Sunday 17 March 2013

Spring.



I ran the Detroit Half Marathon on October 21st 2012 and then I did not touch my running shoes for 3 months.

When I got home from Detroit I brought in my suitcase, unpacked my running bag and threw my shoes under a chair.  They stayed there for months.

I was so discouraged and frustrated about the Detroit run.  It is extremely frustrating when your body does not do what you want it to.   When you spend months training and sacrificing to have the end result the exact opposite of what you wanted.

I told Stuart I would run again but never run a race again. I would continue to run for my health, to maintain my back health and to still be able to justify full body massages :) But I was sure I would never run another race. I did not want to have to go through the mental anguish and physical pain of weeks of running only to get sick and have an awful race again.

I spent weeks trying to break down in my mind what happened to my body in Detroit - of course, there were no real answers. That just drove my frustration more and those shoes under the chair started to gather dust on them.

The fall turned into winter, with shorter darker days and that it matched my feelings about running perfectly. I thought it was much nicer to spend my evenings on the couch with Pismo than running the dark streets.


A dear running friend emailed; she noticed I was gone off of Facebook (Read about why I deleted Facebook here) and she wanted to see how my running was going, what my next goal was.  She had decided she will run her first full marathon in 2013.

I wrote back with honesty and truth about how my shoes had not been touched and how my back was starting to hurt again (Scoliosis and Running).  I told her I was excited about her challenging a full marathon - I know she will be kill it.

So I spent 3 months hating those shoes under that chair in the corner of the room.

I have done a lot of reading about bad runs and the affect they can have mentally - almost every article says you are allowed to mope around for 1 week and than you must start running again.  I extended that week to 3 months :) I compared racing to food poisoning lol.  I got sick from a teriyaki chicken sandwich at Subway about 11 years ago and have yet to try it again.  That is how I felt about Detroit, it was such a hard and sick run I just couldn't imagine doing it again - I couldn't imagine racing tasting "good" again.




And than one morning I woke up from my winter
("Shine on in, give these dead bones life").
 

And I am now on week 6 of a 13 week training program for the Mississauga Half Marathon.

My Saturday mornings are being awoken at 5am to eat again  - I did my first few runs without a watch and without music - just listening to my breathing (as crooked as it is) and my feet hitting the pavement.  Trying to mend my body and mind to feel the run again.  I talked to God, listened to what He had to say about myself and about my running.   I started to feel my legs getting stronger and the thought has now crossed my mind a few times, that maybe the things that don't kill you really do make you stronger.

I am training with Stuart this time, for my 4th Half Marathon and his first.  We will be running with his brother JP as well and Stuart will become one of the 3% of people able to run 21.1kms.

So rejoice spring is coming, to Southern Ontario and to my soul.


 
 



2 comments:

  1. Glad to hear you're back in the shoes! Running is about tuning into your breathing, having fun, and relaxing the mind. A couple disappointing runs shouldn't rob of us all the positive benefits. I've accepted that I can't control what happens between today and my running goals - getting sick, injured, or overwhelmed with life are all part of the journey to the starting line.

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  2. Im so excited for you both. And so glad to hear that you are running again. You get too much from it to stop. Run hard, Huggins family.
    Jm

    ps. That is the cutest picture of Pismo I have ever seen :)

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