How I get fit done
Kristine Kilty, 41, went from training daily to being unable to hold a conversation after an accident during a workout at home
In November 2020, I was 38 and staying at my parents’ house in Ireland during the second lockdown, when my life changed in an instant. I was putting in long work hours as a creative fashion director and I’d do daily 6.30am workouts to help me feel normal and maintain a routine.
Until one morning when, after accidentally snoozing my alarm and rushing to make my 7am HIIT session, I smashed a dumbbell into the back of my head during a dumbbell snatch. It hurt, but I kept going, finishing my workout.
By evening, I was irritable. During an online seminar, I was immediately forgetting what the speaker had just said. Afterwards, I realised I’d filled a full page of A4 with the same sentence. The exhaustion continued; two days later, I tried to complete an exercise class, but I felt nauseous and then I had a nosebleed.
I knew I needed to get medical help, but A&E departments were overwhelmed during Covid; I felt embarrassed taking up their time with an exercise injury. A doctor family friend recommended bed rest, but as weeks passed by, my speech became slow and slurred.
By Christmas, I had contacted various Dublin hospitals – but since I didn’t have an Irish GP (I’d lived in London since 2003), no one would see me. I eventually saw a doctor at a sports clinic, who referred me for an MRI scan. Finally, in January, I was diagnosed with concussion, from which – I was told – it could take months or years to recover.
While the diagnosis was a relief, I refused to accept the recovery time and I followed my doctors’ advice to the letter: only engaging one sense at a time (where possible) to prevent brain fatigue, meditating daily using an eye mask and joining virtual yoga classes – where I’d often lie in child’s pose. Luckily, several work clients asked to postpone projects and, by taking on an assistant, I reduced my daily laptop time to 15 minutes. It wasn�
