Running Into Joy

Last week, I got a heck of a cold. If you recall, I had a cold back in September when I ran the Great Race 10K, so I was not at all happy to wake up to a scratchy sore throat and congestion again. I can remember when I was in high school and college, how I would be the last woman standing even as various plagues swept through my classmates, taking them down one by one. Ah, the immune system of my youth. Taking a day off scares--taking an entire week off feels like tempting fate, like asking to be a quitter all over again. But the after effects of running the Great Race 10K with a cold were fresh on my mind, and I knew my immune system needed rest. So I took off Monday. And when Wednesday found me feeling worse instead of better, I took that off, too. Finally, Friday rolled around and I still could barely breathe, so I decided to make it a round week off. Something like this would have derailed me a few years ago, and I still don't fully trust myself. When I went to bed last nig...

Hello, internet people! Yesterday, we here in Pittsburgh got our first big snow of the season, which means the ground this morning was coated in little patches of ice. Being of the clumsy variety, I've fallen down enough times just trying to exist in the world, so I don't take chances when it comes to running outside in icy conditions. I love running outside, so the shift to the indoor months is always a bit of a struggle. I woke up this morning, check the temperature and took a peek outside, and almost immediately started trying to talk myself out of my morning run. "You can go after work," my brain said. I didn't want to go the extra mile of driving myself to Planet Fitness, didn't want the monotony of the treadmill. I almost gave in, but then I remembered--I'm 5 weeks into this training plan, and I promised I wouldn't quit on myself. I shrugged into gym clothes, grumbling in my head the whole time, and drove myself the exactly 5 minutes it tak...

Cue Crazy Ex-Girlfriend's "A Diagnosis." I've written a few times before about my chronic pain and the road to figuring out what I do and don't have. This week, I visited my neurologist for a long awaited follow-up appointment, the theme of which was basically "Okay, so we know I don't have multiple sclerosis or a brain tumor, so what now?" If you've never had a doctor show you pictures of your brain at 9am, let me just tell you I don't recommend it. Back in college when I took Neuroscience, I always used to get this weird, fuzzy feeling whenever I had to look at images of brains for too long. It always kind of freaked me out to think too hard about that little thing inside my head that was making me think all of my me thoughts. So staring in the face of not just pictures of any brain, but my very own brain, was something before which I would have preferred more coffee. Alas, it was not to be. The morning of my follow-up appointment, I ...

Happy November, friends. I've been working my butt off these last few weeks of October, as I've not only continued with the Run, Selfie, Repeat 5k training plan, but also participated in the Potterhead Running Club's all-out mileage extravangza, Quidditch. And now that November has come around, I've decided to set myself yet another challenge--I'm using the NaNoWriMo motivation to write 50,000 words of CNF this month. But this blog post isn't about the crazy writing and walking challenges I've set myself recently. It's about running. Or, as Kelly Roberts would say, maybe it's about "life with a side of running." The past couple weeks of training have honestly felt amazing. That's not to say there weren't runs where I struggled or days I had to really talk myself into going out the door. Of course there were. But the thing about not being able to run for so long is that I really appreciate the opportunity to get out there now...