the joys of a head cold

One of the only fun things about having a head cold is losing my sense of taste. Suddenly, that no-sugar diet is doable and last night I was amusing myself by downing handfuls of wasabi peas....... what strange and spicy things will I eat today?

I'm sick. One of my office mates was sick last week and came into work anyway coughing his germs all over the room and Wednesday night I started to feel a tickle in my throat. I thought it might have been because I turned the a/c on in the car for the first time this year, but by Thursday morning I couldn't swallow without the help of tylenol. I soldiered through the day, but Friday I decided not to work, but had to take Naomi to an afternoon appointment and then errands and that evening wasn't restful. Saturday morning Ben was awake before 6 and came in to cuddle with me, which ended in him being restless and me not getting back to sleep. I took them to the townships for the day to celebrate my birthday and father's day with the folks. We got stuck in two hours of traffic just getting off the island. Fever, shakey, stuck in immovable traffic, it was cruel. I've decided I'm not leaving the island again unless absolutely necessary.
But once we finally got there it was nice and my fever went away and the kids had a great time running around.
But back to the sick. I cannot remember the last time I was this sick. Throat, fever, chills, cement headed, coughing, aching - it's like a god-damned nyquil commercial.
Sunday after the kids left, I collapsed on the sofa and watched netflix, but everything was making me cry. Obviously being sick makes people emotional, and I can understand when I cried when I watched the documentary, "God Grew Tired of Us" about the lost boys of Sudan, sure, that's going to break your heart, but I cried during "The Nanny Diaries", what kinda twisted flu is this? After that happened, I turned the tv off...safer than seeing if I was going to cry through Spice World.

Monday I called in sick, but I felt bad about not working, so I tried to log in to work, but the Internet connection didn't cooperate and the room was spinning, so I read with my book all sideways until I fell asleep, then woke up, read some more, then fell asleep again. Then it was dark. I hadn't spoken to a soul.

Today I was able to stand up without falling over, coughing still sounds disgusting, but hack is mostly gone. Still can't smell or taste anything, which means I've been eating anything because it doesn't matter. Managed to get downstairs to do some laundry so the baskets aren't overflowing. Sleep is winning out over guilt by mere exhaustion. And yet, the guilt is making me think I should be up, working, cleaning, baking, instead to curled up in bed like a pathetic, sniffling sicko. Why is it so hard to give yourself permission to be sick? I sat down to write hoping it would cheer me up a bit - hahahaha, oh yes, much better now.

This better be over tomorrow....

p.s.: Just remembered that I did talk to a couple of people yesterday - Ben was picked on again at school, grrrrr....... the claws are out.

I did it!

(This post is way overdue, just finding some time now.)

At this moment I am so proud of myself. At the beginning of the year when I came up with the crazy idea of running a half marathon (originally for the end of April, which was postponed) I do not think that I really believed it could happen.

Running half that distance was a challenge for me, and my knees were not super thrilled, plus, let's face it, I'm not a young lady anymore and I'm athletically challenged at the best of times.

I pushed myself January-March. I had a training schedule to keep, but with my kids and work I was constantly out of time and trying to squeeze my workouts into impossible times when I should have been sleeping or doing something else that was important. I got stressed out and felt guilty about not keeping my goals, not spending enough time with kids and slipping behind at work. When I decided I wasn't ready in April and I gave myself permission to pass, two things happened: I regained my love of running, which had turned into a chore that I was starting to dread, and I became even more determined to do the 21k. I decided that I would train and run the distance late in the year. I saw the Oka run advertised and I knew it was meant to be and signed up right away.

I increased my distance gradually and didn't freak out when I had setbacks. I tried to stay as disciplined as possible, and I talked to everyone I know who runs for guidance and encouragement. I also let everyone know what I was doing so that I had a bit of guilt-support built into my routine. Sometimes your motivation on those bad days is knowing that your co-worker is going to ask you how that training is going. Some of my runs got longer, but when I could only squeeze in time for a 5k, I just did that because it was better than nothing.

In September I started running to the mountain, up the mountain, around the mountain, and back, 19k. I love this run. My favorite part is stopping at the lookout to admire the view, I feel so strong and accomplished. On Thanksgiving weekend I ran along the lake in Hamilton and when I got back and plotted my route, I realised that I had run 21k! Wow! After that weekend I took a week off in Maine and ran the 21 twice, as well as other shorter runs and hiking. I felt ready for Oka, nothing was gonna stop me, I had actually managed to plan and prepare for this, I was thrilled!
On Monday, the week before the race, I realised that I was getting a cold.
Shit.
I tried running it out of my system, but that didn't work. I worked from home most of the week and tried to rest and take vitamin c and all the stuff you should do. On Friday I went over to Adriana's and she worked her yoga magic on me with chest openers which cleared a lot of the junk in my lungs out.

