Slackitude

Mothering has really wrecked my triathlon mojo. This, in itself, is not terribly interesting or surprising. Nobody can push their body to shed fat, build endurance, and work faster when they can't tell you if they're going to get 2 or 4 or 6 hours of sleep at night. But what surprises me is how I feel about it. I'm conflicted. Part of me wants to sag into a heap and wear my pajamas all day and snuggle my baby when she sleeps and play with her when she's awake and eat doughnuts and pizza until I'm back in all the pants I just donated to Goodwill. Part of me wants to bootstrap myself up and get back to my bike riding and jogging and swimming and not use this little interlude as an excuse to wreck my season.

Zoe is brand new, she's barely six weeks old right now, and is in NOTHING approximating a routine when it comes to sleep. Some nights, she nods off with me at midnight and sleeps 4 hours at a stretch until morning. Other nights, she just looks at me and cries every time she approaches a horizontal orientation until she finally surrenders around 4 AM.

As of now, the only exercise I can solidly count on having the energy for is a walk, and not a very long walk at that. So that's what I'm doing. And God bless my coach for sticking with me through it and continuing to encourage me to do what I can, when I can, and keeping me accountable when I miss the mark. Every little bit counts, right?

Every time I think my end of the deal is the short one, though, I remember how rough it is for my nieces to even be able to take that walk. They have Mitochondrial Disease and it makes having energy for even basic things like digestion difficult. So, in their honor, I'm going to be taking part (along with the whole family) in a walkathon in February called the "Energy for Life" walk in Houston. If you have a spare nickel, this cause is a good one and the funds will go to researching the causes and potential treatments and cures for a disease that often takes children's lives before they make their teen years. If you can, please do go make a donation. Every little bit counts.

Updates edition

Can I tell you people how much I just don't want to write these days? I had insomnia last night, and in lieu of coming back to the office and jotting this post down, I decided I would count sheep. I did set myself a limit... if I got to 600 sheep, I'd come in and write. Like magic, I dropped off in the mid-500s. That's my insomnia coping mechanism: I set myself to counting sheep and set a limit, if I reach the limit I get up and do something not fun. Usually, that's the dishes, or folding laundry, or cleaning out the fridge, or rearranging the pantry. Last night, I used writing. I don't know why I'm so resistant to keeping up with writing just now, but I am.

I don't feel like I have much to say, and that makes inspiration damned difficult to find. Life is really, really good right now, but it's quiet. I've been working out, I've been keeping busy with organizations I'm part of, plans I've made with friends, and reading escapist fantasy novels because I'm off the junk food I used to put in my body. But none of it is very thought-provoking, or if it is, the thoughts are so primordial that I'm not ready to write about them yet. Think of my brain as raw banana bread batter and you've just about got it right.

Speaking of banana bread, let me tell you how much I laughed at something that happened with Rose over the weekend. She was looking up a recipe for banana bread in the Mrs. Veteran's Vittles cookbook. This awesome cookbook was something my Granny Tootsie worked on when she and my Papa Dell were heavily involved in the VFW. Consequently, it reads a lot like a family scrapbook, with fully 1/3 the recipes entered by my mom, or my Aunt Becca, or my Big Mama Dolly, or my Granny Tootsie, or someone else whose table I ate at plenty when I was still catching fireflies and keeping them in jars by my bed at night. And it is a thorough cookbook with desserts, drinks, entrees, veggies, breads, appetizers, salads, and even a section of Mr. Veteran's Vittles with recipes for stuff like baked beans and barbecue. And Rose announced to me, after perusing it, that she couldn't find the Banana Bread recipe and she felt ripped off by Mrs. Veteran. "How could any decent 50s housewife NOT have a banana bread recipe in her cookbook?" she ranted. I was confused about all this, because I could've sworn I'd looked up the banana bread recipes IN THAT VERY BOOK early in the week when it started to look as though we wouldn't be able to finish all the bananas before the fruit flies set up immigration lines down the chimney. It turned out, after about 5 or 10 minutes of head-scratching, index-consulting, perusal of other cookbooks, and general stomping around the kitchen that those Mrs. Veterans had had the audacity and gall to stick the banana bread recipes (all 3 of them!) in the Bread section of the cookbook, instead of the Dessert section where Rose was looking. And I don't know if that's as funny to any of the rest of you as it is to me, but I figure if something says "bread" in the name of the recipe, you look it up in the bread section. I know it's more like cake, given that it comes from batter and is sweet and you don't exactly make sandwiches from it or use yeast to make it. I get all that, but still... it's called Banana BREAD.

