I have mono - any stories?

Hey guys...I'm a 21 year old female, just found out I have mono. I was wondering if anyone else has experienced this. I am obviously going to take it easy and not excercise, but it's very difficult for me as someone who loves working out and does it 5 times a week. I'm afraid once I get better that I will no longer have the urge to work out as I used to. Anyone have mono stories???

hey bb, sorry to hear about your mono, that sucks! I don't have a mono story, but I have been sidelined by a rare lung condition for the past 5 months or so. I used to work out 5 days a week too, so believe me I can relate to exercise being a part of your life and suddenly not being physically able to do it, no matter how much you want to.

don't worry, you'll only be out of commission for a month or so, you won't lose the urge that quickly. just heal up and get back to it when you get the ok from your doc (don't push it too soon, mono increases your risk for a ruptured spleen!)

My 17 year old daughter had mono (diagnosed this past August).  She was totally out of commission (really sick and feeling crummy) for 1 week.  Prior to and after that week, it was slow going.  The stereotypical exhaustion all the time.  If she got up to do anything (eat, shower) she would be sleeping for 2 - 3 hours.  We were "happy" she got it in the summer, as she did not miss any school.  She is just now starting to re-introduce herself to exercise by walking either outside or on the treadmill.  She used to play soccer, but no contact sports were allowed (due to concern of rupturing the spleen).

Just take the time they tell you to REST - it is possible to relapse and I know one woman who developed Chronic Fatigue Syndrome following mono (she's in her mid-late 30's)

Good Luck and feel better

I had mono back in college and it lasted probably for about 3-4 weeks.  I also worked out and walked around campus but I was so tired all the time.  Then I got strep throat and that is how I discovered I actually had mono because the strep did not go away immediately with medication.

So I would suggest if you walk around maybe jog that would be ok.  Just be careful and make sure you let your body rest.  As you probably feel like you body is failing you and your inactivity is harming you maintaining or weight loss, one month off of not working out hardcore will not set you back too too much.  I would just make sure that you continue to eat healthy.


Rest up and just take it easy.  Walking and jogging is what I suggest.

I also had mono in college and didn't know it until it was almost over.  I don't think I had very severe symptoms like some people I knew, just fatigue (the want to lay down on the side of the sidewalk kind).  I still walked around campus and was actually downhill skiing twice a week (I had it as a class).  I didn't notice that it got any worse or lasted any longer with my activity, so I think you just have to listen to your body.  If you feel like you can do a little light to moderate exercise - go for it! 

I had mono a couple years ago.  I was pretty sick for about 3 weeks.  My appetite was totally surpressed and I couldn't eat much anyhow because it hurt so bad to swallow.  I found myself feeling tired.  Stay away from exercise. You need to let your body heal itself. 

My senior year of high school I was trying out for varsity volleyball and football at the same time (small school and I was a gym rat).   I had practice in the morning and evening and I worked part time in between.  Needless to say I was zonked out.  I mean, I should be right?  It was a lot of work.  Well then I broke out in a rash that started on my face.  I went to the doctor and he determined that I had mono for the past 2+ weeks all thru my sports practices.  The rash turned out to be strep related and was impentago.  It was horrible.  My skin felt aweful.  It was all over my face and I couldn't wear makeup to even try to cover it up.  Not a cool thing for a girl in her senior year of high school. 

Stupid me, I still went to practice, I made it on the varsity volleyball team, and never slowed down unless I passed out after school.  It was a rough few weeks.

Mono sucks, and it's even worse if your skin turns into simulated moon surface due to a strepp infection!

I got mono when I was in seventh grade. I'm guessing I had a severe case, because most of my friends who got it this year weren't nearly as miserable as I was. I was out of school for four weeks.

I had chronic fatigue, and would pass out every hour or so. I couldn't eat or swallow anything other than jello and occassionally sushi and oatmeal. I was even given steroids because my throat was so swollen breathing became hard.

They told me if I became too active I would relapse, and it would take longer form me to get better. They didn't let me go to dance class because mono enlarges your spleen, and it's very dangerous to be active.

I suggest you lay off exercising, and continue eating healthy and eating what you can until you get better. I would hate for you to take longer to get better, or to be rushed to the emergency room because your spleen ruptured.

Take care and hang in there =]

Do I have a mono story?
In grade 8 I came down with mono in March.  Was off school for a month.  Puking, sleeping, lost 15 pounds.
My aunt had my cousin in April and I I would put him in the stroller and walk him everywhere.  I was 13 at the time. 
My grade 8 teacher thought that my cousin was my baby.  We still laugh about it, and I call him my son.

