Where I've Been, Where I'm Going

Don't worry, I haven't vanished into the blog-o-sphere. I'm still around, but just haven't had too much to say for the last couple of months. 

Today was the Celtic Solstice 5 miler and was to have been my come back race from my foot problems. I decided not to participate, thus officially ending my 2011 running season in a dull thud. While I have started running a couple of miles here and there, I was not confident that I could get through all 5 miles without problems. The truth of that matter is that after 3 months of physical therapy, I still have some degree of discomfort/pain in my foot on practically a daily basis. 

I have started planning ahead to next year and being healthy to train for Spring races. I am not going to do a full marathon in 2012, mainly because I don't want to spend a third consecutive summer in training mode. If I can get through 2012 without any problems, then I will consider a full for 2013.

Right now I'm registered for and hoping to do:

3/18/2012 - Shamrock 1/2

4/29/2012 - Iron Girl 1/2

5/6/2012 - Frederick 1/2

5/20/2012 - Run for the Dream 1/2

10/13/2012 - Baltimore 1/2

The optimist in me registered for these as a way to have something to look forward to, especially the time that would be spent with friends. The pessimist thinks it was dumb and a waste of money when I don't know what the future holds. More than once I've thought of just quitting. The problem is, I've never quit anything. However, rather than fuel the desire to heal and improve, all I can think of is the hard work ahead of me. The last 3+ months have brought back alot of old habits - mainly making me lazy and complacent. There is a very long road ahead of me to get back the conditioning and endurance I had. It took so long to get and so quickly to lose.

No Regrets

Today, rather than running the Marine Corps Marathon, I stood at the end of the infamous bridge and cheered, both 10K and marathon runners. I had no regrets.

I watched people hobble and grimace, and I knew I would have been one of them, if I had even made it to mile 22. I had no regrets.

I was there to help old friends and new, and thousands of strangers, when they needed it. I had no regrets.

The Journey Ends

I have decided that I won't be running the Marine Corps Marathon in three weeks, and I'm ok with it.

I think my last entry was a good therapy for me. Now, I can actually talk about the race without tears welling up. I can look forward to going out and cheering on my friends, rather than fear how I will feel seeing everything going on without being a part of it. 

The reality is no matter how hard a decision this was to make, deep down, it was truly the right one. There are many other races in my future, and this insures that. 

When my foot issues got bad in early September, I toyed with the idea of doing a November race instead, either Richmond or Philadelphia, but have since decided that would still be rushing myself. This can be such a long term, chronic condition, that I want to do everything I can to take care of it now rather than risk how bad it could get in the future. 

So, for now, it's rest and planning out the journeys and adventures that await.

30 Days

Well, the Marine Corps Marathon is 30 days away, and, the uncertainty of whether or not I will be able to participate is growing with each day that passes. I've got 2 weeks of physical therapy under my belt, and while I have been seeing some improvements, progress is still slow and frustrating, especially for a Type A personality.

My therapist told me I could run 5-6 miles last weekend, certainly nowhere near the 18-20 I originally had down on my training plan. I planned on 6, and if I felt good after that, I'd do 2 more for a total of 8. I am registered for a half marathon tomorrow, and needed to test out my body to see if 13.1 would even be possible. I had 5 pain free miles. As a result, I am spending this weekend at home rather than running through the hills of West Virginia. This was a race I have been trying to plan for for 2 years now, so to say I'm disappointed about having to cancel is an understatement.

To say that barely making it through 6 miles was a reality check is an even bigger understatement. While neither the podiatrist nor therapist has outright told me that MCM is out of the question, I am beginning to accept that it probably is. I'm beginning almost a mourning process so to speak. My emotions are still too raw - I can barely talk about it without tearing up because of the disappointment I feel so deep down. To know how close I was to being done with my training, I did get all the way up to 18 miles, and see it all go to waste is frustrating.  The early early hours, the pushing myself to my limit in 90+ degree temps and horrific humidity, all seem for naught now.

I am beginning to come around to the fact that even if my foot is feeling better by late October, is it really going to be worth it go through with my race plans? A friend asked me the other day why I feel the need to keep doing marathons. My response "because I want to do them better." Going into a marathon 7 weeks after my longest run and dealing with an injury is certainly not doing it better. Perhaps this is where the experience of having 2 fulls already under my belt is a good thing - I know how hard and painful it would be to begin with, dealing with these factors would certainly be worse.