Newsily, I did quite well in my last triathlon. It was the same one I had to drop out of when I had an asthma attack during the swim the year before. I came in third in my division this time around, so that was a real vindication. The lesson here, kids, is that inhaled drugs are not ALL bad for you. If your pulmonologist tells you to suck down aerosolized steroids twice a day, well, your pulmonologist is probably on to something. I'm finally at ease, mostly, about taking asthma meds all the time. At any rate, they seem to work and I'm not one to argue with results. This triathlon had the distinction of being the first one ever to leave me with sore muscles. Usually, my ability to participate in these endurance events is sharply limited by my ability to exchange oxygen for carbon dioxide. I just can't breathe well enough to really PUSH for any length of time, so I finish races pleasantly exhausted but not feeling as though I've worked my muscles much. This time around, I was able to work hard enough to come home with a pair of sore legs. It's probably baffling to the average user human that I'm happy to be sore, but it represents progress in my cardio fitness and my battle with my lungs, so I embrace every sore muscle fiber and celebrate this for the milestone it is.

Finally, I have to crow about how very proud I am of Rose. She just started riding a bicycle this spring. Her first couple of rounds, she couldn't go 4 miles. But gradually, her fitness improved, her confidence improved, her bike skills improved, and now she goes out and rides by herself. This weekend, she took on her first long distance ride, a 30-mile route that was a fundraiser for the Make-A-Wish foundation. We both have a soft spot for this group since they granted my niece a wish this year. She not only made the entire ride at an average pace somewhere near her usual training speed, she was a real cheerleader and shepherd for other riders who needed help, inspiration, water, and sometimes a kick in the seat. She talked people into going one more rest stop down the road before giving it up. She escorted an 11-year old who was out on the 30-mile route alone with no water. She convinced folks who were waiting for the van to ride to the finish line with her. I just can't say enough good things about her and about how significant this is for her. She's awesome, and I'm not just saying that because I'm married to her. She did a Good Thing, both physically and socially this weekend, and I'm not surprised, but I am amazed.

Run, Thalassa, Run!

When last we left our intrepid Amazonian/wannabe triathlete, she was assuring you that it's not emphysema, it's just asthma, and that she was taking on a very non-intimidating triathlon at the end of her upcoming training class. And then she went away and never updated again. I'm one of those "no news is good news" types, it seems.

Yeah, sorry 'bout that. It drives me crazy when people do that to me. The intervening months have been really good to me, but full of mini events, none of which were big enough to blog about. Or, none of which inspired even slightly readable blog posts. I hate reading those "then I said this, and she said that, and then I had lemon chicken for dinner and watched Mythbusters. see you tomorrow" posts, so I don't write them.

So, to recap, that first round of meds the pulmonologist gave me helped ... a little bit. I always had to bail out of workouts a little early, or go a little easier than everyone else. But I was doing 90% of what my classmates were doing, and that beat hell out of the 60% I was doing before the pulmonologist.

Best news? I did that mini-sprint triathlon that I mentioned, and I finished the whole thing without crashing into the brick wall of asphyxiation! About two weeks later, I went down to Austin and did another short tri with my sister. The tri itself was pretty awful for me. I spent most of the run on the verge of an asthma attack; teetering on the edge of asphyxiation is only slightly more fun than crashing headlong into it.

Rose and our friend Bea and my sister and her friend Leah all met up and we did the tri together. I'm sure our soccer-mom-mobile looked like a clown car as we unloaded all five of our Amazon selves. When it was all over and we got back to our hotel, we were a good 2 hours later than we expected to be. I am nothing if I am not running late, however, the delay meant we were an hour late for lunch with my dad for Father's Day! So, with a haste that mocked our race performances, the five of us checked back into our room, each of us showered, dressed, primped and packed, and we were back out in our cars just 25 minutes later. It was a feat of logistics the likes of which have not been seen since at least the last Superbowl Halftime Show.

Since then, I've been back for another round with my pulmonologist. This time he didn't send me for any scary tests, he just gave me a couple of new meds to try, and it's been working AMAZINGLY well. I can now breathe like Mr. T can talk smack. It's epic Opening of the Alveoli up in here.

I did another tri just days after going on the new drugs, before they'd really had time to build up to efficacious levels. But that was my best one yet, and it was also the longest. I didn't spend ANY time on the verge of an asthma attack that day and I turned in personal bests in all three events!

And now, in the updatery department, I'm training for another tri. This is the same one that kicked my ass last year. But I'm confident I'll be able to tackle it this year and do well. How am I so confident? When we did our fitness test in the swim at the beginning of the class, I e-mailed my time to my coach so he could record it for comparison at the end of the class. He's the same coach I had for the previous two classes, so he's seen me struggle with this from the start. He wrote me back and asked if I'd been doping. Yup, it looks like this crazy concept of taking medication to treat your chronic illness is working for me. Why I had to be so stubborn about doing it in the first place is anyone's guess.

Relax, it's just Asthma...

I finally got my followup from the pulmonologist, and then I promptly left town and started running at a pace too frantic for blogging. (Metaphorically, alas!) So, I apologize for leaving you all on that cliff where I thought I had emphysema, or something.