That night I didn't sleep a lot, and at 5am I was up and getting ready. I packed everything just in case the weather changed. At 7 I was at the race site, the chalet was still relatively quiet. Within a half hour it was chaotic and crowded, so I was glad for my early arrival, even if it did mean some waiting around. I watched the sunrise over the water while I stretched and relaxed. A half an hour before the start time I went out to the start area and waited with all the other crazies. I found my friend Joanne and we jumped up and down trying to stay warm. It was freezing. By the time it started, the bottoms of my feet were frozen. It was good to finally start and the sun came out to warm us and melt the ice off the pavement.

I was at the back and stayed there for pretty much the entire way. I learned a few things. Runners are messy with the cups of water and throwing protein bar wrappers and tissues on the ground, they spit a lot, running clubs are way too cliquey - they move in little snobby packs, couples who run seem to stop a lot at the port-o-potties, and the really fast guys start late and run past you like you are standing still. The route was a go and double back sort of affair. The first guy passed me on his way back when I was at the 7k mark! That wasn't discouraging at all......

Most everyone else passed me around 9 or 10k which was fine. At some points I felt like I was running alone. There were a couple of people behind me, but not too many. The last couple of kilometers where I would normally feel a bit of extra energy I realised that I had nothing, probably because of being sick. All the way, the volunteers cheered us all on, it was so sweet. When I reached the finish, many cars were pulling out of the parking lot. My final time was 2:25, about 25 minutes after most people, but very respectable for me. I had my banana and bagel at the finish line and warmed up a bit at the chalet before heading home.

It was kind of anticlimactic. I'd been training for so long, now I'd done it and I was walking around feeling elated, but very alone at the same time.

I stopped at a friend's daughter's birthday party on the way home. My kids were there and many of my friends, and they all made a huge fuss over me and it was exactly what I needed, especially hugs from my two favorite people in the world. I ate like a pig and afterwards went home and got comfy on the sofa and iced my knees and tried not to move for the rest of the day. Sunday I went to yoga and once again Adriana fixed my body. On Monday I was perfectly fine.



So, the latest total (money is still coming in) is $1657 for the Children's Hospital and another $190 for the WIAHA. Thanks to everyone who donated :-)

I can't wait to do it again.

Limitless

A few weeks ago I was talking about running a half marathon in April. I heard about it in February, and thought that it would be a good idea to challenge myself and to raise money for charity. I figured out a training schedule, and it involved training every day (running or cross training), but my hectic work schedule made sticking to it impossible. I kept trying to fit it in every day and some days it worked and others I just could not find the time, or I was making the time and then having to work late at night to make up time. I realised that I was spending my days feeling guilty for not training, or worn out from staying up too late instead of enjoying my runs. Then I got sent to Sweden and that threw everything off. I managed less than a handful of runs and felt incredibly bad. When I got back home, it was time to face some facts. I'm not ready, and I will not be ready by the time the race comes around for a half. I'm going to continue to train for the half, and work up to it later this year, but for now, I have to be content to do what my body can do and enjoy what I've managed to achieve. Pushing myself further than I can go and putting all this pressure on myself is not the way I want to live. I will get there, I have time, I'm not quitting, I'm remembering that sometimes there is no timetable on your goals.

Girls who wear glasses

It is the end of an era. A few weeks ago, I went for my eye checkup, which I do religiously every ten years. Normally I go and the doctor tells me to come back in another ten years. This time, however, was different.
My eyesight is still great, I can still read the tiniest print on the farthest card with relative ease, but my eyes are getting old. As the doctor explained it, "you know how at the end of the day after you've been on the computer working and you've been doing a lot of reading and your eyes are really tired and sometimes you have a headache? Well, that's not supposed to happen." Oh. So she fiddled with all the settings on that machiney they make you look through and came up with the world's tiniest prescription for glasses to be worn when I work at the computer and for reading when my eyes feel tired. I went with my girlfriends and picked out some frames and the glasses came in. I wore them for the first time today, and I have to ask, HOW DO PEOPLE WEAR THESE THINGS ALL THE TIME? I can barely manage 20 minutes without making myself bonkers. Looking through a layer of glass at stuff isn't normal. Seeing the edges of glasses in your vision is distracting. I got a smudge on them and my eyes started to water. I'm not even sure that they make me look smarter. And I can't look through them for anything past my computer screen, so I have to look over them, or take them off to look at anything else. On the plus side, this does make it much harder for me to poke myself in the eye.
When I was a kid I always wanted glasses, I was jealous of all the kids who had them. Now I realise why so many people get laser surgery. My friends have told me that I'll get used to it, and I know they are right. I guess I don't have much of a choice anyway. Is senility and hearing loss that far behind?