So, I have not canceled any plans as of yet. I've missed the window to transfer my registration to another runner, but I can still transfer from the full marathon to the 10K, which I would certainly be capable of completing by that point. But, would I feel like I'm settling? Is it an all of nothing for me now? Am I admitting defeat? If I can't do the full, I'm not even sure I want to step foot into the expo. It would just be too painful.

Confessions - Follow up

Thank you all for the great input in my iPod debate. The jury is still out on this. Having run MCM last year, there are certain parts of the course that I think I would like a bit of distraction, So, I am still leaning towards having some tunes to turn to if needed. If I decide to go this route, I will get the specially designed One Good Earbud in an effort to address some of my safety concerns.

As for my foot issues, I actually was pretty reasonable with myself for a change. When faced with running a local half marathon this past Sunday, I came to the conclusion the night before that deep down this really was a bad idea. My foot was still achy, and there are other things coming up that I am looking much more forward to. The doubt and fear I had that I would do something to further hurt myself and cause me to have to back out of October plans was far too great. I didn't run, and Monday morning I called a podiatrist.

Wednesday morning I got my official plantar fasciitis diagnosis. The good news is that there were no surprises - this is what I expected. So, I'm now on oral steroids to combat the inflammation, which I think right now is the biggest issue of them all and what drove me to finally see a Dr since none of the at home treatments were working. She even told me that even at it's strongest dose, Ibuprofen wasn't going to touch it, validating in my mind my decision to go. I did vetoed the injection idea though, preferring to try the oral meds route first. The fact she let me choose rather than coming right at me with a syringe definitely impressed me. I have to wear running shoes pretty much all of my waking hours, and, I can still run a couple of miles 3-4 times a week.

Monday afternoon I have a physical therapy evaluation. I'm hoping once the inflammation goes down that the therapist will have me moving again, quickly. Needless to say, my participation in the upcoming Freedom's Run 1/2 Marathon and, of course, MCM, are both hanging in the air. The Dr did write "training for a marathon - wishes to resume training schedule asap" on my therapy slip, so at least we are on the same page. ;)

Confessions

I have a confession to make, lately I have been struggling. Two weeks ago I had a fantastic 16 miler that really helped boost my confidence and chase away a lot of doubts I had been having about doing another marathon, but many of these feelings have returned after a disappointing 18 miler. I guess the poor attitude I had even going into it really sunk it for me before the run even started. I hadn't slept well the night before, it was extremely humid, and once the sun came up it got hot, quick. For some reason, 18 miles is my nemesis. Last year, I had the same problems. All runners go through things like this, and after a miserably hot summer, and a few things Mother Nature has thrown this way lately, like an earthquake and hurricane, finding excuses not to run and to be discouraged has certainly be easy.

I've also been dealing with a slight injury over the last few weeks. I thought I had finally tamed my plantar fasciitis problems, only to have them come back. I blamed some movements we did in my summer boot camp class as the primary culprit, but the reality is that it coincided with my mileage increase, so likely the combination of increasing both my mileage and going to twice a week intense cross training had something to do with it. I stubbornly did 18 miles knowing this, and yes, I knew it probably wasn't a good idea. Didn't this stubbornness lead to a stress fracture 3 years ago? Old habits are hard to break. I am being reasonable though. If it doesn't get better, I know 26.2 miles is impossible.

Anyway, the struggles with my 18 miler reignited a debate with myself - to iPod or not to iPod.

This brings my third confession - I've never run a race or done a long run while listening to music. I've probably only worn my iPod while running outside a handful of times, and all probably in my first year or two of running. Honestly, I'm not even sure I know where my iPod is right now.

Running with a music player is a pretty controversial topic in many circles. Some people swear by it, others are dead set against it, mainly as a safety issue. I agree it is a safety issue, and also feel it takes away from the race experience - listening to spectators and taking in the atmosphere as a whole. However, I have wondered lately if having music would help distract me when things got rough, especially since I am facing running the entire marathon alone. One of the reasons why I've never done it is because I never wanted to feel like it would be a crutch for me, one of those people would couldn't possibly think of running without. If I starting listening to music to on my long runs, would I ever be able to go back? Or, would I spend the money on a new, smaller player, wear it around with me, but never use it?

