Adventures in recovery and sleepless nights…

Yogurthead

The little boy is taking a very good nap, so here I am with a couple extra minutes on my hands.  Yay!

Marathon recovery has gone really well.  Make fun of me if you want to, but I swear those compression socks work.  I wore them as soon as I got home, and then to work the next day, and I also skipped plain water and drank Nuun instead.  I felt pretty good by Monday afternoon.  I am still tight, but I scheduled a massage for this week, and I hope to feel “normal” by the weekend (whatever that is…I think I live in a state of chronically being a little tired and a little sore).

I got a really nice email forwarded to me from someone who took the time to email the marathon officials and say he thought the 4:55 pacers were great.  It made my day.  I needed something to perk me up.  Jasp continues his good nighttime habits revolt, and I admit it has made me a touch depressed.  I really questioned signing up for races the night before the marathon when I was up with him, because I have yet to do a race since he was born without a horrible night of sleep the night before.  Anyhow, I don’t think the pacers do anything special.  It’s a bit of work, but we are all running a race we would probably be doing anyways.  It was nice to know someone got something out of it though. I really like being at a pace that allows people to break a time barrier.  I think that is one of the main reasons we had more runners this year than in years past.  And this year we got some really awesome gear

Mike is out of town and I had to run my loops around the block with the baby monitor.  I listened to the latest RadioLab.  What a good show.   Do yourself a favor and listen.

Ok…time for that little boy to get up.  We have a date with some ducks at Central Market.     I think I will be treating myself to sushi from Central Market for dinner tonight

Relief…

Me and my awesome partner, Korrie

It’s early Monday morning and I am not running since yesterday was the marathon.  I am pretty relieved I can check the box that it’s done.  Last week was one of my roughest mom weeks ever.  Jasper threw any type of schedule we had out the window, and wouldn’t let anyone but me do anything for him.  Sleep was bad, bad, bad.  The night before the marathon I was up with him at 2am, and he didn’t go back down until 4am.  I had to be at the host hotel at 5am, so I just had to stay up.   I’d also had a cold all week, and while not feeling terrible, I was not 100%.  I always knew I could run the 4:55 assigned pace without a problem,  but I didn’t want to hate being there.  I am very humbled to be part of the pace team, and get a chance to help others reach their marathon goal, and I didn’t want to have a bad attitude about it due to just being overtired.

Anyhow, things ended up going well.  Once I had some breakfast and started my trek to the host hotel, I perked up.  The weather was perfect, which was a huge bonus.  After chilling in the hotel a bit, eating a little more, and 10 bathroom trips, we were ready to roll.

Last year the weather was warm, and by about half way we had very few people with us.  By mile 20 we were alone, so it was a little bit of a bummer to end up pacing no one.  This year was different.  We had a pretty large group with us the whole way.  We had a couple first timers, a couple very experienced runners using us to start conservatively, and a couple of folks who really wanted to break the 5:00 mark.  It was a relief at mile 20 to have several people still with us, and we started to talking to folks to keep them encouraged.  There is a hill at about 1/2 a mile from the finish that kills everyone, so we kept talking it up telling them not to walk it, not to give up.  It actually worked.  With about 1/2 a mile to go our whole little group zoomed ahead of us, and we knew they all were going to make their goal.  We finished alone, but since everyone went ahead of us, and not behind us like last year,  we were happy finishers.  The aftermath isn’t too bad:  a little sunburn, achy knees (I have to slightly “break” to run what is a little slow for me), and a bit dehydrated.  I hope to be up as running tomorrow to refocus on the big prize in April:  Boston.

All in all a rewarding experience.  It was fun to meet Laura, MommyRunFast, at the expo, and know that other moms have to go into races on a few hours of sleep (I thought it was just me!).  The highlight of the run as always was seeing Mike and Jasper on the course and having Jasper run with me a bit.  I wish I had a picture of that!

Ok..time to stretch these tired legs a bit and hit the coffee before the little boy wakes up.