I have exercise-induced asthma, and that is all. I don't have "regular" asthma, at least not when I'm on my preventive inhaler. There is this lab test they do that's intended to test that. And the description sounds worse than it is: they give you an inhaled irritant and then wait to see if you blow up. Sound like fun? Yeah, I kinda had myself worked into a tizzy over it, honestly. Because asphyxiation, even if it's only partial asphyxiation, is about as far from fun as you can get without crossing over into near-death experiences. Perhaps because it feels so very much like a near-death experience.

Anyway, the test wasn't bad. It's called a methacholine challenge, for those of you who may ever find yourselves facing it. And they don't actually try to trigger an asthma attack with their inhaled irritant. They take careful measurements of your lung capacity throughout, and if you start reacting to the irritant, they give you a rescue inhaler and stop the test immediately. Also, if you find yourself doing this test? Take a book. There are stretches of 2-5 minutes where you just have to sit there and wait, and your technician has stuff to do while that's happening, so they may be unable to chat with you.

So, with that said, I'm taking another triathlon class this spring. It starts tomorrow. At 6 AM!!! The triathlon I'm taking on at the end of the class is a lot shorter than the one I tried last time. In fact, the swim is about half the distance I made before my asthma attack during my first attempt at a tri. I figured that wouldn't be much of a challenge, but it would also not be very intimidating. I want to have a good experience with this one, and if it goes well, I'll try taking on longer sprints later in the season.

Sunny Sacramento

Open letter to my pants:

O, jeans, you know how much I love you. You're my comfy, faded, hemworn best friends. You keep my legs warm in cold movie theaters, you protect me from the freezer cases at the grocery store, whose frosty fingers seek to molest my shins. With you, I never have to shave! Who are we kidding? I wouldn't shave anyway, but you protect the sensitive eyes of the easily offended from the sight of my leg hair. You fit me whether I'm retaining water or not, whether I've eaten dessert or not, whether I've swum that extra lap or not.

Therefore, it is with heavy heart that I put you on notice. And, pants, sit up and pay attention here, because you ARE on notice of probation.

I am wounded. I have a pulled muscle in my thigh. It hurts a heckuvalot. In order to protect and heal that injury, I have to keep an elastic bandage wrapped about my upper leg.

Your persistent, jealous stalking of the aforementioned elastic bandage is making it uncomfortable. In fact, it has gone to pieces -- totally unraveled -- three times today, to say nothing of yesterday! It's losing its grip! Due to the added social pressure of walking and clinging at the same time, it has taken to falling apart in extremely public places like airports and hotel lobbies.

This is simply unacceptable. I do NOT want to look like the girl who couldn't get the tile comet off her shoe before leaving the ladies' room. I further do not want to look like an escaped zombie who managed to steal some awesomely comfy pants off an improbably tall woman, but forgot to tuck in my bandages before shambling off to the airport.

So, please, dear blue jeans, for the love of all that is fashionable, will you leave the Ace bandage alone and let it do its job? I swear I will call you my Ace jeans for the rest of your existence and love you more than all other pants if you will only do me this one, teeny, tiny little favor.

Luvyameanit,
Thal

Pooped

I just started a new exercise routine. Actually, it's more like I just started a lifestyle revolution. I guess if a revolution fails to take hold, it goes down in history books as a revolt, huh? We'll see how this goes. I'm holding out hope for revolution, but that won't be clear for a while yet. I'm revolting against the steady increase in the size of my butt. I've gone up two pants sizes since I started this job three years ago. At this rate, long before I would be eligible to retire, I will not be able to do my job because I won't be able to travel by commercial airliner. I'm not about a number on the scale, and I'm not dieting myself dangerously thin, I'm just trying to get my body back to the proportions it has when I'm being active and mindful of my diet. Lately, I've been doing neither of those things.

Anyway, I'm taking a triathlon training class. And "class" makes it kinda sound like we sit around with clipboards and learn how to train for triathlons. But it's more like hiring a personal trainer with 9 strangers and all agreeing that you'll work out together for the next 2 months. Some of these strangers are FAST, y'all! I'm the pokey little puppy at the back of the class. One of my very dear friends is also in the class, and she and I together comprise "Group 2" in most of the workouts. All the skinny fast kids who've done this before are "Group 1."

So far, though, I haven't had a single asthma attack. My coach gave me a great piece of advice tonight, and I think it's going to make this my favorite sport of all time, ever: Any problem you encounter in a workout or a race can be solved by slowing down. So, if anything ever goes awry, like my lungs seize up and I start sounding like a hurdy-gurdy, I just slow down. Even stop for a minute. I won't ever be the fastest girl on the course that way, but frankly, that's never been my goal. I just want to finish one of these things. I want to be able to work out without having an asthma attack every fucking time. So far, at least, this "slow down to fix your problems" sport sounds like the sort of thing that will accommodate my goal.

I might never be good at this, but if it can keep me from having to upsize my pants again, and I'm having fun, I don't even care. Viva la revolucion!