Thanks for all the replies. They've been very helpful. I'm a lot better. My glands are no longer swollen and I don't feel too tired. I think I've had this for about 3 weeks already because I had a temperature starting November 8th. I was thinking of starting some light excercise on Saturday and seeing how my body responds and then slowly increasing the excercise every week. I'm scared of a relapse though!! i've been walking to class and it doesn't seem to take too much out of me.

I had it when I was 15. I was out of commission for a month, and that was considered a mild case I guess. Just take it easy-- there's real danger of your spleen bursting through too much activity even for a while after you are better. I got mine in the beginning of Aug. and still couldn't do gym class ( per the dr.) for the first 6 weeks of school. Rest!!!

When me and my brother both lived at home.. about 4 years ago, I guess.. he got mono really bad. But it was his fault it got so bad, cause he didnt go to the doctor until about a month into it. He was out of commision for 2 months, but 2 weeks of it was in the hospital. I think the main reason it got so bad was that he played hockey and basketball at the time, so for that first month he was really active until he finally gave and went to the doctor, thinking it was just the flu and a sore throat.
and he wasnt allowed to play any sports or do gym class for the rest of the year.

so... moral of the story. sit back, relax. take a few weeks to make sure you really are better. You dont want to damage yourself or keep yourself sick longer than you have to be, and afterwards, start exercising slowly.

Hope you feel 100% soon <3

I also got mono back in University days - I had a relatively mild dose to begin with so, I re-commenced intense training for rugby.  Bam! I was down and out for almost three weeks with a range of secondary issues.  I lost about twenty pounds which (then) I couldn't afford to lose.  I also lost a season of rugby and had a brutal semester playing catch up.  To the good, I learned a valuable lesson which served me well when (much later in life) I contracted serious pneumonia in China: if you're normally an active healthy person and you're still feeling the effects of illness, make it your "work-out" to get well rested and recover.  People who try to push through a significant illness are taking a big risk of a major relapse.  Your latest post sounds sensible if you take the walking, etc., with a chance to rest for the next day.  You're probably on the road to recovery already but applying some patience will not hurt you at all.  Go easy! 

ok...so right now i have mono..it sucks totally.i got it about 3 or 4 days b4 thanksgiving.. im am getting over it slowly..so when i was starting to get mono i thought it would be just a sore throat because i had no idea what mono was....so i was talking to my best friend on the phone b/c we wanted to go to this guys house at my school. but we couldnt go b/c my mom wasnt home..so after i hung up with my best friend my throat was hurting ..and everytime i swallowed it just hurt worse, and i thought i was just tired because it was late at night.so i was sick all thanksgiving break and then i missed 2 weeks of school..so during that time i went to the doctor the first time when i was feelig horrible and we had a test to see if i had strepp but i didnt...then the second time i went to the doctor we had the monospot done..i didnt want to get the prick because i knew i couldnt have mono...but they made me anyway..so i had mono...i almost cried,b/c right now im out of basketball,PE,anything excercizing...im am a sports freak...i play soccer i LOVE soccer ..i tried playing...it didnt really help..i got soo tired after i slept for 5 hours. i also have a lot of make up work for school...mono can be really depressing if you dont think of happy things..i thought i was gonna die i felt so bad...ive lost weight and gained it and lost it again but overall right now ive lost 10 lbs. ive had pretty much all the symptoms of mono...Signs of mono include fever, sore throat, headaches, white patches on the back of your throat, swollen glands in your neck, feeling tired and not feeling hungry. ...my doctor told me that my tonsils were touching that was why i could barely swallow..but the kind of mono i have is..you get better and then you get worse and then better again..it is very scary knowing that you might get it again and might have to go through all the steps again...im 13 years old and i have no idea how i got mono ...like everyone says "just rest"...UGH i want to play sports i want to run i want to use all my energy and then just crash i want to just run on the beach and never stop. that is how i feel when im tired..the weird thing is ..is that i get so much energy saved up from doing nothing and i try doing something and it doesnt last as long as i thought it wouldve ...pretty much..mono is disapointing b/c you get it and there is no medicine they can give you unless you have an infection...all they can do is treat it ...and it doesnt always work..that is sad..i think it is really sad..good things come out of mono and bad things come out but when you get better you feel all the weight of tiredness lifted off of you...slowly..but surely i hope you feel better b/c im in it with you

man,,whats with thanksgiving and mono?? i had mono about 10 years ago, and i couldn't work out for 2 freaking months. all i wanted to do was sleep, i would sleep for 12-16 hours a day, and all the lymph nodes in my neck swelled up so badly that i couldn't eat. did the spot test, came up pos for mono, but had a secondary infection to go with it. i couldn't work, go to school, take care of my daughter or anything. i lost nearly 30 lbs, and when i finally started to feel better, even walking from my bedroom to the bathroom was exhausting.