Austin marathon weekend…

Clearly fashion merchandising is not my area of expertise...

Well, almost….just a few more days.   I admit I am looking a little more forward to it.  The last week has been rough, and the weekend of all things running will probably be good for me.  Jaspy got sick, and while it was nothing serious, he developed horrible sleep.  I also got the same cold he had, and while I wasn’t nearly as sick as he was, getting 3 hours of sleep a night on top of it…well, pretty much sucked.  I admit one night during a two hour stretch of being up with him I was reduced to tears.  Doing my job becomes hard, even thinking that I have to run a  marathon in a few days is hard, and I get a stress skin reaction around my eyes that makes them look even more red…as if I need to look worse.  Anyhow, I believe Jasper is on the mend, and is slowing relearning how to sleep through the night.  He also developed extreme clingy-ness, to where if I am home I cannot put him down.  My back was feeling it so I was LOVING going to two yoga classes over the weekend.  Only I totally trashed my quads and was super sore in my legs a week out from the 5 hour marathon.  Uggg…..  I never claimed to be smart…

We are getting super excited to move into our new place.  I have faced the fact that we are just going to have to spend big bucks on this move and get movers.  I don’t know how else to do it, especially with a big project at work at the same time.  I also have faced the fact that our house will not come together for a while.  We have a second living room/ media room that will need all new stuff.  Some of our current furniture is crap/ hand-me down and I would like to finally do away with it.  It takes me a long time to find stuff I like since I am terrible at decorating, but yet still have an ideal in my head that I want to magically create.  Plus I don’t have a million dollars.  So it will take a while to get everything the way we want it and I’ve made peace with that.  I really like to come home to my house in order, but we may have boxes for some time.

Well, I gotta hit a closet or drawer while the little boy sleeps.  Like everyone else, we have random stashes of crap I want to get rid of before we move.  I really don’t want to pay movers to box up a bunch of half empty scotch tape dispensers, pens that no longer write, and 3 year old day planners that never got used.

Good luck to everyone running the marathon this weekend…

Wow, there is time for  the blog  if I do it at work.  Although I don’t have a ton to say.   I am in semi-taper mode this week.  I say semi because I am only omitting a long run, but keeping up everything else.  Next weekend is marathon pacing, and I admit, I will be glad when it’s over.  It’s turned into a bit of just something else on my plate.  I am hoping to feel the energy on race day and get a better attitude.    After that Boston training resumes, since we will be 8 weeks out!  Yikes.  It’s going well.  I did a hard 18 last weekend, and a tough yoga class and was ready to back things down some this week.    Mark and I sighed a deep relief that neither of us were park of the Rocky Raccoon 50/100 mile races this past weekend as we have been in the past.    I take my 18 and then a yoga class that kicks my butt over that any day.  And, speaking of yoga, I heard an interview with Boston marathon runner up, Desi Davila where she says she does yoga as much as she can during her 120 mile weeks.  Very cool. 

Mike is out of town, so it’s circles in the hood with the baby monitor for me tomorrow.  I already listened to all my favorite podcasts this week, so I will need to get creative to entertain myself for all those circles.  I’ve even gotten to where I listen to some of my favorite interviews twice.  A kinda new good one is “ask the ultrarunner ” on endurance planet.  I like the old Endurance Planet better, but on the new version, this segment isn’t too bad.  It makes you realize that people really do ridiculous things.  Why do so many people feel the need to run back to back weekends of 50 mile runs?

Well time to punch back in.  That 30 minutes goes fast.  Coffee is calling me.  Jasper wakes up once a night now hysterically screaming “Mama, mama!”  He does go back down quickly, but will I ever have a night in my life again I don’t have to get up at least once?

