When Pigs Fly
I had a fantastic weekend in Denver a few weeks ago with my BFF. At one point as we were chatting I was telling her in grotesque detail (that I will spare the blogosphere) about my health challenges throughout the last year and a half. She got to hear the gory details of the abscess that took ten months to heal and then the meniscus surgery that followed shortly thereafter. I had a moment during this discussion where I realized how much my body has been through in the last eighteen months.
If you know me you know I don't know my limits. I also tend to greatly underplay my health issues. But if I'm being honest I must admit that this is the longest it's taken me to bounce back from a Crohn's incident, both physically and mentally. The unrelated meniscus tear challenged me even more.
During the first week of November, the week I had knee surgery and was still drugged up on narcotics, I decided to sign up for a race a few months out. Initially I was told I would be running again in four weeks, so I thought I would be back in full force within six months. I've always wanted to run the Flying Pig Half Marathon in Cincinnati, and that was just over six months after my surgery. But registering for the half wasn't enough. I registered for three races: the 5k, the 10k and the half marathon, all to be run in one weekend. Perhaps it was the Norco, but at the time it seemed reasonable.
Two months after surgery I was still not running. I had additional inflammation that was repaired during the surgery, so recovery was slower than I expected. Then on January 1, two months exactly after surgery, I started the busiest job I've ever had. Even if my knee felt up to running, my body was exhausted. Sleep oscillated between elusive and coma-like, but either way getting up early to run was not going to happen.
Finally in March I emerged from the fog of the previous few months and clocked a reasonable 27:24 in a 5k on St. Patrick's Day. It was only six weeks before the three races in Cincinnati, but I was still cautiously optimistic. I told my husband and myself that maybe it'd be extremely slow, but I could power through all three races. As the days flew by I rationalized that maybe I'd run two of the races but not a third. As much as I hate admitting my weaknesses I knew I wasn't in shape for a race hat trick.
I've been doing a lot of cross training, but I'm still not logging the miles that I'm used to or need to be in order to perform at Flying Pig. The week before the race I admitted to my husband that I wasn't ready to run the races. A sluggish 5k at the Race for the Cure the Sunday before solidified the decision: we weren't going to Cincinnati. I wasn't running the races. I was not ready.
Admitting that to myself was hard. Admitting it to the world is even harder. But unlike other times I've been hospitalized or had infections I took a very significant break from running for about eighteen months. I had an extreme Crohn's infection and knee surgery. My body has taken a lot of hits, and I'm not where I was a few years ago. I'm not even close. I weigh the most I've ever weighed. While my body has healed I'm battering it every day with a level of work stress I've never experienced. I love my job, but the adjustment has taken a few months, months where I should've been training to run 22.4 miles over the course of 24 hours.
Instead of being in Ohio last weekend we had a lazy weekend at home. I ran four slow miles on Saturday morning, and I tried not to think about missing race weekend. I'm still searching for the elusive work/mom/wife/runner/friend balance. And I'm not sure when I'll be back in shape to run at least 13.1 miles. It's going to be a few more months, and I'm going to try to be patient. This year marks 20 years since I first experienced Crohn's symptoms. My body has been through a lot, and realistically it's only going to get harder as I age. I want to continue running for a long time, and in order to do that I need to be patient. I need to be kind to myself. And I need to be realistic about what I can handle both physically and mentally. And Flying Pig will still be there next year.
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| Resetting with my bestie in Denver |
During the first week of November, the week I had knee surgery and was still drugged up on narcotics, I decided to sign up for a race a few months out. Initially I was told I would be running again in four weeks, so I thought I would be back in full force within six months. I've always wanted to run the Flying Pig Half Marathon in Cincinnati, and that was just over six months after my surgery. But registering for the half wasn't enough. I registered for three races: the 5k, the 10k and the half marathon, all to be run in one weekend. Perhaps it was the Norco, but at the time it seemed reasonable.
Two months after surgery I was still not running. I had additional inflammation that was repaired during the surgery, so recovery was slower than I expected. Then on January 1, two months exactly after surgery, I started the busiest job I've ever had. Even if my knee felt up to running, my body was exhausted. Sleep oscillated between elusive and coma-like, but either way getting up early to run was not going to happen.
Finally in March I emerged from the fog of the previous few months and clocked a reasonable 27:24 in a 5k on St. Patrick's Day. It was only six weeks before the three races in Cincinnati, but I was still cautiously optimistic. I told my husband and myself that maybe it'd be extremely slow, but I could power through all three races. As the days flew by I rationalized that maybe I'd run two of the races but not a third. As much as I hate admitting my weaknesses I knew I wasn't in shape for a race hat trick.
I've been doing a lot of cross training, but I'm still not logging the miles that I'm used to or need to be in order to perform at Flying Pig. The week before the race I admitted to my husband that I wasn't ready to run the races. A sluggish 5k at the Race for the Cure the Sunday before solidified the decision: we weren't going to Cincinnati. I wasn't running the races. I was not ready.
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| Post Race for the Cure. Way more exhausted than expected. |
Instead of being in Ohio last weekend we had a lazy weekend at home. I ran four slow miles on Saturday morning, and I tried not to think about missing race weekend. I'm still searching for the elusive work/mom/wife/runner/friend balance. And I'm not sure when I'll be back in shape to run at least 13.1 miles. It's going to be a few more months, and I'm going to try to be patient. This year marks 20 years since I first experienced Crohn's symptoms. My body has been through a lot, and realistically it's only going to get harder as I age. I want to continue running for a long time, and in order to do that I need to be patient. I need to be kind to myself. And I need to be realistic about what I can handle both physically and mentally. And Flying Pig will still be there next year.
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