This week was pretty nice to me for the most part. I’ve had some on and off sinus issues, which I’m attributing (hopefully) to allergies. I have a lovely tendency to get sick during my tapers, so I am taking all the elderberry and Zicam I can get my hands on. On Thursday, my son came home from school complaining of a sore throat and a teacher who had to stay home with the flu. Off to urgent care we went, where he tested positive for strep and I came up clear. We both got a shot of antibiotics just in case, and at my husbands’ urging, I kept some distance between he and I for the next 24 hours. Thankfully, it looks like we caught it early, and he wasn’t feeling too terrible. Now, I think a lot of women here would really struggle, and in full disclosure if he were feeling miserable, I would toss my germ concerns out the window and do what I could to make him feel better. Racing is important to me, but I’m not entirely heartless.
However, with him being in good spirits and my husband on duty, I am not willing to subscribe to the belief that I need to be the parent who cares for the sick kid just because I’m the mom. My husband is 100% capable of caring for him, and I honestly think I’d be doing all of us a disservice if I stubbornly resigned myself to being primary care giver this week. For me, this brings up the topic of mom guilt and marathon training, and self-care in general. Marathon training is absolutely a selfish hobby; I don’t run for anyone but myself and for any reason other than personal enjoyment. There’s a lot of other great benefits that come from my healthy habits, but at the core, it’s about the fact that I believe I am a human that is worth taking care of. That is a message that I think is important for my son to receive from his mom. I take care of myself, and I welcome the help of others who want to support me in this. I know I am fortunate to have this support available to me, and I am thankful that my husband has no issue picking up the parenting slack to allow me to avoid getting sick the week before an A race.
This race is something I have trained for for the past 16 weeks. It’s important that I give myself the best opportunity to run strong, even if it means I’m not the best mom in the world for one weekend. I hope more women will join me in letting go of the expectations of being perfect at everything, and embrace the fact that sometimes to be an A+ something else, you have to be willing to be a B+ mom for a short period of time. There’s a time and season for everything, and I’ve certainly given my fair share of time to motherhood; now is a period of time for me to chase something that is just for me. I know this is a topic that comes up quite a bit, so I’m thinking about focusing a post on what has helped me reject and let go of mom guilt in relation to self-care. Let me know if that’s something that would be interesting to you.
In other news, I’m getting really excited to race in Dallas next week, and I’ve started the compulsive weather checks. It’s looking to be nice and chilly with some sun, which is perfect. I honestly cannot believe it’s so close to race weekend. This training plan has been incredibly challenging for me, but I feel stronger and more prepared for this race than any other in the past. I plan on writing a full review of the Hansons Marathon Method training plan in a later blog, but suffice it to say I am quite the fan. I’ll be skipping the week 16 programming, as I had to start one week behind when I began this training cycle. I had looked ahead and decided that weeks 16 & 17 looked very similar, so I decided to go straight from week 16 to week 18. This means next week will be 100% easy runs as I taper, and as shocked as I am to say it, I think I’ll miss some of the intensity. Guess that just means I’ll need to find another race in the near future!
This Weeks Workouts
Total Miles: 55
Hansons Marathon Method, Week 16
How the Runs Felt
It was really nice to be home all week, and to just step out the door and run my typical routes every day. This was also a week full of “lasts.” For this training block, I had my last strength run, my last tempo, and my last set of back to back 10 milers. My last strength run felt somewhat labored, but it wasn’t horrible. My throat was bothering me Wednesday and Thursday morning, and I was worried how I would feel during my last tempo run. Surprisingly, I felt really strong during my run, but the rest of the day I wasn’t feel so great. I took a nap during lunch, and went to bed early without the sick kiddo, woke up Friday, and was ready to go. These tempo runs have been the most difficult part of the training program, and I’m really hoping they’ll pay off on race day.
Saturday’s long run was easy and uneventful. It was my last double digit run for this block, which is a little surreal. I started a short-term carb depletion on Saturday after my long run. I’ll be minimizing carb intake, massively increasing my fats to make up the calories, and keeping protein the same as usual. This will only go on from Saturday until Thursday morning. Thursday I will go back to my usual intake, and Friday and Saturday I’ll be carb loading. I’ve never done any sort of carb deplete, and I’m honestly not enjoying it so far. I read Hungry Runner Girl’s post on her experience with a short carb depletion before the carb load, and decided it was worth a shot. The thought behind the deplete is that it may allow your body to hold on to the carbs you take in during the carb load more effectively. I’m not sure how or if it will do anything for my performance, but I’m certainly looking forward to my carb load more than any other race I’ve done in the past.
What I’ve Been Listening To
Urge to Kill & Murder in Oregon continue to keep me listening. I stumbled upon a very interesting new podcast this week, called Disorganized Crime. A woman shares her experience growing up in a very idyllic setting, only to discover that her parents afforded this wonderful life by smuggling large quantities of pot. So far it sounds like a comedy of errors and entertainment. I’ve also really loved Don’t Keep Your Day Job; I think it’s a podcast that everyone could take something from.
How the WODs felt
Monday and Wednesday’s WODs felt pretty solid, though I did drop a loaded 65lb barbell on my leg as I was stepping down off the box on Monday. That left a lovely bruise, but nothing that kept me from my workouts. Fridays, I normally run in the morning and catch the noon WOD, but this Friday I took the day off work and wanted to have the rest of the evening to relax after my run. I planned on jumping into the 5:30 class on Thursday but then my son needed a trip to Urgent Care (his timing is somewhat irritating). Since I dropped a workout last week, I decided to be somewhat stubborn and jump into open gym after my run on Saturday. It wasn’t my best workout, but I’m glad I was still able to work in 3 WODs for the week and not sacrifice my down time on Friday.
What Went Well
This whole week was pretty good. I got some good sleep, my nutrition was fairly reasonable, and my workouts felt strong. I’m not loving this sinus stuff, and it’s making me slightly paranoid, but I’m trying to stay positive and keep up with my immune boosters. I went to my doctor and got a steroid shot for the stressed ligament in my pelvis, and I’m hoping that will get me through the race until I can look into some physical therapy options. The WODs this week included a lot of really great core work, which is always nice. Overall, I’d say this week was a good one.
What Went Shitty
Work was fairly stressful for me this week, and I know that stress often leads to colds for me. So far I’ve been able to stay on track, so I’m hoping that continues. Waking up with a sore throat and some sinus stuff certainly wasn’t a good time, but I’m choosing to focus only on what I can control. I can control my hydration, my nutrition, and getting good sleep. So that’s what I’m going to keep focusing on this week.
Plans to Improve Next Week
I started my short carb depletion on Saturday, that I’ll continue until Wednesday. I’m really looking forward to going back to carb business as usual later in the week. All of next week’s run’s will be nice and easy, and I’ll be focusing on mobility and hydration for the week.
