Why Do I Always Get Sick When I Finally Stop?

I am writing this from my bed with COVID.

My husband started with a sore throat a few days ago, tested positive, and by Sunday I was coughing. By Monday, there was that telltale second line on my test. Of course, I caught COVID from my husband. I am not suggesting that the Let-Down Effect somehow gave me a virus. But as I lay here feeling thoroughly sorry for myself, I couldn't help thinking: here we go again.

How I got here

The last few months have been full. I finished an intensive coaching course that I'd been working on for most of the year, wrapped up a particularly busy year of volunteer service, and then headed to the UK for six weeks, much of it spent helping to care for my aging mother-in-law. There was also a quick trip to France thrown in, which I realise doesn't exactly make this sound like a tale of hardship, but someone has to live it.

But even lovely things take energy. Travel takes energy. Caring for someone takes energy. Completing something you've worked hard for takes energy. Being away from your own home and your own routines takes energy. Add in an unusually hot summer and quite a lot of rushing around, and apparently I had been asking rather a lot of myself.

I eventually arrived home in Los Angeles and attempted to get over the jet lag, only to find it was still incredibly hot. Heat and my multiple sclerosis have never been particularly good friends, so my body was already working harder than usual. Then I went almost immediately into several very busy days with my university's alumni association — 23 hours of meetings and events over just a few days. On top of that came the enormous excitement, emotion and, if I'm being truthful, a fair amount of nervous energy around receiving a prestigious award and giving a speech in front of nearly 300 people. It was a wonderful experience, but there had been weeks of anticipation and preparation leading up to it, and even the happiest moments ask something of us psychologically and physically.

And yet, somehow, I was still fine.

Until I wasn't.

The part that makes me laugh at myself

The irony is that I know about this. I've known about it for years. I know what I normally do to help myself through precisely this kind of transition, including a meditation I use around something called the Let-Down Effect. I should have recognised that after weeks of running on momentum, this was exactly the moment not to go from full speed to nothing.

But I didn't.

To be fair, it all happened so quickly that by the time I thought, "Oh, I should probably do my Let-Down meditation," I was already sick.

I can't say I was surprised.

What the Let-Down Effect is (a quick recap)

Have you ever noticed that you can make it through weeks or even months of deadlines, travel, family responsibilities and general life chaos without so much as a sniffle, only to get sick on the first or second day of your vacation?

You finally stop. You unpack the suitcase, pour yourself a drink, put your feet up and think, "At last."

And your body apparently thinks: Excellent. My turn.

There is actually a name for this phenomenon. It's called the Let-Down Effect, a term associated with the work of psychologist Dr. Marc Schoen, who has spent decades studying the relationship between stress, relaxation and illness. During periods of stress and heightened activity, our bodies make physiological adjustments that help us respond to what is being asked of us. Then the stressful period ends and that physiological state changes. For some of us, that's when the headache arrives, the cold takes hold, the exhaustion hits, or whatever we've been successfully keeping at bay suddenly announces itself.

(If you missed part one, I wrote about the Let-Down Effect and how I first encountered it — including the personal story behind why it mattered so much to me.)

What I learned from working with Dr. Schoen

Many years ago, after my first MS exacerbation, I went to see Dr. Marc Schoen. I wasn't looking for him to cure me. I wanted help coming to terms with the possibility of the diagnosis and, perhaps more importantly, I needed a different way of thinking about how I was going to live my life.

I remember being frightened that if stress was part of the conversation around MS, then perhaps the safest version of my future was going to be a very small one. No travel. No ambition. No excitement. I didn't want that.

Working with Marc introduced me to a very different idea. The answer wasn't necessarily to eliminate stress from my life — apart from anything else, good luck with that. It was learning how to manage my energy and help my body move through periods of intensity without repeatedly running myself into the ground.

That distinction mattered enormously to me. It meant I could still have a big life.

Apparently I still need reminding.

What to do instead of collapsing

All these years later, I find it rather amusing that I'm writing this from bed because I failed to follow some of the very advice I've been using and teaching for years. But perhaps that's useful too. Knowing something doesn't make us immune from being human.

So while I'm going to go much deeper into this in the coming weeks, there is one thing I'd like you to take away from this.

If you know you've been running hard for a while, pay attention to how you come down.

Our instinct is often to keep going until whatever we're doing is finished and then collapse. We fantasise about doing absolutely nothing. We sleep late, abandon our routines, stop moving and assume that the opposite of stress must be complete inactivity. For some of us, that sudden change may not be what our bodies need.

Instead, think about keeping your energy gently ticking over as you transition. Go for a walk. Eat properly. Keep roughly to your sleep routine. Meditate. Do something you enjoy. Give yourself space without necessarily going from one hundred miles an hour to zero overnight.

Most importantly, start noticing your own pattern.

Do you get headaches at the weekend? Catch colds on vacation? Feel exhausted as soon as a major project ends? Find yourself strangely flat after something you've been looking forward to for months?

Your body may be telling you something worth listening to.

I knew exactly what mine was telling me. I just happened to remember about three days too late.

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Footnote

1. Marc Schoen, PhD, The Let-Down Effect: When De-Stressing Makes You Sick, Psychology Today (2026). Schoen first explored these ideas in depth in When Relaxation Is Hazardous to Your Health (John Wiley & Sons, 2001).