Fatigue, Stress & More Miles

The 2017 USATF-NE Iron Runner jacket. I like it, although it makes Vermont look so lonely.

Omg. So I'm having a hard time even wrapping my head around this week. Seemed like SO much bullshit went on. Ran out of oil one day before the scheduled delivery while I was at work for my 24 so Bryan had to take care of keeping the house warm for John until we could get oil the next day. It wouldn't have been so bad if things were going well between us all, but I honestly felt like I was going through my divorce all over again. Things between John and Bryan came to a head, and I was caught in the middle looking like the bad guy to Bryan. Neither of them wanted to be with the other, and I was watching John deal with his dad knowing full well what he's dealing with since I lived with it for 16 years. Bryan was losing his shit. It was like he lost control over John and couldn't take it. John actually said that he hated his dad. His dad said, in front of me, that he didn't want to be around John either...except maybe once a week, like a normal parent. (Ummm. That's not normal parenting.) This was said after he barged into my house to start a "talking at me" session. I was seriously seeing the Bryan during our divorce. The one who was acting out after losing control of his family.

When John told me that he no longer wanted to be with his dad, I had one option for him...full-time school. This was something that Bryan had not previously supported unless it was something that John wanted to do. Well, John chose full-time school. I think Bryan was both relieved and hurt. Things didn't end there. It was over a week of turmoil, crazy messages to me, John being dropped off at the house while I was at work and left there for hours because they didn't want to be around each other. Communication with Bryan became difficult. I was at the point where I was definitely going to contact a lawyer to get the ball rolling on full custody. I was stressed. I couldn't sleep well, and when I did, I was having dreams of paranoia. And then I would wake up with no idea where I was; was it work, home or Hawaii? Haha. It was crazy. My running shit the bed all week. I felt pretty overwhelmed with it, and it continued into the following week. I finally said things to him that I had been holding off on, like how he doesn't provide a home for John, but instead lives off of his ex-wife. I think that was the one that sunk in because 2 weeks later, he has now calmed down a bit. He decided to pay for John's school. He stepped up and paid for John's skiing and John's 3-day school trip to Sturbridge and Providence. Although, he won't get involved personally with the school, he seems to be owning up to his share of John's expenses. And now he wants more time with John than our parenting schedule currently allows him with John in school, so that's good that he now DOES want to be with John more. However, I won't budge unless he gives me a full weekend day, but he says he wants to trade my Thursday evening for a morning or afternoon on the weekend. so that's a no-go. One FULL day or the parenting plan stays the same. Sooooo...it's staying the same.

All of this makes Bryan sound like a horrible person, but he's really not. He loves John, but he just doesn't know how to be nice or handle a pre-teen boy. He has major anger issues, anxiety and PTSD (15 months in Iraq with the Army). It's who he is, and it's just been exacerbated over time. I feel like John needs other influences in his life besides just us, and The Community School is a perfect fit. John needs more, and I've been pushing for it, but it had to be John's decision, and it was. For now, Bryan, seems to be accepting it and acting more at ease. Maybe it's the free time he's getting to be out hiking with Chill. I don't know, but I'm hoping that this Bryan stays because the other one was just mean, overly emotional and irrational. He is making a huge effort right now (two weeks from when this blog post takes place haha), so I give him credit for stepping up to the plate and realizing he has financial obligations to his son. He even got a phone! As in one with cell service. So maybe things are looking up. Let's just hope he can repair his relationship with John, as well.

So it's been a whirlwind, and that long-winded crap I just wrote is only touching the surface. The stress of this didn't help my already fatigued body out much. I really started to feel my lack of recovery from the 50K and had some pretty terrible runs towards the end of the week. Instead of slowing down, I ran more because I had that stupid mileage number in my head. 60 miles! To most, that's not even high, but with my life, that's about as high as I get with mileage. After my terrible run Friday, I should have backed off for the rest of the week, but I didn't, and I think I'm still feeling it now. But, hey! I got 60.5 miles in and 5,105ft of elevation gain, which is something I've been lacking. I had two races on my schedule, but I scratched both for a no-race weekend. It was a good choice, even though I didn't talk to a single person other than John the entire weekend other than the woman checking me out at the grocery store. It was still nice. Down time with John. No traveling. Just some xc skiing.

Monday, January 15, 2018- I did not want to get up early to run, so I didn't, but I vowed to fix the damn treadmill at work so I could run there. Fortunately, one of my coworkers had every Allen wrench known to man in his truck, and I found a match! A few turns to tighten the belt was all it needed, and voila! A non-slipping treadmill. Unfortunately, I can't fix the screen that showed the time and mileage. Because it's a walking treadmill, I have always run on it at max speed, so all of my past data shows only max speed which is about 7:23 per mile. So now, if I want to know the mileage, I have to run it at max speed all the time. Haha. So today I ran 6 miles in 44:20.