i know it's going to be aggrivating not working out, but, if you push yourself too much, you are going to regret it. take it easy, rest!!! i cannot stress that enough. one of the reasons i was so sick was i would work 3rd shift, go from work to class, during break between classes i would hit the gym for an hour, get home at 2 pm, spend time with my munchkin, go to sleep at 7 and get up at midnight to work the overnight shift at the gas station down the street.

please be careful, even if you are feeling better, give yourself a few more weeks before you start pushing yourself...you don't want to get sick again!

aww one of my friends at school just found out she has it and was told not to do ANYTHING. she has it pretty bad. she found out the week before finals and can't even get out of bed to get up and walk to class. she might have to postpone her finals. the reason she has it so bad is that she didn't recognize the signs soon enough and pushed herself too hard. she really regrets it now. she even has an infection and flu like symptoms now because she couldn't slow down. i would take it easy to avoid getting worse. i hope you feel better!

I was diagnosed with mono the other day, and I do not understand it. 

I went to the doctor with a sore throat of my life, and three days later she called me and told me that I have mono.  Now that my throat feels better, I do not feel any different.  My doctor told me that I can do anything I feel like I can do, except full contact sports and carrying loads over 20lbs, so that I do not injure my spleen. 

I am still working, I am still doing cardio.  I am not weight training for the time being because I like my spleen. 

There is nothing wrong with me whatsoever.  There have been times in my life that I would have sworn that I had mono, but didn't.  Now they swear I do, but I feel like I am faking.  I told a friend at work, and she doesn't believe me.  Everything assumes that I am supposed to be bed ridden or something. 

Meh, another bad experience...

Orientation week at college. I had just gotten back from a trip to Canada. That week I felt like dogsh*t. I was very sick and couldnt go to half the orientation (which was graded). I passed out at one of them and went to the hospital. I had severe dehydration and...mono.

I dont know if it was the freshman 15 or the mono, but I gained 20 pounds in 3 months and havent been able to keep it off since. Im now a third year student. *sighs*

Oh my god! Mono is the WORST!!! Especially since normally the mono spot comes back negative until the 2nd, 3rd or even 4th week of the sickness. I first got sick right before I went home for thanksgiving break this year, like I felt like I was about to die and couldn't even swallow my own saliva! Everyone just kept telling me it was strep and the medicine would work for about a week and once I stopped taking it I would get sick again. It was HORRIBLE! horrible horrible! I had mono spot after mono spot for like four weeks! I had been on every antibiotic for strep that exists and was on steroids for a bit, nothing seemed to work! FINALLY in like, January or the beginning of February they got a positive test and were just like... "yeah we can't do anything!".. but at least I knew I wasn't making stuff up! haha. I was sick for so long. Then they decided that my tonsils should just come out (god that's fun at 18) and I got them out in March (I was still getting sick after antibiotics, and it was getting to be fewer days between antibiotic sessions before I'd get sick again!) I had complications with that too!! Not a good year! haha.

Moral of the story: MONO SUCKS!!!!!!!!!

i just got mono yesterday !!! I HATE IT !! yesterday i went to the doctor thinking i just had strep thraot because we normally get it in my family considering my mother is a carrier but when the doctor came in a told me it was a negative on the strep thraot test and i mist have mono i almost fainted i couldnt say anyting i couldnt belive it !! i mean i had heard of mono but i had heard its a desease that keeps you in bed for 6 to 7 months i was relived when my doctor told me she would predict it would go away by the weekend but i have my high school orientation this saterday its horrible i wont be able to go to my own high school orientation ut realllyyy sucks but my throat it crazyy sore but what i found out that helps is taking 3 MOTRIN my doctor told me it was ok to take a larger dise if i was in alot on pain which i am my tonsils are covered in white stuff and it realllyy hurts im glad i found this page nbecause it relives me that other people get it and im not such s freaakk i really hope it goes awatt

i had mono in college.  totally kicked my ass.  i was in bed for 2.5 weeks (had to come home from college).  i also had a really painful throat infection.  the drugs for my throat knocked me out (not that i needed any help) and i had some of the craziest dreams ever.

 i got back up to school,and still felt pretty weak.  it took me another 3 weeks or so to really get caught up and feeling alright.

in the end, i had to quit the sailing time, and drop a class...all of which sucked.