5 Years

Five years ago, I completed my first endurance event.  It was a 15k.  I was woefully unprepared, and spent a little over a week recovering.  By recovering, I mean regaining my ability to walk/sit/stand without wanting to cry. I had a panic attack in the first mile.  My Jenny's sister, Jessica, told me if I didn't keep going she would make me run a 1/2 marathon with her. At that moment, it was the scariest thing I had ever heard.  Thirteen miles seemed like crazy talk.(Yes, I realize the hilarity of this statement.)  Five years makes quite a difference.

I am not overly proud of my performance during that race.  I guess I should say I wasn't very proud, finishing the marathon on the same course as the 15k did a lot to help my memory of that first race.

Tonight, in the same Disney parking lot where I had that panic attack, my family will run our first 5k.  I have never run a 5k, so this will be interesting.  I will be running beside my girl and I am so very excited for her to cross her first finish line and get her first medal. 

Heartbroken

I am heartbroken for the people and runners in Boston today. 

Boston is a dream, a goal that a marathoner looks toward, trains for, and must qualify to even attempt to sign up.  As a new marathoner the look I get from people that heard I have finished a marathon is one similar that I give to those that say they have completed and or qualified for Boston. 

The early finishers often make their way to just before the finish line to cheer on the runners still going.  People will hang out at a finish line just to cheer for people they don't know.  Spectators and runners are some of the most special people in my world right now.  There were many nameless runners that cheered my on to my first 26.2.  My breath catches and heart aches to think these strangers that loved on me for a few minutes in January may be hurt or their world torn apart today. 

I went to Boston for the first time in college.  We were there for under 6 hours but the city has held my heart ever since.  Today it breaks with theirs.  My family lives there, I am scared for them.

Someone told me that I am now a part of the 1% of people that will ever finish a marathon.  These people today are part of my 1%, I will stand with them and pray for them in the days to come.  If I cross paths with a Boston 2013 participant, I will hug them, hold their hand, and tell them I am so glad they are safe and I will mean it with ever fiber of my being.

I Am No Longer That Girl

I love looking back at the photos of my race weekend.  They never cease to bring a tear to my eye.  I was laughing today because of my picture from the expo.  That poor girl had no clue what she was about to do.  She was scared nearly to death but excited to try.  Whenever someone asked her goals about the race her answer was "To not die.".

I am no longer that girl. As much as she will always be a part of me, I will never doubt I can finish a marathon, or anything else I want for that matter.  My body image is completely changed.  I am less discouraged at how my legs look, they are still scarred and larger than I would like but they carried me to a long standing dream.  I am much more forgiving of a little cellulite. I look in the mirror and see strength not weakness, there are no words for how freeing this is.

I know not every person will have a chance to run a marathon.  I want to share the video of me when I caught sight of the finish.  It was supposed to be a picture but the palm of my hand switched the camera to video.  Please excuse the slightly off key and overly exuberant singing, I had after all just completed 26.1 miles.  I was nearly there, joy and thankfulness was radiating out of every pore. This is what it looks like when a girl that was told she can't realizes she can and did.

One Year

I am one year out from my first 1/2 marathon.  I started this blog to track my progress during the training for said 1/2 marathon.  It took a few stops and starts but last February, I finally crossed both the start and finish line. I have heard numerous times the person that crosses the finish line is not the person that started the race. I had no idea how true this would be. I finished my first half and immediately set my sights on my first full marathon.  Somewhere on that walk around Disney I decided I might want to try the Goofy.  Once that thought entered my head, I could not get it out of there. 
A little over a month ago I completed the Goofy Challenge.  I am still struggling with the emotion of having completed this goal.  I still tear up when I see a part of Disney I have not seen since my races. When I talk about my Goofy weekend, my voice will still catch in my throat and my eyes will well with tears.  I was afraid this was not a normal feeling, until I met a fellow runner at Disney and as we talked about our races, I noticed we were both in tears.  I think of all the reasons I shouldn't have been able to do this, and know my emotions are fine.  I think the biggest of these was the fact that I ran on the tenth anniversary of setting this goal.  When I had my daughter, ten years ago, I had to have a c-section. For ten years not only have I carried a goal of running a Disney race, but also the feeling that my body failed me on her Birthday.  I am thankful every day that I was in the care of doctors that were able to deliver her safely and healthy, but I feel like my body was not able to do what God had designed it to do. This was the second occurrence of a body part not working and me ending up in an operating room. I think the overwhelming emotion comes from knowing that I overcame something I have struggled with for years.  This time my heart and body both got what they wanted. My ankle was strong, my heart beat normally, my brain wouldn't let me stop. I finished.  I will carry this success with me always.