Got in the Sandy Morris Ab Challenge later on and attempted to deal with the empty oil tank and Bryan at the same time. $160 extra to come out that night was not happening so Bryan and John got the wood stove going which made the house warmer than the oil heat anyway. Still ended up being a nightmare dealing with Bryan, but I couldn't do much about it from work.

Tuesday, January 16, 2018- I had planned about 13 miles down Ossipee Lake Rd with the loop around Pequawket Trail, but I was kind of stressed over getting the oil taken care of and just decided to cut it short to 10 instead. This was the first run this week when I noticed that feel did not match up to actual pace. It felt faster than it was by a lot. This should have been my first indication that I hadn't recovered properly from the race. But instead, I was disappointed. It's not like it was horrible. 10 miles in 1:16:05. 7:35 avg pace. But for my norm on that road, it is usually faster, and the key was that it FELT faster.

Anyway, got back to the base, changed clothes and made some phone calls about the oil. I felt so relieved when it was straightened out. I was told it wouldn't be until Thursday for oil, but that was fine since I picked up a bag of pellets for the pellet stove and walked in to the wood stove cranking. It was really nice. However, an hour later, the oil guy showed up to put oil in the tank. Haha. But... of course! A set back! He couldn't restart the furnace. It was clogged and needed a technician. Grrrr. Haha. So it wasn't until  Wednesday for that. Oh well. Just kept the wood and pellet stoves going. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to pay for a full tank of oil, so it's going to run out any day now (the gauge is broken on the tank, so I never know the oil level until it runs out haha). Hoping it won't be a fiasco again, though.

Hell yes, it was warm in there.

I had to run errands which is a usual Tuesday thing, and then John and I took a fun walk around Redstone Quarry after. I've always been creeped out by the big abandoned house, but John talked me into going in there this time. We only walked a little over a mile with Phoenix, but it was a good time.

I'm standing in the latrine. Haha.

Illuminati

I got in another Zuzka Light Upper Body and Abs workout that night. Crazy how quickly my pull-up strength has been diminished by only doing minimal pull-ups the last two months, but it's coming back quickly.

Wednesday, January 17, 2018- I got myself up for a decent 5 mile treadmill run before work. This actually went well. 35:40. 7:08 avg pace. I wonder if the treadmill might be fucking up the feel of pace since I've been on it so much. I don't know. I do know that wearing a watch did fuck it up since I used to only run by feel, and I notice that now I'm less consistent in my pace since I listen less to my body and pay more attention to my watch. Not that I'm going to stop wearing it, but it's a thought I just had.

My regular partner called out so I was stuck with my "supervisor" for 24 hours. I had never actually worked with him as a partner...and I never want to again. That was the most painful shift of my life. Haha. Just wow. He never stopped talking. He can't drive. And everyone is dying...even from knee pain. Seriously painful. I hope that never happens again. Haha. If it does, I'm going to bring a sign that says, "CALM THE FUCK DOWN!" that I can hold up in front of his face when necessary. It was seriously the most excruciating 24 hour shift I've ever worked...and that's saying something. Haha.

Thursday, January 18, 2018- Woke up to a beautiful day. Not too cold. This was the morning that Bryan came into the house to talk at me. When I got home from work, John was asleep still, but Bryan called and woke him up. John walked into into the kitchen as pale as a ghost and said he was sick. He went into the bathroom where he gagged a few times but never threw up. I was really worried. He didn't look good at all. He got up and went into his room to pack a bag. I had to ask him something so I walked in the room and found him wobbling and dizzy. He looked so bad. Out of mom habit, I ran over and picked him up before he fell over, and he let me carry him to the couch where I laid him down. I grabbed him some water and a cookie. Haha. I texted Bryan that John was really sick and to let him know that I had to leave soon for a dentist appointment so that he could stay there for awhile if they needed to. Bryan took it as me asking something of him and burst in the house yelling at me. Ugh. Funny how much better I am at dealing with this now. So anyway, after my trip down my marriage's memory lane, I left for the dentist. About an hour later, John asked if he could go home to stay since he and Bryan didn't want to be around each other anymore. I was annoyed since I would be gone for over 4 hours, but I said it was fine. Ugh.

Had no desire to run on the pavement so I brought my snowshoes along for a run on Hurricane Mt Rd. We had gotten 2-3in of fresh powder snow on Wednesday which was nice to run on. Unfortunately, people had stomped the hell out of the road with bare boots prior to this, and the 2-3in of snow didn't really mask it at all for the first part of the run until I hit the snowmobile trail on the road past the top of the land. It was slow going, but I didn't care. To me this is just a fun run without a care in the world about my pace. I love snowshoe running on this road. I rarely see anyone other than a few snowmobilers. Today, I saw no one since the trails were not in great shape with the thin snowcover, and there was a blow down across the road making it impassable to the Black Mt Trail.

