Studying Despite Sickness

Heyo!

I've been really ill lately, and today seems to be the worst yet! I woke up and my whole body felt heavy, and it hurt to move my head, so I wasn't really off to a good start. After some breakfast, I was able to start feeling a bit better, and had some juice, fruit, and some tea. I always find fighting a cold a fight best done with food, tea, and other hot things to counteract how awful I'm feeling. I went to Lidl and was able to get myself some stuff to help, including some lemon cold and flu sachets without any honey in and some lemon and ginger herbal tea. I bought myself some bubble bath too (not Matey! unfortunately) but some Radox with things added which smelt amazing and claims to help with stress, so really hoping it'll be successful and it might calm me down and the steam might be good for my flu-like thingy.

I have also been really busy doing work for my Publishing essay and for my dissertation studies, and I have actually been pretty successful, making over ten pages of notes (front AND back!) and it's been good to get so much done. I thought I would share a couple of tips with you guys for studying, or just getting things done, when you're feeling really ill and just want to crawl right back into bed and sleep until you feel better!

Drinking

No, not student-drinking type of drinking! Keeping fluids up is something that you parents, grandparents and every hangover guide ever tells you to do, but it's super important when you're ill. This is the best way to flush out the illness, and the sooner you flush it out the sooner you'll start feeling well enough to do some normal things again. I've been drinking a lot of tea and lemsip-like drinks, but hot drinks and a mix of water too will be the best way to combat the cold. Keeping up fluids, and having hot ones too, will be a lot better at keeping you feeling well and will keep you warm in the process.

Eating

Obviously when you're not feeling well, you don't really feel like cooking up a storm. Another note, why is it whenever you're ill you body and brain seem to want food that will in no way benefit your body. Try and eat three meals a day, two as a minimum. Eat when you want to though, don't feel you have to stick to eating the meals at the 'correct' times, as you might not be hungry for lunch at 1, but come 2 you'll want it! Have at least one hot meal a day, this will physically help you feel better and also warmth will make a difference when fighting the cold. Soup seems to be a great sick-food, others include a chicken and onion broth (as recommended by my lovely landlord - onion and garlic broth if you're vegan!) and things like stew, beans on toast, and other hot and partially liquidy-things especially if your throat is killing you like mine is now! Eat things that are nutritious and good for you, as your body really needs the nutrients right now, no matter how much you really want that chip butty (and yes, that is a note from me to me!)

Small tasks

Take on small tasks, don't try and tackle a huge to-do list when you're not feeling physically (or mentally) up to it! I've managed to do bits of work today little and often, and I've been managing to tackle it all pretty well despite illness. I have been sat at my desk a lot, and I have been taking tea, relaxing and food breaks quite frequently to break up the amount it hurts my brain to research what news is. I'm looking into fake news in contemporary news alongside the rise of fake news via social media, and of social media news outlets (I'm not sure if it even makes sense anymore, but it's actually really interesting!) I'm going to be making a survey to help my research, so if you see it in the next few days please fill it out - you'll be a great help! Take small tasks, or little bits that you can do wherever you are most comfortable, wearing whatever is comfortable for you. For me, I've been wearing a comfy hoodie and jeans all day and it's been great!

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The main message is that you shouldn't try and do too much when you're not up to it, recovering is more important than risking making yourself worse for the sake of attempting to understand potentially difficult things whilst feeling like death. I'm now going to have a bath, another mug of the lemsip-like drink from Lidl and fall asleep watching Porco Rosso!

If you're not ill, I envy you. If you are ill, I wish you a speedy recovery!

B x