ve lost everything and slowly seeing my body getting out of shape in the mirror.
I have never been hit with such a sickness and have mixed signals on when to return to lifting and such. My doctor said I could do light working out but I think she didn’t realize that a light workout to an individual is different then a college athlete. The only symptoms I show now is I’m still sleeping a ton. I told myself I’d be out of the gym for a month and then come back. I was wondering about tips on returning to the gym and what I should maybe do for a workout and not to over due it.
I’m almost 22 years old in college.
when I was at my peak at 19 I power lifted and had raw numbers of 335 bench, 500 squat, 500 dead lift, ( I know irrelevant, I probably sound like a tool)before I dieted and decided to attend college and wrestle at the 165 pound weight class. So I don’t consider myself a full blown beginner but I do have a lot to learn and was looking for some advice.
Thanks for everything
I had mono a little bit over 2 years ago. After 4 weeks off, I started back training 3x/week just doing bodyweight work (pushups, pullups, bodyweight squats, stepping up to a box, etc.). I did this for a couple of weeks. Then two more weeks of what would be the workload of a deload week (i.e. cutting total volume down while only using 40-60% of my previous 1RM). Then from there everything back to normal.
Thank you. Yeah It’s almost been a month. It was weird though because my first two mono tests were negative… but the third positive… so the doctor said I had mono probably before the first test but it just showed up negative because the tests aren’t always accurate. My fever was no longer I just couldn’t swallow and my neck was swollen. After some meds for the neck everything was fine except the sleeping. I plan to get back in the gym next week… that will be approx. 1 month off. I was thinking about doing one muscle group a day and just light weight lots of reps. just get the body and muscle memory back to the swing of things.
I just don’t want to relapse or get screwed because pre season for wrestling is only 4 months away… I plan to stay off the wrestling mat for awhile… any advice on how intense of cardio I can do?
I don’t know what your conditioning levels were like before the illness. I started at literally 10 minutes slow and easy on the bike and added a little each workout. Once I got back into full training though, I went back to zero conventional cardio, which is more my style. Only you really know what you can handle really. The last thing you want to do is try too much, though. Just be smart, and be prepared to call it a day even if you’ve only done half of what you were hoping. In time, you won’t even remember this. I promise. In the 8 months following my bout, I got my deadlift from 225 to 405. Play it smart and you’ll be just fine in 4 months.