 

This blog could get even more dull…

I am about to get a lot busier, and that means the blog time will probably fall by the wayside.  We are moving in April.  We found a house we really like with the schools we wanted.  While I am really excited to get in our new house, anyone who has ever done a move consisting of more than throwing all your belongings in the back of your car, knows it’s a bit of a nightmare.  Add a two year old, and having to prep and sell our current house, and I have no clue how we will get it done, but we will.  I also have a massive review at work, which is based around the entire reason my department even exists…to get the hospital to pass this review every 3 years.  Time off is on a moratorium right now.  I also have two marathons between now and then, so every weekend has a big run planned.  I hope none of this sounds like complaints…it’s not meant to.  Sometimes even really good things in life create some stress.  I’ll try to blog when I can, but I may not do much.  I already decided I’ll do a full fall marathon training series.  So if anyone is interested, sometime this summer I’ll start what will hopefully be a lot of helpful information for anyone planning a fall marathon.   I think I’ll have a lot more free time after April.  But I am so excited for my new  ’hood!  There is a really nice park nearby…with a pool…and a little running path….and a grocery store nearby….and I’ll have granite kitchen counters….and a landscaped backyard…..and Jaspy will be able to walk to his elementary school….I’ll keep telling myself these things in the next few weeks when life gets busier.

Art in the Park…

3M half marathon + Jasper’s birthday…

First off never mix these two.  I was so tired last night and pretty sore today.  After a really bad sleep night (2 hours in w/ Jasp!), I ran , rushed home, showered, got party supplies from Costco, set up the party, had the party, cleaned up the party, put Jasp to bed and was completely wrecked.

As for the race, ended up with a 1:36:15.  Did not break 1:36 which was my goal.  BUT, I think I could have if I hadn’t missed the start by about 5 minutes.  I already sent an email to a friend that  pretty much sums up my stupidity.  So here’s a cut and paste since my blog time is limited today…

3M was a bit of a cluster at the start.  Got there with 45 min to spare, parked with no problem.  Sat in the car for 10 minutes, and decided to get in line for the bathroom .  Longer lines than at Boston.  WTF.  I had planned to do the clothing drop, and I had on a nice fleece from REI.  No way was I just going to chuck it on the street.  So I hop out of the bathroom line, and into the clothing drop line.  Another cluster.  Drop it off, 3 minutes until the start.  I really want to hit the bathroom and figure the porta potties have to be dead by now.  I get in line, hear the gun go off, wait another 3-4 minutes and realize the line isn’t moving at all, dart out of line, find a bush, sprint to the start and hit a wall of walkers in costumes.  I cross the start line thinking “I’m not too far behind, this isn’t so bad”, until I pass the 2:30 pace group a mile in.  My plan was to start between 1:35 and 1:40.  Yeah, I had a lot of catching up to do.  At the shuttle at the end, I was chatting to the guy next to me.  He said he sat in his car with the heater until 5 minutes before the start and stripped off his warm clothes and jumped in the corrals.  Smart guy.  He ran the same time I did.   I spent 35 minutes shivering in the cold for a clothing drop I didn’t really need and still ended up peeing behind a bush in the gateway shopping center.   You would think I would know how to run one of these things by now. 

 

So there you go.  thanks for everyone for well wishes.  It was fun, I’m glad I did it, despite the night before sitting in Jasper’s room at 1am telling myself there was no way I would run in the morning.

 

Jasper’s Art in the Park 2nd birthday party went really well.  The kids seemed to enjoy the art activities and the weather cooperated.  I realize you get what you pay for with a 99 cent pack of 64 crayons….when you open the box up and 55 of those crayons are brown….and were ignored by the kids who much favored the sand paintings.  Jasper didn’t have a single bite of cake since trying new foods freaks him out.  I brought over 1/2 of a mammoth dinosaur sheet cake to work today since I seem to have a thing for horrible sugary frosted kids’ birthday cakes.  I would have been eating that thing for the next month.

 

Thanks to everyone who came to the party and sent positive vibes my way for 3M.  Maybe next year I won’t be such an idiot at the start and actually hit my goal.

 

Party pics will be posted later….