It’s so much fun to write posts about things like “The Best Run of my Life!” It’s not so much fun to write about where I am right now. But for the sake of honesty I think it’s important. It’s not easy and joyful and mindful and strong every single day. Some days suck. This week has had some great moments but it’s also been kind of sucky.
I feel overweight. This is not just my imagination and “feeling fat.” The combination of last week’s vacation and this week’s Thanksgiving has not been a happy one. I’m sure I could have been more mindful on both counts, but it was what it was. Thus feeling the F word in a big way and then wanting to beat myself up for not doing better. SO not fun.
I feel super cranky. Partly because of the first point, but also because of some interpersonal tensions I do not feel at liberty to write about. Just… argh.
My body feels like CRAP. I had TWO absolutely awful walks this week in which I could not run barely at all. My ankle is feeling suddenly unstable, achey, wobbly, painful. What is up with that? I don’t know. It started really twinging when I took this pretty hike in the elk preserve last weekend, and it has been bothering me a lot since then. I am noticing that my ankle does very, very poorly on hills. It really sets it off. I noticed last night that it even bothered me in bed while I was just lying there, and I woke up with it throbbing. UNHAPPY. I have a half-marathon one week from today. UNHAPPY.
My fasting blood glucose was up in not-good land this morning. Great.
Realizing it is going to be in the 30s in Las Vegas at the time of the half, and worried/freaked out about freezing and being even less able to accomplish this thing.
Cranky/sad because once I had an absolutely packed, overflowing, 3-bedroom suite at Vegas and now I am going to be alone there (alone!!) on Friday night. Junior and Pubsgal are coming on Saturday, but I need to figure out something to do Friday so I don’t have a massive pity party and hit one of those mile-long buffets.
I’m premenstrual. Which means that I will probably be in full-blown crampy gore-fest right during the half. FUN. But which also explains my extremely terrible foul mood.
Tomorrow is LAUNCH day for the new Weight Watchers plan, which I should be so excited and happy about, but given the state of how I am feeling about myself, I am less rah-rah than I’d like. I hope I can pull it together by Wednesday.
It is pouring rain outside and I am not going to go for any long run. I actually think I need to go to the meditation center more than I need to go to the gym, but I guess I will go to the gym. I am feeling extremely uncentered.
What a bizarro week it’s been. I think I can safely say that the motto of the week is “Feedback, not failure.” (a WW favorite) I think it pretty much applied to everything I did and experienced. I got a lot of feedback. But I don’t feel like I failed.
First, the food. See details here. At the beginning of the week I was in a bit of a cocky state, crowing “I can eat cookies! I can eat pizza!” because at first, my weight just went up a teensy bit. Then like 3 days later, it went up a LOT. Okay. So I can’t eat “everything.” Especially not all in one week. It has now settled back into my regular range, so that’s good, but it was, I suppose, a bit of an eye opener. I did learn a few things from my week of Indulgence though:
A lot of people avoid sugar because they feel like it will be like a Gateway drug into more and more and more sugar. This was not my experience at all. I ate cookies for a couple of days, and my response was, I WANT VEGETABLES. Same thing with the fried chicken and pizza. They made me crave greens and vegetables and “clean” food like nobody’s business. So that was kind of illuminating, and also a relief. I feel like I don’t need to see another chocolate chip cookie for a long time. Or pizza, for that matter.
It took like 72 hours for the food to “settle” onto my body.
But it also went away pretty quickly. Most of it. Not all of it.
It’s just really, really hard to stay in a good range when one eats out a lot. Which I really did this week. So. Lesson learned.
I’m not about beating myself up or feeling “guilty” or like I blew it. I don’t think I blew it. I think I learned stuff. Yay for that.
Now, to my 10k race this morning. Haha ha ha! Let me just say that until I was actually on the course, I never really believed I was going to run a 10k today. If I had, maybe I would’ve, like, TRAINED for it? Ha ha again.
Back up. I found out that this race was happening in a park very close to my house. Which got me all excited. It’s a beautiful park in the redwoods. I vaguely remembered seeing people doing this very race (or maybe it was a different one) a few years back, and what I remembered was a few people running, and a bunch of Sierra Club-ish septegenarians with hiking boots and walking sticks. And their website says “hikers welcome,” meaning you don’t have to run it. So this WHOLE TIME I was thinking, I’m gonna hike this baby. Easy peasy.
But several elements transpired to transform this thing from an easy 6.5 mile hike into a crazy, grueling, up-and-down hills 10k RUN. First, I got to the registration place. I did not see a single 75 year old with a walking stick. Not a one. Instead what I saw was shirtless people with 2% body fat. I immediately felt faint, and like, UH OH. Then I ran into my friends: one of my Team Penguin buddies (surprise! yay! he was doing the 20k, ooh!) and my friend Sarah from solo performance workshop, and a WW buddy.
