What's worse than sleeping in a hotel room with your mom, your sister, your 1 year old niece, AND sharing a bed with your baby? Waking up at 5am to run a marathon the next morning!
6pm last night: We check into our hotel room and get settled with our Subway sandwiches.
8pm last night: Bedtime, or so you'd think. Trying to get two children (a 1 year old and an 18 month old) to sleep while 4 adults are trying to get to sleep is very challenging. The six of us crammed into two queen sized beds that were right next to each other, and we were all trying to get to sleep. Well, my child never sleeps in a bed with us, he's always in his crib. He always goes right to sleep in his crib. It's not the same for a bed. He was flopping around, playing with Brandon's hair, poking us in the eyes....it took us a long time to get to sleep.
11:37pm: I can't sleep because of nerves and also because my mom is snoring so loud right next to us. Brandon rolls over to me and says, "We've got to wake her up and tell her to turn over. I'll never be able to sleep with her snoring like that." Luckily, the snoring dies down a little bit and Brandon is able to go to sleep. I have to pee, so I get up.
12:37am: I'm still awake after the snoring and the peeing. I don't know what time I finally got to sleep, but by the time I do, Sebastian starts flopping around, kicking Brandon, and getting comfortable. But he never did wake up.
Well, the rest of the morning hours are restless between more of Mom's snoring, my niece waking up crying, my son kicking me, my husband taking up my half of the bed with his knees and feet, waking up to check the alarm clock, and dreams of the marathon.
4:45am: The alarm finally goes off. Brandon and I get up and get dressed and eat breakfast. And poop. You always have to have a good poop before a run. Well, it wasn't the best pooping I'd ever done. In fact I was still a bit nervous that I was going to have to stop mid-marathon for a poop break. Hallelujah I never did have to stop to poop. Prayers are answered!
5:45-6:45am: We wait in the car, in the rain, in the parking lot. We wanted to come early for a good parking spot, but we didn't want to be in the rain, so we just sat in the car. I wanted to pee before we went to the start line, but I detest port-a-potty's. I also didn't want to wait in line in the rain. What's the solution? Why, pee in the empty cup in the car, of course. This marks the first thing of the day that I did that I had never done before. I squatted in the back seat on the floor and peed in a cup. I didn't spill a drop though. Now, that's talent. Okay, not my proudest moment, but you do what you gotta do.
6:50 am: Race starts. Because of the rain, we were soaked before we'd even run the first mile. Nature of the beast, I guess.
Miles 1-17: Relatively easy running. Yeah, the rain and wind sucked, but we got used to it.
Oh yeah, mile 13: My right heel starts to hurt because of popping blisters. About mile 17 is when both heels start hurting and I glance back to see bleeding heels. Nice. Not the best feeling, but also not the worst.
Mile 17-23ish: I hit the 'wall' that marathoners hit around mile 20. I had negative thoughts floating all around my brain, and it was all I could do to keep going. We stopped for our first potty break, and that kind of threw me off too. I'm so glad that Brandon was strong and stayed with me the entire time. He really pulled me through this whole race.
Mile 23: Just when you think that you're nearing the finish line and that it'll be a pretty easy finish, you hit mile 23 and time feels like it's going in slow motion.
Mile 25: Just 1.2 miles left, yippee! People are holding signs. Spectators are telling you that you're almost there. My pace starts slowing down a little bit, and Brandon reaches out behind him. "Come on, Aim, you can do it." That sets me into an emotional upset. I literally start bawling. I don't really know why. At that moment, I wanted to quit. Brandon said that he could see the finish line, and I couldn't see it. I was pissed! I wanted to see it too. But, he grabbed my hand and we run together. Oh, so sweet!
4 hours 45 minutes after we start: We cross the finish line. I'm still emotionally unstable and I continue to bawl. Finally by the time they placed my finishers medal over my head, I've calmed down.
The soreness that my muscles were feeling was intense. My bleeding heels were aching. We make it back to the car and change into dry, clean clothes. It has never felt so good to wear dry clothes. The sad thing was that it took us about 10 minutes to change since neither of us could hardly move. We then go to McDonalds for our ritual after long run meal. Oh, so good!
There's the #2 thing that I did for the first time in my life on this day. Completed a marathon.
Alright, now for the third thing of the day that I had never done.
On the way home from Huntington Beach, we got stuck in traffic. Because I had consumed a lot of liquids during and after the race, I really had to pee. My only option lied in the diaper bag. I was going to have to pee in a diaper. Now, I could have peed in the cup again, but we had already thrown that away, so the diaper really was my only other option. So, yes, I did it. I peed in a diaper. Well, two actually. I had to pee a lot! I had never in my life peed in a diaper, other than when I was an infant. Once again, not one of my proudest moments, but what are you going to do?
So today, I sit here, sore muscles and heels, and I blog about the 3 things that I did on this day that I have never before done. Wow, it's been an exciting February 3rd. Happy Marathon Day!
2 comments:
I need to just tell you again how proud I am. You should see the tears that fell from MY eyes while I read this.
I would have cried too! I guess I did cry - just not during the marathon.
Too much information at times, and just enough at others. Again, way to go. I'll be in touch throughout my training. My biggest fear is injury. I just hear too many bones and joints pop and creak from time to time. So far so good.
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