Wore my Dion 120s.

I ran the 4 miles to the other end of the road in Chatham then turned around. I debated the entire run back up the mountain taking a detour up to the summit of Black Cap. I usually talk myself out of stuff like this, but I didn't even hesitate to veer left onto the untouched trail. That was nice for a bit, but after awhile I was hitting roots, rocks and ice under the snow. I didn't care, though, so I kept going to the summit. Such a good choice. So pretty.

Post-run shoes

I ended up with 10.4 miles which wouldn't seem so tiring, but I was out there a LONG time. Strava has moving time at 2:16:33 and total time at 2:35:15. 2,774ft of gain. I was so beat after that. I had no food or water that entire time which I'm sure didn't help. Haha. It was probably a big factor in the fatigue I felt the rest of the week. No proper recovery from the long race, lack of sleep and now this. I was destroying myself. No wonder the head cold was STILL lingering, too. Haha.

She was so happy to see me when I got home.

 I stopped at the store and then Starbucks for my free reward drink then went home where John was. I was happy he was feeling better. I, on the other hand, was junk. I was a sloth the rest of the day and night until right before bed when I felt like doing the Ab Challenge. Haha.

Friday, January 14, 2018- Since John was with me, I told Bryan I would take him to school. It's near the Sandwich spring, and I needed to fill up my water jugs anyway. I also decided that I would do a long-ish run on 113A, as well, so it all worked out. Well, the plan worked out. I barely survived the run, but it still went as planned at least. Haha.

I dropped John off then drove up to the Brook Path trailhead. As I drove, I noticed the shoulders of the roads were a mess of ice and snow. Fortunately, this road is super quiet, so I figured I could just run in the actual road for most of it. I planned 15 miles out-and-back. The run started ok, even though I felt a little tired. As predicted, there were very few cars. In fact, I didn't have a single car come in my direction until I was 4 miles in. Haha. Unfortunately, at mile 3, I had very brief dizzy spell that quickly corrected itself so I carried on. I immediately found the hills felt much harder than usual, and I started to feel pretty awful. My pace was very far off of feel; I was shocked to see how slowly I was running since it didn't feel that way. I decided to turn around at the intersection with 113 just past the 7 mile mark. I was feeling drained, but not that bad until a mile later when I got really light-headed. I didn't feel good at all, but I had no choice but to keep going to get back to the car. It was a LONG 6 miles of yogging, and with this route, it sucked bad. By the time I got to the last two miles, I was struggling to just breathe normally. I finally had to stop and take a breather...and then another one. I have felt bad on runs before, but this is one of the worst in my life. I almost walked it in for the last two, but I just wanted it to end. 14 miles. 1:53:08. 8:04 avg pace. Hahaha. This was not the "course" for dying in the second half...

Anyway, shit happens. Bad runs happen. I know that I hadn't been eating much during the week, so that probably played a factor as well as the need to recover more. Plus, the day before was tough. Just not really a smart choice for the day.

Drove back down to the spring to fill my jugs then headed home. I showered and ate some food and then left a little early to pick up John at Cranmore so that I could stop by the post office on the way. For the second year in a row, I had to complain about my mailman not delivering my mail. 3 weeks went by without a bit of mail, and there were things I was expecting. I was nice about it to the people there. I asked them if they could find out why he does this since he's never said a word to me. I said that if it's something I can fix, I'd like to fix it; I just don't know what it is. So annoyed, though. And it's just not right. They found my 3 weeks worth of mail just sitting in a box in the back. One thing was paperwork that had to be signed and returned by the day before! Wtf. No note. No explanation. Just a total dick move for no fucking reason that I've NEVER been told about. But, guess who gets mail every day now? This girl! I guess I have to complain every winter in order to get my lazy ass mailman who probably gets paid double or more what I do with full benefits TO DO HIS JOB. I make $11/hr, and I do my fucking job. Just pisses me off. Omg. "It's so hard to put my hand outside my car window and open the mailbox." Waaaahhhhh! Haha.

Included in my mail was my 2017 Iron Runner jacket and this sweet gift from Beth Lazor-Smith. Her note was funny. She had to say it was from her because she thought I would freak out if it was anonymous. And she's right. It would have. Haha. Thank you so much again, Beth, for this ornament for Spot. Extremely thoughtful of you. :)

I picked up John at Cranmore after his first ski day with his school. He was SO happy. Had so much fun. Fridays are great. The first half of the day is stewardship, and this quarter his is volunteering at the animal shelter which he loved. I found a few photos of him on the school's FB page.