They herded us into different groups: 10k, 20K, 30K, 40K and FIFTY KILOMETERS. Holy mackerel. The woman with the megaphone referred to the 10k as a “lollipop run” to which Sarah took offense (“What are we, babies?”) but then I pointed out I think that was the SHAPE of our course, not our level of difficulty. I nervously noted that MOST of the herd was in the 2ok and up crowd, and the 10k bunch was relatively small (50? 70?).
They counted down (about 20 minutes late) and then were off. The trail was really narrow so it was pretty much single file. People were passing me like crazy, including a woman with one leg and one spring. That was impressive. After a while the course thinned out incredibly and I was in the company of this guy who looked Not At All Like A Runner, wearing snowboard pants and a wool cap. And carrying a loose water bottle in his hand. This other guy, who was Most Definitely A Runner, kept running up ahead at great speed, then coming back to check on the snowboard dude. I later learned they were brothers. I am not sure if Snowboarder was grateful or wanted to kill his marathoner brother.
Anyway, I ran the first half-mile or so then it started going uphill. Then REALLY uphill. Like a ladder. And my ankle, in spite of its sturdy brace, began experiencing major stabbing pains. It just DOES NOT like inclines. Or declines. Or anything other than pure flat terrain. My missing toenail, on the other hand, did not bother me at all.
The trail was really beautiful. It looked mostly like this.
Very pretty. People kept passing me. Eventually Snowboard Guy, who was behind me for a mile or two, passed me. These two women, who were behind me, passed me. Finally I was all alone. It occurred to me that chances were VERY HIGH that I was the Very Last Person in the 10k pack. And I had to do some serious talking to myself. I felt sorry for myself. I felt like a loser. I felt stupid for not training more, and for not really checking out what this race was truly like.
Then I remembered this guy from this video I saw last night.
And I started crying. I was like, Guy, if you can do what you did, I can get through this 10k. And I also thought, even though I am probably the END of this pack of athletes, I am HERE. I am doing this. And how many people are not doing any 10K at all, OR a 5k or even a 1k. And then I felt a little better.
Running is such a psychological experience!
I had a few periods of what I call “gazelle running” – when I was truly running fast, LEAPING over logs and just flying. For me. But then other times I was trudging up steep inclines. And my ankle was crying. And then a few times I got all dizzy and nauseated and my hands went numb and I knew I was getting dehydrated. It turns out that they do not have aid stations every mile or so, like regular big runs, but instead EVERY TEN KILOMETERS. In other words, when my race was over. And I was not carrying any water. Duh. When will I learn? (Today, Jesus, today!!!!!!!!!)
I did have a KIND bar which I think helped me with hypoglycemia. So I got through it. I eventually finished. I felt like both crying and throwing up when I finished, but I did neither. I had to rush off to pick up my daughter from crew practice, because Mr. McBody (um, Dr. McBody) was on call and could not do it. So that also helped me hustle my little tushie through the woods in a timely manner. For ME, I ran my ass off, and it was still really really hard.
My final time was 1 hour and 50 minutes. This was not stellar. I was, I think the last person in. The first finishers finished a full hour before me. But you know? I feel good about it. And sort of dumb. I wish I’d realized I was going to RUN this thing. If I had, well, I either would have dropped out ahead of time, or I would have prepared better.
Live and learn, right? For now I am feeling pretty proud that I did this thing.
This event from yesterday impacted me so much that I am double-posting part of it from the food blog. Here’s what happened:
the problem was, I didn’t get enough sleep last night. I went to bed really late and got up unrested and so that was the wrong foot. It’s a Monday after a nice celebratory weekend. I went to work and the poor guy I had to work with was just a miserable soul in a lot of pain. I felt for him, and his pain leeched into me.
So by 11:30am I was just feeling terrible. Exhausted, cold (SO cold!), sad, lonely, (this is my not-so-social work place, as opposed to my super buddy workplace) and just DOWN. I began plotting all the ways I could comfort myself at lunchtime. I would take myself to this restaurant across the street that has ginormous portions of comfort food. I told myself I’d “forget” to bring my camera. YIKES.
But I was trying to be mindful. I was trying to recognize the fact that I was actively planning to use food for non-food distress. (even though hunger was part of the mix too) I teased it out in my head. I told myself, I could go to a soup place instead, and that way I could take care of cold, hunger and comfort all at once. That was a really good first step. Then I felt willing to bring my camera.
THEN I had a REAL stroke of genius. (ha!) I remembered that it was Monday, the only day of the week when Mr. McBody and I work about 2 blocks apart from each other. I texted him. “Lunch?” He had already eaten, but he said he’d come meet me. I waited on the street corner and man, I was never so happy to see someone. I really felt like he was literally saving me from a binge.
