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Pacing guide

Spend your energy on purpose

Pacing is a way of managing activity so you stay inside the energy you actually have, instead of borrowing from tomorrow. It isn't doing less forever. It's doing a steady amount you can repeat, so you have a base to build on.

The boom-and-bust cycle

On a good day it's natural to catch up on everything. Then you flare, spend days recovering, and start again from further back. Over months, the crashes eat the gains.

For some conditions, like ME/CFS and Long COVID, symptoms can get markedly worse after exertion, sometimes a day or more later. This is called post-exertional malaise (PEM). If that sounds familiar, pacing matters even more, and increases should be small and guided by your symptoms, not a fixed schedule.

How to start

  1. 01

    Find your baseline

    Track energy and activity for a couple of weeks. Your baseline is the amount you can do on an ordinary day without paying for it over the next two days. It's usually less than you'd guess.

  2. 02

    Stop before you're spent

    Rest is a tool you use early, not a reward for finishing. Break big jobs into pieces with breaks between them, and end sessions while you still feel okay.

  3. 03

    Spread the load across the week

    Put demanding days next to easy ones. A hard workout, a long shift and a social plan on the same day is how a good week turns into a bad one.

  4. 04

    Watch the delay

    Overdoing it often doesn't show up until the next day or the one after. That lag is why tracking matters: it connects Tuesday's crash to Sunday's long run.

  5. 05

    Build slowly, from stable ground

    When your baseline has held steady for a while, add a little and see how you respond over several days. If symptoms climb, drop back. Progress comes from staying consistent, not from big jumps.

Where immune.fit fits in

immune.fit puts your daily energy, symptoms and activity on one timeline, and reads from Garmin, WHOOP and other devices as those connections come online. That makes your baseline visible and shows how each week of training is landing.

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This guide is general information, not medical advice. Talk with your doctor or physical therapist about the right approach for you, especially before increasing exercise.