I love The Community School so much because John loves it, but unfortunately, it's in financial trouble. The upkeep of the building/school has been draining them. The director has forgone pay for the last two years in order to help keep the school open. Her kids go there so that's motivation enough to sacrifice. It's such a wonderful place, and I'll be so sad if it isn't able to continue for John. They are in dire need of some big donations, and I wish I had something to give but I just don't. They're currently trying to figure out a plan for the rest of this year. I hope they can make it work, but it's just not looking good. They need $38,000/month just to keep it up and running the rest of the school year. I'm sooooo sad about this. :(

Saturday, January 20, 2018- Slept in. Needed sleep badly. Had to run super easy this morning since I was so beat from the two previous days. Ran a loop from home into Conway village and back via Cranmore Shores. I totally forgot this run was less than 5 miles so I had to add on extra in the neighborhood at the end to make it 5 even. 39:40. 7:50 avg pace.

The weather was actually really nice, so I took John to Believe in Books again to xc ski. It's really the only groomed trails that are affordable for poor people, and we usually only see a random person here and there. And it's the only place I can really bring the dogs along, too, that isn't backcountry. John and I both enjoy groomed trails so this was fun. We got in 2.6 miles. Not as much as I would prefer, but I don't want John to start hating groomed xc skiing, too, so I only do just enough to where he enjoys it.

Goofball spit snow out of his mouth on purpose for the pic. Haha.

We did nothing else the rest of the evening but sit at home. I did get in an upper body and abs workout at least.

Sunday, January 21, 2018- I slept in again because I can't help myself when I don't have a good reason to get up. I was 9.5 miles shy of 60. Do I run 10 or not? That was the question. I decided to head out and play it by ear.

I'm SO sick of running from my house, but I remind myself of the time when I didn't have that option. Only mutiple 1 mile loops around my neighborhood. And before that, treadmill was the only option. So when I remember how fortunate I am to have an almost 12 year old who is very independent, I'm thankful for my boring-ass routes from home...kind of. The dirt roads were probably still a mess, so I decided to alter my Bald Hill/Kanc route to avoid the dirt road by Darby Field Inn. I ran an out-and-back on Bald Hill, cut through Thorn Hill and then ran a short out-and-back on the Kancamagus Hwy, back through Thorn Hill and then home. I ran past Kevin Tilton's twice and waved at the house. Haha. Finished with 10 miles in 1:18:36. 7:50 avg pace. 911ft of elevation gain. Yet another run where it felt faster than it was. Ugh. Am I just done? Should I give up? Just felt so defeated after this week.

Ran past my Dirty Girl Trail Race course

Even though it was really nice out, John chose ice skating at the Ham Arena over a hike. That was fine with me since we have free passes, and I love skating. Best thing I ever did was buy a pair of hockey skates. Now, I'm bumming that speed skating didn't exist where I lived as a kid. Haha. Our last visit didn't work out since John fell on his tailbone early on, but this time was super fun. We had a great time skating together. My only frustration was the moron parents who were letting their moron kids just cut in front of people and go in the wrong direction. Kids that will become morons like their parents. It wasn't super crowded at least so we were able to dodge the little shits. Haha. John called it quits after 45 minutes so I stayed out for another 15 minutes getting a speed workout in. No. No I don't really ever take it easy. The session was about to end so the ice had cleared a lot making it the perfect opportunity to get in some speedy loops on the ice. It was such a good workout that I was sore the next day. Haha.

After we were done, we were on our bench taking off our skates. These 5 young kids were horrifying me with the mess they were purposely making all over the floor and bench. It was just unbelievable. But it all made sense when the dad walked over  and said, "You guys made a mess!" But then proceeded to walk off without cleaning it up.

This was actually after it was partially cleaned up by the guy working there.

Popcorn was only $1 so I decided to get some. And proceeded to look like a hypocrite when I spilled it all! Hahaha. I couldn't believe it. But I made an effort to clean it up right away. Funny, though, that I was horrified then proceeded to do the same thing. In fairness to myself, I do have a deficiency in not spilling popcorn. Haha. We stayed for a little bit while the hockey games got underway, and I realized how thankful I was that John didn't really like hockey. To watch hockey games all weekend, every weekend in a freezing cold room would be awful to me. Haha. And it's just too much anyway. Fuck that. I'd rather skate for fun WITH my kid.

The rest of the night was just hanging out at home. On to another week. I hoped my running would be better, and I planned to cut the miles back to 50-ish, too. The stressful shit didn't end yet, but things were certainly getting better for John.

There couldn't really be a better song for the week than this one since it's basically like the last few years of my marriage to Bryan. Fucking misery. And it's a pretty awesome song in and of itself.