And it was like: OMG. I wanted comfort. And I got REAL LIVE human comfort. How fantastic was that!! He gave me the biggest hug. And all of a sudden I didn’t even need the soup. I was warm! I was loved!
We went to my favorite salad bar place and he sat with me while I ate my salad and listened to my woes and then gave me another big hug. And then I felt like I could make it through the afternoon.
I actually can’t stop thinking about this and I credit the reading of Savor (which I love) – about slowing that moment down, being mindful, and saying, what do I REALLY need?
I was hungry. I needed food. But what KIND of food?
I was cold. I put on my jacket.
I was lonely and needed comfort. I called out for my dear spouse, who luckily was close by.
I was tired. I had a cup of coffee because I couldn’t really go for a nap at the moment. But it taught me that going to bed early is key.
I was so ready to go and get some plate of SOMETHING to deal with all those things when in fact it would have helped none of them, not even the hunger, because it would have most likely been something regretful that I would then feel physically and emotionally bad about.
Last night I went to see the movie “Inception.” One of the ideas in the film was about planting a seed in someone’s unconscious so that it grows and takes over. This morning I felt like such a seed had somehow gotten planted in my mind. The seed was, “Your health and fitness have gotten in the way of your writing life.” Which may or may not be true. Maybe I’ve just made certain choices this past year.
But this morning I felt like an all-out war was going on inside my head. It literally took my breath away, the incredible degree of anger and venom between the various parts of me.
So as you all know, I run this annual camp every summer during which time I put everything else in my life aside. It’s just all consuming. But I have especially had to put aside my writing life, which most of the past 15 years has been very very important to me. Last year, after camp, I did not “go back” to my writing because the writing had been laid aside so I could focus on my health.
This year, though, the writing has been pressing its face to the glass, wondering, When is it MY TURN? I ran into one of my best writing friends this week and we made a mutual commitment to write 20 pages a week. I was so excited. Here, finally! So this morning I got up. The whole day stretched in front of me. I wanted to write. But I also wanted to go for a long walk. And I felt like whichever one cam first would sort of dictate the rest of the day. If I put the walk off, it might never happen. If I put the writing off, I’d get distracted. Which one was going to get those clean, prime morning hours?
As it turned out, neither and both. I felt like a screaming, knock-down, hairpulling, knife-wielding fight was going on inside my head. I felt paralyzed and as if I couldn’t do either. Finally, I went off on my walk, but I was MAD about it. Believe me, this is not a good way to do exercise.
WM (Writing Me) was yelling at HM (Healthy Me). I can’t believe you’re getting away with it! Again!!!!!!!!!! All year I’ve stepped aside so YOU could get all the spare time. And you take up every freaking minute. If you’re not going for a walk, you’re writing on that stupid blog (and NO, that does NOT COUNT as “writing!”). Or you’re going to Weight Watchers. Or taking pictures of food. There’s never any time for meeeeeeeeeeeee any more!
(me. In shock. In between)
Now I’m mad at Healthy Me. I’m sobbing. I’m outraged. DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH I’ve freaking GIVEN UP for you?!?!? I’m feeling betrayed by myself. I’m feeling so angry. I’m feeling like I somehow got tricked into the illusion that This Is All There Is. While meanwhile, my books have been languishing, unwritten. All my computer will do is blog. My novel(s) are dead. My collection of short stories, dead. Nonfiction book: dead.
The realization of this just killed me. I sobbed and wailed and yelled at my husband (who was coming down off the trail and gave me a nice compliment). I tried to articulate for him what was going on and he said something to the effect (I am paraphrasing) that of course my health has to come first. Which made me fly even MORE into a frenzy. I took off up the hill, sobbing even more.
Long walk. Two hours. (in which I had to convince myself that I was doing this walk to THINK, not for the purposes of EXERCISE so that WM would not throw HM off a nearby cliff.)
It just so happens that when I was deep in my Writing Self, I didn’t give a crap about my health. Or exercise. My writing was everything. It took a lot of time, and attention, and energy.
So when my Healthy Self came along, Writing Self had to go on the back burner for a long time. And was fairly patient about it for a long time. But the time has apparently come for that patience to RUN OUT and Writing Self wants my time and energy and attention back. In a big way. Problem is, I now have a bunch of jobs, even though one is not as intense as it has been. I am still going to have to divvy it up.
And I’m just exhausted. I feel like I cannot parse out every single minute of my free time. I need time to do NOTHING, too. (aka the Nothing Self)
The walk was good. It calmed me down. It wore me out. During the walk, my older girl called me. It was so good to talk to her. I will be seeing her in a few weeks for my birthday, and I can’t wait. She understood the post-camp letdown, the exhaustion, the just being so tired you want to cry all the time.
I don’t know that it is an impossible thing, to have these two things that mean so very much to me. I can’t figure it out right now. But I think it was good to realize how important they both are.
foodfoodbodybody 