True love

Ok, so it's midnight on Valentine's Day and I'm just getting around to this. V-day started early this morning when the kids climbed in for a snuggle. Ben wished me a Happy Valentine's day before he even got into bed. There's something so indescribably wonderful about having a conversation with cuddly children in bed on a lazy weekend morning. That was my V-day gift, and it was the best present ever. We got up and I made waffles and cut little hearts in them which amused everyone. Their dad came and got them a while later, leaving me the rest of the day to myself. It was cold today, but not frigid, so I got dressed up and prepared for a run. It's getting harder to get out there lately, and I've been trying not to feel bad about that. I hate the treadmill - it's convenient and warm, but so dull that I can only do about 6km before I die of boredom no matter what music I have playing. To have a proper run, I really have to be outside.
So out I went, not wanting to brave the elements, but in need of the thing that makes so much of my life better. I count on running now, it's become more than a friend to me. It brought me through a really tough time and continues to offer me peace and calm when nothing else can. If you had told me a few short years ago that I would be running 10km on a Sunday morning, I would have looked at you like you were insane, but now I do it with relative ease. I am not a fast runner, I get passed by the people in the fancy black running clothes like I'm standing still, but it's not about speed or time for me, it's about quiet and release, listening to my body and letting my mind go.
I am contemplating a half marathon in April if my schedule permits (my travel schedule may conflict with the race or interfere with my training time too drastically) to raise money for the Children's. I've never run that far and I am not into racing, but I think it may be time to challenge myself, and if I do, I want to do it for charity.
Running has given me so much mentally and physically, it is a love that came late but that I hope to hold on to for as long as I can. Someone told me recently that as women get older running actually becomes easier, that we have more endurance, or maybe more of a desire to embrace that silence and serenity in ourselves. When I came in after my run I felt alive and happy and proud and like I was lit from within. That's what love does to you :-)

Positive thinking, it's not just for breakfast anymore

So I was reading this excellent book review a couple of days ago and it got me to thinking. The review was of a book by Barbara Ehrenreich, Bright-Sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America. I haven't read it, but the title tells you the subject and stance. The author addresses the mass-mania positive thinking has in our society.
As witnessed, there has been a lot of positive thinking going on on this blog as of late. Most of it stems from the fact that I am generally a pretty happy person, but I also believe that positive things happen to positive people and that sometimes you just have to slap that smile back on your face and keep moving in order to get out of places of pain, ("smile, though your heart is aching, smile, even though it's breaking"). This all comes from the belief that everything happens for a reason and no pain lasts forever - at some point some new pain will come to take its place ;-)
With all that said, I know that sometimes it's just all blah blah blah. The idea that we should be happy all the time is an impossibility. We are all going to have bad stuff happen: heartbreak, loss, failure, disappointment, it's what we do with the bad stuff that matters. When you can take a soul-sucking failure and turn it into a life lesson and move on, that's a good thing - when you refuse to acknowledge your failure and quote something you heard on Oprah, well, that's stupid.

Ehrenreich talks about being shunned when she was being treated for cancer. Apparently failure is not an option, and she was criticized for expressing her feelings because she should have been spending all her time fighting off the cancer with positive energy. In our world of teddy bears and pink ribbons what is a woman to do when she feels mad and sad about her cancer? Is there no room for individual thought? There's a lot to be said on this subject. Let's face it, the ribbons have gotten out of control - they are on lapels, pickup trucks, hanging from houses, and even show up in emails made out of \ and |. They have come to symbolize the insipidness of people to follow blindly in large groups, it's like Mary Kay, only terrible because breast cancer awareness and all the fund raising should be a subject we respect. All too often now, the pink ribbons represent a roll-your-eyes symbol of fat ladies walking in large groups with inspirational music playing in the background. Not to say that this doesn't have its place, but being able to have one's own thoughts about one's illness is important.

So how do we find sincere positive thinking? Well, for starters, it has to be actual thinking, something that comes from the individual. Jumping on the bandwagon to raise money is all fine and good, but to gain anything on a personal level you have to think for yourself. Most of all, you have to be honest with yourself and not dismiss your less-than-positive feelings, they are an important part of the process as long as you learn to let them go.

And when all else fails, ice cream and your girlfriends solve nearly everything....

