I arrived home last week from some work away and have been in bed ever since. Hence the lack of activity around here. Manflu is one of those stupid euphemisms designed to suggest that men are malingerers. It is sexist and deeply annoying. I am self-employed, so if I have to cancel work it cost me. Consequently if I have a heavy cold, I take the relevant remedies and carry on. This week, I was unable to do that. Every joint ached, I had no strength and have slept pretty much continuously since Thursday evening when I arrived home.
Yet, when I spoke to colleagues and friends they accused me of having manflu – and it is often men who perpetuate this absurd, stupid, puerile myth. Personally, I refuse to give these memes any traction. I don’t use them myself and get irritated when others use it because it encourages the underlying accusation that we are malingering.
There is no such thing as manflu. You either have a cold – in which case business as usual – or you have what I have had and cannot carry on. Either way, I have not had manflu. For the first time in years, I have had a cancel a weeks worth of work and that was painful as I have had to let clients down.
Today, I am feeling just about well enough to get out of bed and start to deal with correspondence. I’m not yet able to get on a bike, though…
You have my sympathy, LR. I had something like this during the first two weeks of January. Week 2, I just felt exhausted all the time and worked reduced hours, as I can’t afford 1 week off, never mind 2.
I see the man flu thing as just a joke and don’t really get upset about it. Most people know the difference between a really stinky cold and real flu because they have actually experienced both. The real thing is quite rare, I’m 59 and I think that I might have had it about three times. I’m not self employed but it is rare for me to have time off for illness.
Oddly enough, my sense of humour was somewhat absent…
Most people have no idea what one has to do when one is self-employed or a small business owner. Taking time off is often not an option. In about 35 years of working for myself, I can count on the fingers of one hand how many days I took off sick. And sometimes I felt like death warmed up, and would have loved to stay home to recover.
However, that said, I was never tempted to go back to working for someone else. I’m not very good at having bosses, and I’m not very good at being told what to do.
Hope you get better soon, LR. Flu’s a bugger.
In body count terms ‘flu’ is, apparently, one of the most lethal diseases on the planet. I’m told it makes The Black Death’s tally look amateurish. Infact I seem to recall there is a body (wrong choice of phrase?) of thought that some of the Great Plagues may infact have been flu?
I once made the mistake of assuming a flu was ‘just’ a really heavy cold and so walked the 1/2 mile into town to get something or the other (probably something from the chemist). By the time I reached the town centre I apparently looked (and FELT) so ill people were stopping me and asking if they should phone an ambulance- this was in a time before cell phones and ambulances would arrive within a matter of days not weeks.
LR, am I right in thinking you’re the principle carer for Mrs LR and that if she catches flu it might be far more serious for her than you?
That’s a horrible situation to be ill in 🙁
Fortunately, she seems to have dodged that bullet.
I think flu is quite rare, most of the time it is a cold, which can be a very miserable experience.
I believe that I have only had flu once. I felt it coming on and moved all that I needed into the bedroom. When it hit me I too ached all over, it was nothing like having a cold. Get well soon.
I’ve got it too, a new variant for me, as for the first time ever it’s in my digestive apparatus and my breathing apparatus at the same time and this is week two so far. I’m self employed as well, with 2 full time employees so I drag myself to the job-site at 8 and 4 to make sure things are proceeding, then sleep.
Came down with it just after a motorbike tour in Mexico, but not from the Mexicans – some damn Yank was sneezing constantly in the pool area of our hotel.
And for sure it’s not man-flu because my wife has it too.
I might have caught it in China once. Real bastard, must have been Fu Manflu.
The winner!