catherine's running efforts

When I joined the FRB in 2009 my main life goals were to finish my PhD and run a marathon. Instead I got married, had three kids, jacked up my pelvic floor (thank babies), and *then* finished my degree.

A couple of weeks ago I also ran a marathon. It was horrible. Running-wise I was fine, but all of the forces conspired to make me super sick (Olive Garden+ibs+shark week+anxiety over pelvic-organ prolapse=a difference in moving vs. elapsed time of over 30 minutes). Since then I've felt really discouraged and haven't wanted to run.

I know running is the fastest way to feel like running, though, so today I finally made myself get out (to the garage because I'm a wuss about the rain). I did 3 sets of 0.25 at 6:40 and 0.1 at about 12:00 x 4 with 5+ minute breaks between sets, for a total of 3.85 (so 3 miles fast and 0.85 slow). It didn't feel *too* hard, but I definitely regretted the donut, cookie, and leftover birthday cake I had eaten earlier in the day. I love how running seems to change what I feel like eating.

Before the babies I'd occasionally run with a group of faster women in Provo. It was intimidating - their pace was about a minute faster than my normal pace, and it was pretty easy for them. Running with them gave me confidence that I could get faster, though, and the harder workouts really did help.

So last week I asked to join a couple of the faster women in my neighborhood on their run this week. This morning I was able to hang with them for three miles before I lost the mental game. I'm a little bummed I bailed early, so hopefully this will motivate me to finish the run next week.

8:24, 7:46, 7:23, 8:58, 9:05 for the last

I wish I could do better at remembering the feeling of finish a run when I'm trying to make myself go outside to start a run. I really do love running. I was stressed today because I've only run a couple of times this week, and I want to run with the faster friends again on Monday, and I need to build up some more fitness and confidence so that that can be more comfortable, so I *wanted* to go, but I knew it wasn't going to be as easy as it was a few weeks ago when I was running more, and I have work to catch up on, and my kids wanted to go play outside, and...so many excuses.

But pretty much as soon as I started running I felt happy and strong. It was a bit warm because my procrastination had pushed me into late morning, but it wasn't too hot. My planned loop was perfect, and I did as well as I wanted on a segment I had planned to go faster on. I was tired at the end, but for the last mile and for about a half hour after I finished I had that great running-produced sense of well being. And now I don't have to worry about going out again for the rest of the day!