Coming back from setbacks

**Lothene** · Posted On: 10/23/2006 11:20pm

This is really starting to get to me. I'm in Thailand, came here four months ago with the idea that i'd spend a year training Muay Thai, but things haven't worked out quite as planned. I've been sick so many times it's not funny (food poisoning x3, something "like cholera", a couple of viruses, acute conjunctivitis, infected sores etc) , and right now I'm sick again. I've had a fever and been feeling really weak for about three weeks, and the hospital doesn't know what's wrong with me. I get the results of my second round of blood tests tomorrow.

I took about a week and a half off training, but didn't get any better, so now I'm training a *little* bit, but can't do much at all, which is f***ing annoying.

I'm finding it incredibly frustrating, as I quit my job and left heaps of things behind so that I could come here and improve, and while my technique's getting better, my body seems to be going backwards, and I don't know when I'll be 100% healthy again. I really want to get back into training hard but last time I slogged myself when I was still sick it ended pretty badly.

When I started training one year ago, I'd never been a fit or active person, so the whole time I was training I was in better and better shape than I'd ever been before. I only had a couple of injuries, and never missed more than a week or two of training, so now I find myself in a position I've not been in before - where I have to work to get back to the condition I was in before.

Since I don't have any of my own experiences to draw on with this, I was hoping maybe you guys could share your experiences of having setbacks in your training and coming back from them. (And how you kept your spirits up in the mean time)

Cheers.

**alex** · Posted On: 10/24/2006 1:35am

this will sound kinda corny but positive thinking is where its at. I used to be a bit of a negative thinker in my approach to training, i would think of reasons not to go, i would overplay injuries etc. then i got offered a fight and was training like a madman, and it got cancelled a few days before the event, which pissed me off but i also realised that during that time my view on training had taken a total 180. instead of thinking of reasons not to go i was thinking of reasons to go. doesnt matter what the reasons are, so long as they get you there.

even when it comes to being ill the power of positive thinking is incredibly effective. with illness you just have to concentrate on feeling good, do **** to take your mind off it. if you cant train then go along and watch. that way you might see things you never noticed before because you were too busy training. if you feel weak then take your time and focus on perfect technique instead of tiring yourself out.

out of interest where are you training? most camps provide food to their fighters and its hard to believe you could get food poisoning off the same place 3 times without something being done about it. you might want to look at a change of camp if your health is being compromised.

**Hannibal** · Posted On: 10/24/2006 1:56am

Thailand is a shithole no doubt. It's not the cleanest of country's.

Do not train while you are sick and recovering. No way. You've had food poinsoning three times so your body needs nutrician and rest. I say get on a plane and come back home. There are still good places to train Muay Thai in Melbourne. Positive thinking is good but like it or not if your sick your're sick. The last thing you want to do is put extra strain on your body and all the positive thinking in the world won't change that.

Get on a plane and fly back home.

**Lothene** · Posted On: 10/24/2006 2:15am

Thanks mate. I have been trying to stay positive but often struggle to. In some ways I feel like I've shot myself in the foot by not going somewhere where there are other 'farangs' for me to talk to but maybe it's better if I can't whine to people!

Neither of the gyms I've been at have provided food. To start off I was training at a very small gym in a village in the countryside of Sisaket in Isaan, living with a Thai family and just eating what they were eating. Thing is that they'd often cook fish in the morning, we'd eat some of it, then they'd leave it out in the heat, and it'd be served up again 6 hours later for lunch. Because we couldn't always get water from the taps there, the water was kept in a big trough in the bathroom, and it had stuff growing in it. When I first arrived I thought I was invincible and would clean my teeth with the rank water (stopped after two weeks though), but even using that water to "shower" with would sometimes mean getting a bit in my mouth etc. Anyway after three months I decided to go somewhere where I could have a bit more control over what I was eating, so I moved to Ubon. I've only had food poisoning once here and it was no big deal, only lasted 2 days (the other two times my stomach became infected and I was sick for 1-2 weeks and had to get injections etc) and the other guy who ate the same food as me was sick for about a week, so I think I'm getting tougher, but anyway none of these things were the fault of either of the gyms.

In restrospect it would have been good to have gone along and just watched everyone training when I wasn't able to train at all, but at that stage I just thought it was flu and would be over soon and didn't want to spread it around, particularly as a number of the boys had fights coming up. Right now I'm doing as per your suggestion and trying to work more on technique, though it frustrates me seeing everyone else training hard and most of all I hate that after training I don't have that satisfied, exhausted feeling, I just feel depressed.

I just hope the hospital figures out what the problem is and fixes it and I can get back into it.

Sorry for long rant.

**Lothene** · Posted On: 10/24/2006 2:25am

Originally Posted by Hannibal

Thailand is a shithole no doubt. It's not the cleanest of country's.

Do not train while you are sick and recovering. No way. You've had food poinsoning three times so your body needs nutrician and rest. I say get on a plane and come back home. There are still good places to train Muay Thai in Melbourne. Positive thinking is good but like it or not if your sick your're sick. The last thing you want to do is put extra strain on your body and all the positive thinking in the world won't change that.

Get on a plane and fly back home.

I've recovered from the food poisoning, the thing I have now is something different altogether. The hospital has taken a second round of blood and urine tests and hopefully I'll know more tomorrow. I also saw a different doctor who said I probably have mild dengue fever or typhoid, but BOTH said it's okay for me to do light training. I'm really not training hard at all at the moment, just running 2k, then doing 3 rounds shadow boxing, 3-5 rounds on the bag, situps and that's it.

No way am I coming home, don't want to give up that easily. Worst comes to worst I can always go to Bangkok or one of the islands, somewhere with more modern facilities etc, but I'm not going back to Melbourne until June unless the test shows something that would mean not being able to train for an extended period of time.

Everything has turned to **** right now but I really want to make this work.

**alex** · Posted On: 10/24/2006 2:32am

remember that hannibal has that village idiot tag for a reason. it would be in your best insterest to disregard anything he has to say.

**ar549** · Posted On: 11/30/2006 8:16am

Originally Posted by Lothene

I've recovered from the food poisoning, the thing I have now is something different altogether. The hospital has taken a second round of blood and urine tests and hopefully I'll know more tomorrow. I also saw a different doctor who said I probably have mild dengue fever or typhoid, but BOTH said it's okay for me to do light training. I'm really not training hard at all at the moment, just running 2k, then doing 3 rounds shadow boxing, 3-5 rounds on the bag, situps and that's it.

No way am I coming home, don't want to give up that easily. Worst comes to worst I can always go to Bangkok or one of the islands, somewhere with more modern facilities etc, but I'm not going back to Melbourne until June unless the test shows something that would mean not being able to train for an extended period of time.

Everything has turned to **** right now but I really want to make this work.

I sent you my phone number by PM. Give me a call and I will get you sorted.

There is one farang Camp in Ubon, it does not sound like you are there at all. You cannot live like Thai village people or you will continue to have the same issues over and over. Im just wondering how you ended up in Sisaket in the jungle with those guys, thats pretty far off the grid. I have a completely modern place and my wife supplies all the food, My food is a higher standerd then either America or Australia.

I can hook you up with the guys in Ubon if you dont know them or you can come here for a week and check out whats going on. My first suggestion is to get to a hospital in Udon or Bangkok that treats westerners and get some tests, you could have liver flukes from sisaket or dungee but you will not know if they dont deal with lots of westerners in order to see this kind of issue and recognize it. Bryan Lee