D's knees

(image borrowed from: http://216.74.18.90/image/122/totalknee/images/Img%205%20Knee%20Anatomy.jpg)

I went to the physiotherapist today bracing myself for the worst. I expected that she would tell me to stop running for a while. This would kill me. Yes, I did go for a *tiny* run this morning just in case she said "no more". And I ran to the appointment... well, come on, I was wearing my running shoes!
Ok, ok, so she had a good look and made me do all sorts of bending and she poked and asked questions and prodded and asked me if that hurt, how about that? I think after a bit she was trying to get me to scream.
Good news! I had an alignment problem of my sacrum that was throwing everything off and ultimately causing my right knee to turn in. And my right butt muscle is weak. She made the adjustment and I have exercises to do. This is so much better than I'd hoped, so guess who will be doing her exercises? She also suggested that I tone down the mileage until I build up the muscle and she's sure that the alignment takes.
I think I can live with that :-)

afternoon napping on a great big bed

Sitting in my ex's living room waiting for the in-laws to come and get Ben for a week of fun and games in Ottawa. He's only ever been away from us for one night – ever. This is going to be weird. This is the kind of stuff that he'll remember when he's older. I was never close to my grandmothers. I never liked my dad's mom, she was a hard lady, and pretty mean. I loved my mom's mom, but she kept her emotions in check a lot, that was just her way. My kids are lucky to have all four grandparents and to have such great relationships with them.
Yesterday was a down day. I eventually went for a run and then home, a shower, and then some me time. I put on my comfiest clothes and picked up a new book, laid down on my bed and spent a couple of hours reading and napping. Pure bliss! You forget what a luxury that is sometimes, to be quiet and just be, nothing to do, no one to see, no place to go, that hazy, happy, heaviness that comes over you when you lay down on a crisp bed and begin to unclutter your mind.
After I woke up I went down to the video store and picked up “Forgetting Sarah Marshal” which helped shake off the blahs. Bits were stupid and predictable, but there were some lines which were truly original, and of course the full frontal guy nudity, which is astounding for any Hollywood film. I know that penises are not the most graceful bits of anatomy, but I have no idea why they are so shunned. Perhaps if they were seen more people would find them more attractive. I've always liked them in that quirky way that you like strange-looking dogs, or odd clay statues your kids make.
Once Ben is away, Naomi and I are off to do something. She needs new shoes, but it's so nice a day that we may just go to the park instead. This summer has taught us to take advantage of the nice weather while it's here.
And supper? Hmmmm... good question.....

My body

Perhaps in the spirit of getting back into the blog thing I should tell the one or two people who still wander through what's been going on for the past couple of years. We'll start with my body.
When Naomi turned one and I returned to work I was over 190lbs and pretty down about it. Now, I've never been skinny, but having kids and staying home for a year with each had really taken its toll. I was in nasty shape and fat as a house. A couple of months before, I got back in touch with my old friend Deb. We had lost touch when she and her boyfriend split. We invited her over for dinner one night, and when I opened the door to let her in, I took one look and said, "Cripe Deb, where did the rest of you go?". She had easily lost 30lbs and looked fab. She told me that she followed Weight Watchers. I remembered doing WW in my early twenties with a bunch of my friends and losing 10lbs. I also remembered how hard it was to keep track of the breads, milks, etc. After being reassured that it was not like this anymore, I signed up online for a trial free membership, downloaded all the info I needed to do it on my own, then cancelled and off I went. So that was two years ago. Since then, I've lost more than 50lbs and am down to a healthy weight.

I don't follow WW, but I eat reasonably and I continue to eat the normal, healthy food I have always eaten. Last year I returned to the gym and now I have a routine of 4 or 5 days a week. I started running, which now feels amazing because my knees don't hurt and I no longer feel winded. In short, I'm happier with my body than I've been in 10 years. My goal over the winter is to work with a personal trainer on my upper body and train for 10k.
I think my success is in part to do with the fact that I wasn't in a hurry and I never obsessed about the scale. When I reached a point where I wasn't steadily losing, I just kept doing what I was doing until my metabolism caught up. When it comes to your body, patience is the best thing you can give it, and a cute new pair of jeans of course...;-)

stop when you hear the crunch

After living with back pain for the past 18 months, I finally decided to do something about it and booked an appointment with an osteopath. The trouble all started a month after Naomi was born. I would wake up at night and have to pile all the pillows up so that I was nearly vertical to get enough relief to go back to sleep. The pain has dulled significantly over the year and a half, but I still wake up somewhat sore, and that ain't right. A friend recommended her osteopath who has done a good job on her, so I swallowed my fear of all people who manipulate your body and went in. I'm not sure what I was expecting (cracking, breaking, crunching), but she was really nice and figured out that the problem is probably that my hips weren't aligned, not uncommon after birth, especially one that's so freakin' speedy (thanks again, Naomi). I felt fine right after, but now my hip is achy. It would be great if this gets me back to normal, and I'm not afraid anymore! Well, of her anyway.