Training With The Girl

We have decided to run the Expedition Everest 5k challenge as a family.  This means we also needed to convince a 10 year old, she is capable of running 3 miles. All of this happened while I was doing my recovery from my last race.  This will be all of our first 5k.  I am a little nervous because 3 miles is my most disliked distance.  I am hoping to embrace the "short" run. While training for my first 1/2, 3 miles was my scary distance when I started, maybe that has just stuck with me. 

I have never trained a child, I struggled training myself, and I am not an expert.  That being said, I started this blog to encourage and log my training to hopefully inspire others not sure of where to start. I will continue that now as I also work with my daughter to get her 5k ready.  The Girl regularly talks about running the mile at school and that some days PE consists of run/walking the track for the allotted class time.  I also know she is capable of walking miles and miles at Disney without whining. I used these benchmarks as a starting point as to what seemed like a reasonable goal.  My husband had taken her on a 2 mile walk the other day and she was running ahead and back, in a similar fashion to a quarter drill for a good chunk of that.  As the member of the family that has done a race before, my main job will be encourager/pacer. 

I decided to take her out for a 3 mile run/walk to see where we were starting.  Since it is a Run Disney event they have a required pacing of 16 min/mile.  The girl and I did 3 miles in 42 minutes.  I also added in a 1/4 mile warm up and cool down lap.  We started with a 1:1 run walk ration of 1 minute. Now that we know she can keep the pace required for the race we are going to slowly build up the run:walk ratio. We will likely add in some upper body work-outs for all of us since we are unsure of what the obstacles will be.

A Few More Memories

I have a few more things I do not want to forget. I have enjoyed 2 weeks of rest, the hamstring seems to be all healed up, and The Girl and I have completed our first 3 mile run as a duo. As I took my downtime after the races, new memories come flooding in.  I wanted to get them in writing so I could look back on them when training for next year's Goofy gets rough.

- Yes, I said next year's Goofy.  My husband and a friend or three want to do the Goofy with me next year. 

- The final Marathon finisher finished with her service dog.  One of the lovely, amazing, and beautiful volunteers brought a medal to the dog in the med tent.

- Having a best friend that stayed up to make sure she could talk to me while I was on the way to the starting line both days.  Also having her husband, one of my favorite people in the world (mostly because he gets my stupid jokes), tell me they were proud of me. I miss those two.  With any luck they may be 2 of the three from item 1.

- A guest service representative that saw The Girl cheering for every single runner, asked her to come find her before they headed to see me at the finish.  She rewarded her with any stuffed animal she would like.  The guest services rep said since she spent her birthday weekend cheering for the runners she deserved something special.

39 Thoughts

I haven't posted about my training for the Goofy.  I am now two days out from the Goofy Challenge and my legs work just like normal.  They are a little sore and the hamstring I pulled during the full is still angry with me, but I feel incredible.  So much so that I am having a hard time believing that I actually finished a half and full marathon a mere 48 hours ago.  Since I haven't updated on the training I will probably add a few thoughts on that to the 39.

1. The best moment of the races was my husband telling me he now wants to start running and do a race with me.

2. In two different races with 25,000 + people at the start line, I found a runner that had done the half with Jenny and I.  It was incredible to find him nearing the finish line of our Goofy.

3. The half was the most amazing day.  I cut 10 minutes off my Princess time.

4. It seems unreal that the sunburn will last longer than the muscle pain.

5. Social Media is a powerful tool.  I realized the day before the race that I was doing something amazing when an Ironman wished a couple of us Goofy runners good luck.  My friends came through with positive comments, prayers, and good thoughts when I thought I was done in mile 9 of the full.

6. Bio Freeze rocks.

7. Did you know monorails have horns?

8. I told my fellow half participants what the lady had told me on the overpass into Epcot.  I had another runner look at me and say "I needed to hear that, thank you.".

9. 3 sunrises over Disney are beyond magical.

