The last 8 weeks of my life have been a little out of sorts. I like schedules. I like knowing what I’m doing, where I’m going and in what time frame I’m doing and going. Whether it’s an Asperger thing or not (though I suspect it is), having a schedule reduces a severe amount of anxiety.
For the last 8 weeks there has been nothing even remotely close to a schedule. Off work for most of that time because of gallbladder surgery, throw in a long-ass road trip and not being able to get to a Crossfit class for the entire 8 weeks and I can feel my mental strength get a little wobbly and my physical strength tucker out much sooner.
Return to work, only to be there for a week and turn what was supposed to be a 3 day “vacation” trip to Toronto to be with Mimi when she received her award in to a 9 day official vacation with a short stop over in Toronto but let me fill 3 of those vacation days with interpreting work so I didn’t really take a vacation, just got paid to stay home from one job while I worked another job.
Hopefully this show I like to call LIFE, will resume it’s regular schedule this week. No vacations until January (Yay for babies!), I go back to Costco tomorrow and resume my nightly shifts. I, #fingerscrossed, go back to Crossfit this week and get back to making the hashtag #trexloveslifting a daily part of my vocabulary.
I can physically feel this non-scheduled life weighing me down.
Today, after spending the better part of the day drowning in a swarm of Jr. High School kids I thought a nice run would help me feel better. This, after I literally tore my apartment apart looking for my iPod shuffle…which by the way did I mention when I forget where I put something (cause everything has a place…again that’s the Asperger), it throws me for a loop? Not a “oh I’ll find it later” loop…no it feels like a screeching halt, nothing is right, everything is out of place, I’ll never run again, where the fuck did I put it, hit myself in the head so I can release the anxiety kind of loop. I misplaced it, panicked. Looked for it. Was up at night thinking about it. Panicked some more. Then methodically looked in every nook and cranny until there it was nestled in a coat pocket (which I never leave it in a pocket of any kind so I must have been totally distracted) and my first thought: Let’s go for a run and clear my head because after spending 6 hours with a few hundred 13 year olds, the auditory sensory was way overloaded.
The only problem about this run? It totally sucked. I know the first mile usually sucks ass. The body has to warm up. Lungs have to adjust. A rhythm has to be found. The body warmed up. The lungs adjusted….other than that it pretty much blew chunks. I kept telling myself how tired I was and how out of shape I was. How I didn’t have the endurance. I had to walk a lot more than I wanted and each time I did that damn voice kept nagging at me:
Too Slow.
It took a lot for me to keep going. I had to remind myself that not every run is fantastic. In fact sometimes it’s good to have a super shitty shuffling of the feet. To stop and want to quit knowing that you can’t because you’re too far from home and the only way back is to suck it up and do the best you can.
I have to remember that it wasn’t that long ago (though it feels like a lifetime – and sometimes not even my life ago) running for just a few minutes left me winded for the better part of the day. Some days just feel harder than others. I abused my body for a long time. Most of my adult life really. I didn’t care about what I was putting in it and I certainly didn’t care what my body was putting out in the physical sense. Preferring to leave a little sweat on the ground rather than watching a CSI marathon only truly began happening 3 1/2 years ago.
On days when I don’t feel as fast or as strong as other people I try to remember that this body is a work in progress. Some days I’m going to feel like I’m at the front of the pack. Some days I’m going to feel like I’m eating dust at the back of the pack.
AT LEAST I AM PART OF THE PACK.
Today’s run left me feeling cranky but I’d rather be cranky, sweaty and in need of a long hot shower than sitting on the couch at 270 pounds, watching a CSI marathon doing nothing but slowly eating myself to death.
I needed this. Truly. Being part of the pack is a thing. A real thing. I run slow. So slow that my fitness pal has no idea what to call it. So fuck my fitness pal, I just run.
I can totally relate. I have plenty of, “this run SUCKED” days. And while the temptation is there to beat ourselves up about it, like you said, at least you’re part of the pack. Some days we break personal records. Other days, just getting out there needs to be considered victory enough.
Good on you.
I just found your blog and really have to say that your words made me feel better about a lot of issues in my own life that I thought only I deal with. Thank you for sharing and providing motivation to others. It means so much when you feel as if you are the only person in the world drowning. Have a wonderful weekend! And again, thank you.