Yesterday I had a routine medical appointment, and was chatting with my doctor during the visit. She's currently training for her second half marathon, and is running it with another doctor and a couple of family members. She said that she could never run that distance alone, and what could people like me doing marathons possibly think about while out on the road for such a long time. That is the mystery of being a distance runner I think, and where some of us blossom, and some of us struggle. There's a fine line between squashing the doubts and letting the doubts take over.

So, I ask you - to iPod or not to iPod?

Running Through History, Part 2

I arrived home from our Williamsburg adventure on Monday, and Friday morning boarded a plane to my next adventure, Boston. Lauren invited me up for Memorial Day weekend and proposed running the Run to Remember, a race put on by the Boston Police Runner’s Club to honor those who have died in the line of duty. This is one of only a couple of half marathons that run through downtown Boston, and knowing the cause, there was no way I could turn down the opportunity. And, given my back of the pack pace, this was a race I didn’t need to qualify to run.

I was very anxious though, as Katie (who sadly was still feeling under the weather) discovered in the weeks before that there was a time limit on this race and she couldn’t get a straight answer from the race officials as to exactly what it was, and if there were going to be any sweeping points on the course after those doing the 5 miler split off at mile 2. It seemed the time limit was about 2:45. I did two races under this is March, so it was possible. Lauren told me it was a great PR course, so I felt bolstered that this was a challenge I could do and tried to put my nerves aside.

I arrived Friday morning and spent time with Lauren at her home and wandering the town of Plymouth. It had been about 20 years since I had been to the waterfront there before, and it was just as I remembered. Saturday we headed into Boston to pick up our packets and she took me on good portion of the Freedom Walk. How cool! I definitely need to plan a trip up there just to take all of it in. We also passed through Boston Common and Boston Garden and she helped me on my quest to find the Life is Good flagship store on Newbury Street. We spent a lot more time on our feet than I would have liked, but sightseeing in a new city was just too much fun!

We headed home to relax for awhile, enjoyed some pasta, and settled in for the early morning. Morning came and Lauren and I, along with her sister, Jill, headed into the city. We were able to park near Lauren’s hubby’s building and use the flush toilets there. Score! Before we knew it, it was time to line up at the start. We said our good byes, agreed on a meeting point after, and I made my way to the back of the pack. It was a HUMID morning and my nerves were very high.

I crossed the starting line and off I went. When I start a race I generally try and run a bit of the start until it seems safe for me to start doing intervals without getting run over. (This is NOT the way interval running is supposed to be done.) It quickly became apparent that this was a FAST race. Unlike any other races I’ve done, no one around me was doing intervals or speed walking. Around mile 1 I finally had an opening to jump up onto a curb and take a walk break. This was not good, but I still felt pretty good and knew I had to keep pushing since I had to be where the course split off by a certain point. My walk break was over and I jumped back into the throng of runners. About a half mile in I was able to take another walk break. Finally at mile 2 we reached the course split and I was doing more than fine on time and it had finally cleared out enough that I could do my 2:1’s.

The damage was done though. Running my ass off the first couple of miles and in that humidity did me in. I saw Lauren and Jill on the out and back about mile 6. I was still chugging along a bit at that point, but by mile 8 or so I’d given up to just walking the whole thing. I was miserable and mad at myself. This was not how this was supposed to go down. Then, about mile 11.5, once the course had made it’s way back into downtown from the river, it happened. A police car came behind me and the rest of the back of the pack and announced that we had to move to the sidewalks because they were going to open the street. I started having a near panic attack. I vaguely recognized where I was, but had no idea where I was supposed to go, and didn’t have my cell phone on me in case I ran into trouble and needed to get a hold of Lauren. The other back runners and I got to an intersection and I yelled at a cop across the street to find out where we were supposed to go. I was near tears. But, it also got me moving. I was determined to stay ahead of the street openings for the last couple of miles. I kept going and going, trying to run smartly and keep myself calm, a slightly tall order. I was so over this though and ready to be done. Finally I got to the bridge back to the race area and knew the end was close. Thank God.

As I came down the final stretch I looked for Lauren and Jill and gave them two big thumbs down. My final time was 2:52:45, generally one of my decent times, but I was so disappointed in and even angry myself though for not coming close to my 2:45 goal and for having my worst ever race that I couldn’t appreciate that I had made it through. Mentally, I don’t think I was ever in it. As days and weeks passed though, I have started to feel better about it, but still not great. Boston is a wonderful town, but clearly one you need to be fast to run.