10.  Disney does magic best.  The concierge at the hotel was handing out flowers to the finishers when we arrived back at the hotel. I cried.

11. Magic = Defying Gravity coming on my iPod as I rounded the corner to the finish of the Marathon.

12. To the man with the "One day you may fail, Today is not that day!" sign at mile 24, Thank you.

13. The most hilarious sign was "You're halfway there" at mile 4. The girl next to him had a sign that had an arrow and "Bad at Math".

14. I started in the last corral.  I looked around during the half and found that I was mostly running with people that started 2-3 corrals in front of me.

15. One of the larger charity teams had volunteers spaced throughout the race to cheer on their runners.  During the full one of these groups loudly said "You need to cheer for these people the most they probably won't make it." as I was running by.  I almost believed them.  Luckily my long distance cheerleaders were louder.

16. Can't is a powerful word. It is even more powerful when you prove that you can.

17. At mile 22 a Florida Highway Patrolman was telling us all we had to stop at the water station at the top of the hill.  The heat was brutal.

18. There were nurses at the finish line that wouldn't let you pass until you had started drinking your water or sports drink.

19. I didn't stop at any of the medical tents during the half.  I made up for this by stopping at all the ones that had Bio Freeze during the full. (A third of them had run out.)

20. On the Speedway just after I realized I had likely pulled a hamstring, I saw the pacer bus. It scared me. Terrified me actually.  I hobbled to the next med tent, slathered as much Bio Freeze as I could on said hamstring and never saw that bus again.  The next 15 miles weren't pretty.

21. Miraculously I finished in the allotted time.  I was told that once you were in the parks you could go over the time limit because they wouldn't sweep from the Studios or Epcot. I was not in the mood to test this theory.

22. The number of hours from the finish of the full marathon until I decided I would like to run another.

23. It took another 26 hours to decide to do another Goofy.

24. I had experienced marathoners tell me I was crazy to do my first marathon as part of the Goofy.  They were right. However it makes the accomplishment that much sweeter.

25.  Runners are a generous group.  I had people offer me candy and salt during the full.

26. Runners ability to lift each other up is incredible.

27. The Medic that walked a runner over the finish line deserves a special medal of his own.

28. Disney shoots the confetti cannon at the finish for the winners and the very last finisher.

29. If you are running an endurance event, pack your own nutrition. The conditions of the race can vary in ways that cannot be anticipated. Knowing I had enough Gu in my pack allowed me to not stress when the Clif bar team had run completely out at the first stop, and only had two flavors left at the second.  Mile 19 is not the place to discover if you like/dislike a new flavor of energy gel.

30. Walking around Magic Kingdom on Marathon Monday, wearing my medals, knowing I had wanted that moment for 10 years, was the most amazing feeling.

31. I ran the Goofy to challenge myself.  I sincerely congratulated every race finisher I saw.  I was amazed at how many said "I just did the half/full" as if it were a lesser accomplishment. Getting out there and doing any type of endurance event should never be discounted. Never.

32. I have done two half marathons and one full.  I have all my toenails and haven't had a blister.  The right shoes make all the difference.

33. My new goal is to get all of the East Coast Disney medals.

34. I have heard many times "The first steps are the hardest." this was true when I started training. Although I know think this is never more true that the 48 hours post marathon.  Once I am moving I am good but starting from sitting can be a bit dicey.

35. If you go to a race expo or watch a race you will see people wearing funny calf sleeves/knee socks.  These are compression garments.  These people are smart, follow their example.   I am convinced these have played a major part in my recovery. I also switched to properly fit compression pants during my training.  The recovery from my 17-21 mile long runs was better than the shorter ones with non-compression pants. They are amazing.

36. I do not have a picture of the finish lines once they were in my sights like I do for the Princess.  The palm of my hand switched to video as I was running. I was upset at first until I watched the one for the half.  It is hilarious.  I did it again on Sunday for the full. I obviously did not learn a lesson on Saturday.  I am so thankful for this video now.  I can hear the sob/laughs and some off key singing along to Elphaba.

37. Three medals are heavy.

38. This weekend contained so much joy.  I am going to hold on to that joy and try to not let the memory of the fear prevail. I am so thankful to my cheerleaders. 

39. The number of miles I ran at least a little bit of.  Next time I will run more. I cannot wait to continue this journey.