Atlanta Marathon Training: Week 18/18

Week-beginning Thoughts:

Whelp, my kid's sick with a 103 degree fever and I spent all of Sunday cuddling with him. This doesn't really bode well for marathon week... Mom life, right? 

Monday

Scheduled: rest

Did: rest

Felt dead last night and slept for about 11 hours. Woke up feeling kind of normal, but then got to about 80% well by the time I got to the office. Nothing bad during the day, but still have zero appetite. 

Tuesday

Scheduled: 10KTuesday

Did: 6.36mi @ 9:39/mi avg, Big 1

Feel like my ears are a little stopped up and I have some post-nasal drip in the back of my throat, but still operating around 80%. Run felt good. I just wish I could ENJOY a marathon week for once. Seems like every time we get to this point, I'm sick or stressing about something... *sigh*

Wednesday

Scheduled: 3mi easy

Did: nope
Laid in bed sick all day. 

concerned kitty giving cuddles

Thursday

Scheduled: rest

Did: nada
Worked 11 hours, through some light congestion and lack of appetite. Picked up marathon packets, but without any excitement or joy. Today's mantra has been "If I can make it to the start line, I can make it to the finish", and I really hope I'll be healthy enough to make it to the start line... 

Friday

Scheduled: 3mi easy

Did: nope
Still feeling stuffy-headed, though my appetite is starting to come back. If I'm going to exhaust myself running and risk a relapse of illness, I'd rather do that ON marathon day. 

Saturday

Scheduled: yoga

Did: nope
Couldn't even stomach the idea of a walk this afternoon to try out my new watch. I can't tell if I'm actually still sick or the nausea is caused by trying to eat too much too soon or too many different types of foods since I'm kind of desperate for calories today. *sigh* Still hoping I can wake up feeling ready to go in the morning and that I've done enough... 

Total Weekly Mileage: 6.3

Week-ending Thoughts:
This is NOT what I wanted my marathon week to be like at all. I'm grumbly, bitter, and quite whiny with my "this isn't fair" attitude. I've worked incredibly hard to prepare for this week and this is supposed to be a fun celebration of what I've accomplished, not just in this training cycle, but getting over all of the craptastic things life handed me in 2018. Instead, I feel like I'm still living through craptastic things. Grumble. Grumble. Whine. Whine. 

Do I need an attitude adjustment? Yeah, probably. If I'm lucky, that'll come in the form of a 26.2mi run on Sunday. 

Chicago Marathon Training: A Normal Kind of Taper Madness

"I'm sick."

"My hip hurts."

"I haven't trained enough."

"What if I can't do it?"


...yep, taper madness is upon us. In the past 24 hours, I've almost broken down and cried four times (and this is after a different kind of taper madness had set in). I've been here before. I know what a mindmeld tapering can be. I've run a marathon before. I know I can do it. It doesn't help, though. Getting through taper week without a breakdown is mentally harder for me than (8) 800m repeats at pace.

I'm worrying about what my goal is going to be. I'm worried about people I'm usually faster than "beating me". What if I don't do as well as I "should"? This is supposed to be a redemption marathon. What if I don't redeem myself? 

I talked to another marathoner friend about all this this morning, and got this response:

"Yep. I get it. It's like the marathon is your big celebration party and you want the party to go perfect even though no one gives a shit if you get the wrong color napkins."

^so much this. 

Anyways, as I'm going through all this, I had this wonderful thing happen to me this morning at the office. We recently got a new admin, and she has access to all of our calendars for scheduling purposes. She saw "Chicago Marathon" on mine for this weekend, and started talking to me when I got in about it. She's done 28 marathons herself, including Chicago, so it's nice to finally have another distance runner who understands all that sort of thing in the office. 

As we're talking, she says, 

"I'm beyond impressed with you. Marathoning is one thing, but you just had a baby, didn't you? Like, less than a year ago?"

"Yeah, last Thanksgiving. He's ten months old now."

"And you found time to train for a marathon. How does that happen?"

"I have a super husband."

"But you still have to do the training. And your body went through a huge ordeal... less than a year ago. You don't even LOOK like you had a baby ever. And you're going to run a marathon this weekend. Wow. That's awesome. You're awesome."

I needed to hear that. I needed that so much, to have, essentially, a total stranger tell me I'm awesome. There was no talk of times, or splits, or goals. Just a "you're going to run a marathon, and that's awesome". It was a really necessary reminder that training in itself , what I've already accomplished, is a success. 

...I'm still going crazy, but at least I had a few minutes of reprieve this morning. :)

FOUR DAYS.

Chicago Marathon Training: A Different Kind of Taper Madness

Things are not fun right now. 

I feel a little overwhelmed with everything, and it's really preventing me from getting in a Chicago state of mind. 

one step closer to the edge...

Everything: 
1) Voice Issues
I've been having throat/voice problems that necessitated a visit to an ENT specialist. I paid a crapton of money this morning to have a tube shoved down my throat via my nose and, while there's nothing super serious amiss, and I should still be able to sing at the International contest in 14 days with my quartet and 15 days with my chorus, I'm not able to sing for the next ~10 days, which means less practice/rehearsal time. This is stressing my quartet out, which stresses me out. Also, it still hurts to swallow. :/

2) Work
Work has gone from chill-lax mode to OMGEVERYTHINGNEEDSTOBEDONERIGHTNOW mode... and over half of the things on my plate are things I don't know how to do. 

3) House
Our house is a disaster, and I've had no time to address any of it. A housekeeping service might vacuum, but I'm pretty sure it won't organize our junk for us.

4) Bad wife
Training + rehearsing for International = next-to-no time with family this past weekend

5) Unprepared
I have done ZERO preparation for Chicago. No packing list. No "do I need to order anything off Amazon?" check. I don't even know how I'm getting from the airport to my hotel. Did I mention I am the most Type A person you will ever meet? My Google Calendar has scheduled sleep, shower, and meal times. I also have a comprehensive GSheet with every packing list ever. I haven't so much as STARTED a sheet for the Chicago trip.

6) Bad mom
Baby boy is moving up a class and I wanted to get his Infant room teachers parting gifts. Nothing has happened on this front.

7) Fraud Crap
Our credit card got stolen last Friday and now I'm having to go around updating EVERY SINGLE THING we use it for. This is about a dozen AutoPays (most of which have stupid@$$ GUIs on their webpages that make it impossible) and all of my hotel/flight/travel/everything reservations for the next month of trips. Did I mention that every time I've called my Chi hotel to update the card number on file, they transfer me and the line goes dead? I hope I have a room when we arrive on Friday.

8) Bad friend
I've had a handful of friends have babies this past month, and a few other friends who haven't had babies, but who've tried to reach out and reconnect with me. I haven't made time to call them back, and I haven't made time to visit or see if any of the new mommies need anything (except one). 

9) Poor nutrition
I've been eating terribly this week. A lack of preparation meant that my breakfasts have consisted of Jerry's Poptarts, lunches have been fast-food, and dinner is whatever I can throw together (and this hasn't included vegetables). I know this is an important part of success on Sunday too, but I just don't have the time to cook the broccoli or cauliflower that are sitting in my fridge... 




While it's been nice not to freak out over the fact that I'm running a marathon in five days, I feel like some focus is essential for success, and I hate that I haven't had the time to do it. Really hope this changes in the next couple of days... Maybe once I get through the next two days of work I'll have about twelve hours at home to prepare. Hope I don't need anything that I can't buy in Chicago at that point...