Should I train when I'm sick?

This topic is one that is commonly asked and commonly unknown so I thought it would be a great time to talk all about training when you're sick, should you rest, should you just push through?

Now sickness can mean a whole lot of different things. You could feel a little tired, just fatigued. Or you could be feeling fluey, cold, chest cough low energy. Or maybe it's stomach related. 
Whatever sickness it is you need to be honest with how you feel. 

Almost always I'd say no to any strenuous exercise as your body is already under a lot of strain with fighting whatever sickness and adding extra 'stress' to the body (ie exercise) is only going to slow down your healing process and take your bodies focus away from healing and more into repairing and recovering from a workout. 

This also goes for heavy strength training as again when strength training you are usually aiming for muscle fatigue to encourage muscle growth and strength but in the case of sickness again this takes the focus away from healing and now your body is also using energy to repair the muscles you just worked out. 

Now gentle movement is okay in the instance of mild sickness and also okay if you feel up to it. Every sickness will feel different and the first few days when it's the worst if all you feel like doing is sleeping and you have no energy to do anyhing else, REST. Don't get up for a walk just to move. Take the few days of rest and only add in a gentle walk IF you feel able to. 

Trust me when I say resting WILL NOT take away all your fitness progress it WILL NOT make you lose all your strength gains and make you instantly unfit. 
This also means that when you are sick you STILL NEED TO EAT 
Your body is burning a lot of energy to fight the sickness you have in your body and even if we don't feel as hungry as normal we still need to try and maintain whatever food we can have to help our body have energy and nutrients to get better quicker. 

Use this time for rest as an opportunity to read some books, catch up on your fave tv show, write a creative piece, or just sleep and rest. 
In the scheme of things these moments slowing down when we're sick don't matter overall and you're better off slowing down and getting over your sickness nice and fast so you can return to normal life rather than continue pushing and prolonging the sickness way longer than it would have been if you rested.