A Man's Got To Know His Limitations

"A man's got to know his limitations" --Dirty Harry in Magnum Force

Have you ever... just "tested" yourself just out of curiosity? Just to know what your magic number was? Like " just how long could you hold your breath?". Have you ever intentionally (perhaps in a training environment) or unintentionally (in a real world situation) tested some of the limits of your endurance. The Native-American aphorism,"What one man can do, another can do" is an interesting, if not always useful, guideline, meaning if one human being has ever accomplished anything, the feat can be duplicated. Nowadays with so many "extreme" athletes, I don't know about that. Like, there are people who have run "double Marathons" (that's 52 miles) in one day. I doubt I can ever do that (even if chased... LOL), but I do know that I can cover about 25 miles in one day with a full pack, road marching, if I really push myself.

I am a scientist at heart and just out of curiosity, I run experiments on myself just to test these physical limits. I find these facts interesting to know, and in certain situations, somewhat reassuring knowing that I've done it before and knowing what I can expect.

Relatively immobile, I've been able to hold my breath underwater just under 2 minutes and 30 seconds (note: this is using a dangerous CO2 purging technique which should not be attempted alone). I'm a pretty strong swimmer, and pushing off the walls, I've been able to swim (underwater) about 2 and 1/4 lengths of a 25m (racing) pool. That's like to the 60 yd line of a football field. I consider myself a "strong swimmer" and I feel pretty comfortable in and under the water. I have swum as far as 4 linear miles, but I know I could go on much further. I can tread water, or float, seemingly endlessly without a PFD (but have timed myself only up to 2 hrs). With SCUBA gear, the maximum depth I've reached so far is about 84 feet.

I have personally "fasted" (gone without food whatsoever) for 8 days under "light to moderate" activity. I did this experiment when I was healthy (not sick or healing). I of course drank water (because you can cause serious bodily damage by not hydrating). The first day or so is a breeze, as nutrition already in your system slowly passes out, but, for me, approaching the 48 hour mark was the hardest part. Starting on the second day the hunger gets worse and worse and right around 48 hours it seems to reach a "hysteria" point (when you will eat just about anything). Then, suddenly, the hunger just subsides and becomes this dull background ache, which you can live with fairly easily for a long time. I think the body just switches to it's fat stores or something. As long as you don't consciously think about food, you can go and function. For me, it was about the morning of the 4th day before I felt the first physical effect in the form of weakness when standing up and general tiredness throughout the day. But I was still able to work and function at what felt like a slow burn. I'm sorry, but I scoff at people that say they are "starved" after missing one meal, or claim they "feel weak" from not eating. It takes the body a long, long time to actually starve. So at that point (4th day + ) my hunger level just plateaued psychologically and I even found myself "not caring" if I ate or not, believe it or not. I really didn't notice a significant impairment of my functioning until about the 8th day, when I would pass through spells of lightheadedness and dizziness. Though I knew that I could will myself to continue the fast for another few days, I decided to terminate the experiment because it was effecting my ability to safely drive. So what I came out of this experiment with is some interesting data about myself, and this newfound confidence in my ability to survive should I find myself in a situation without food. Oh, and I only lost 11 lbs, so "starvation" is not a great weight loss method.

In an Army training situation, I have been awake for 5 and 1/2 days continuously. During emergencies, I often work 30 to 36 hour shifts (but, admittedly, I can sneak a 10 min "cat nap" in here and there if I have a trusted buddy nearby to wake me). Heck, when I was a young man, I routinely stayed up all weekend (from Friday until Sunday) continuously doing some fun activity (ski weekends, beach party, visiting friends in L.A.), not even thinking about wasting time with sleep. I know it's not safe, but I've driven full 12 hour shifts on road trips when I really wanted to push for distance.

I personally know that I seem to have a high tolerance for cold and freezing temperatures, and conversely a lower tolerance for high or very hot temperatures. Like I feel fine working all day in an ice rink, or perfectly comfortable working outdoors in a t-shirt at 40 degrees F, but once that thermometer starts to go above 80, I start to sweat, and at 90, I have to be careful to hydrate or I'll get heat exhaustion. 100 or above, forget about it. Only once in my life, so far, I have been medically diagnosed with severe heat exhaustion, requiring IVs, ice bags, and over-hydration (and note: even then, I was still functioning nominally at my job and went to the hospital under protest).

I have a high tolerance for pain. I've never been much of a complainer or cryer. My Mom tells me that as a baby I didn't cry (that I was a strangely silent, content baby). Hmm. Pain is a kind of bio-feedback that can be ignored or dampened I found, if you choose to. I learned about this in Army training. "Pain is weakness leaving the body"... LOL.. or more seriously "Pain is sign of the body healing". In any case, we started priding ourselves on how much we can take and not complain. We would just slough off minor injury (small fragments, bruises, sprains, lacerations) and just drive on. That's what God made duct tape for! Or you can mask it with "Ranger candy". In some cases, medics would actually offer us morphine for pain, but we would refuse it (sometimes for other practical reasons though). I once injured my ankle (seriously, I later found out) out in the field, but I just taped it up tight and limped all the way home under my own power, about 3 miles. Now I know, for future reference, that I can walk at least 3 miles on a broken extremity.