26.2 Miles

I completed the Cowtown Marathon yesterday in Ft. Worth. Running a marathon has been on my list of life goals for over 15 years, and I truly thought I would have to surrender that one. In the past ten years, I was diagnosed with (mild) scoliosis, degenerative disc disease, a disc rupture 8.5 years ago, and a bulging disc this past December. I severely injured the intrinsic muscles in my feet 4.5 years ago and couldn't stand up longer than about ten minutes at a time for over two years. (I couldn't even attend a birthday party without having to sit down.) Through physical therapy, my feet eventually got mostly better, though they still hurt a lot of the time. I remember crying about a year into the foot injury, believing that I would never be able to run a 5k, much less a marathon.

Even before the physical injuries/setbacks, I was never a strong runner to begin with. I was slow, and I hated every step.  But once my feet got to the point where I could return to normal function, I knew I had to at least try to train for a marathon. I put the feelers out to my friends, and Melanie Meliza (a friend from our old neighborhood) said she would train with me. She had a goal of running a marathon by 40, and she is 40, so it was now or never for her.

We started running together in October 2014. It was a slow and grueling process to build up to three miles (she was fine. I was not!), and we got to the point where we could do some combination of run/walking to loop the lake (9.2 miles) after a few months. We set our sights on the 2015 Dallas Marathon and were very diligent with our runs. When summer 2015 hit, we were miserable and decided to suspend our training until the fall, which meant we wouldn't be able to train up to the mileage needed for the Dallas Marathon. We adjusted the plan to prep for the 2016 Cowtown Marathon, and we went at it full steam ahead. It's hard to put into words the bonding that comes with a running partner. She became my encourager, my trainer, my therapist and my dear, dear friend.

One morning in early January I bent down to tie my shoes for a run, and felt my disc slip out of place.  I hobbled to the car and met Melanie to try to still do our training run, but I literally couldn't run a single step. I knew I was in trouble. My friend Lynn's husband is an orthopedic doctor, and he greased the wheels to get me in the next day to see the spine specialist in their practice (my former spine doc retired a couple of years ago) He ordered an MRI and told me that whether I could continue to train depended entirely on what the MRI showed. He warned me that there was a significant likelihood that I would have to give up the marathon. I waited an agonizing week to learn the results, and when he called, he said the MRI showed the disc was bulging but that it didn't appear to be pressing on any significant nerves, so while he preferred that I not run, he cleared me to proceed with a run/walk training and to run/walk the marathon. And cautioned me to stop at any sign of nerve issues (numbness in my feet or legs, pain radiating down my legs, etc.)

That was really tough, as I knew it meant I would not be able to run the race with Melanie. Her natural and trained pace is far faster than mine even when I'm healthy, so I knew I couldn't ask her to run/walk with me. (It's agonizing. It's generally a 3:1 run/walk ratio, which slows you down significantly). But I was elated to know that I could still make a go at completing the marathon. I had to sit out nearly 3 weeks of training the month before the race (and had to miss a 20-mile training run, which meant I had to sub out the 23-mile final training run for the 20-mile one I'd had to miss.)  I was stunned by how much I'd lost in terms of stamina and strength in just three weeks, and I was pretty worried when I discovered my right foot went numb on several runs (sorry Dr. Khalil). And I knew it was going to be absolutely brutal, but I was very determined to finish.

So onto race weekend. Melanie and I went to Ft. Worth on Saturday, and her friend Kenny flew in from D.C. to support her, so he joined us for our carb-loading dinner. We were too nervous to eat much, and we were a wreck of anxiety by the time we got back to the hotel that night. We laughed and worried and laughed and worried until about 10:15, when lights went out. Between how hot our room was, how noisy the street was, how VERY noisy our fellow (non-running) hotel patrons were, and how very nervous we were, we slept horribly. The last time I looked at my clock (which was still long before I fell asleep), it was 12:45 a.m. Our alarm was set for 5 a.m., and we had to be on the shuttle by 5:45. I woke up feeling like I hadn't even slept.

We got up on race morning, got dressed and headed out to the curb to wait for the shuttle.  It drove right by us! We decided to call a cab, but before a cab arrived, the shuttle realized its mistake and circled back around to get us. It was PACKED with anxious and excited runners. We were three-to-a-seat on a school bus in the dark with windows shut. Yowza. That was a long 20 minutes to the race. We got there and sat down by the elevators and tried to force down some breakfast. Then we got in the endless bathroom line, and by the time we were out, it was time to find our starting corrals. I was in a different corral than Melanie, so I had to say goodbye and mentally prepare to get going.

Finally it was time for my corral to start, and we were off! The first 5k was my fastest time in a long time, and I ran it straight without doing my prescribed run/walk. I realized I needed to work the plan or I risked breaking down, so starting in the 4th mile, I switched to my 3:1 run/walk ratio and held that through the first half of the race. My half time was about 2:45, which is a LOT better than I expected. In fact, I was only about 5-10 minutes behind Melanie, which I discovered when I saw her hubby, son and Kenny at 13. I began to wear down a bit after 13, and when I saw Larry, the kids, and my parents at 15, I cried with joy/relief to see them. They had made these awesome posters with balloons and brought me candy and water. I sat with them for a few minutes, and it was very hard to leave them to keep running. Zane held my hand and ran with me for a couple of minutes, and I cried the entire time.

I met up with them again at 16.5, and I was really starting to hurt, but again I was overjoyed to see them, and again it was hard to leave them.

Then I hit 17 miles. I've heard of runners "hitting the wall," and I thought I had experienced that in training runs. I'd hit points before were I was like, "this SUCKS, and I do not want to keep going." That was not a wall. The wall I hit at 17 was this absolute belief that I could not continue and that I would walk off the course. EVERYTHING hurt. I was dehydrated beyond belief I had tried to keep up with hydration through alternating powered and water, but I didn't realize that I was about 32 oz behind at that point. I had been running for 3:45 and hadn't peed yet. So I stopped and tried to make myself, and literally nothing. So then I began to panic in earnest, which made me light-headed. I sat down on the trail and sobbed, and then I cried even more because I was panicking about wasting fluid with tears! I texted a few friends, and they lifted me up with encouraging words, memes and prayers. I called Larry and begged him to meet me at mile 19 instead of mile 20 (the plan was for him to meet me at 20 and guide me to the finish.)  He couldn't get to me at 19 because it was deep in a park, and so I knew I had to make it to 20 on my own. I cried and walked most of the way from 17-20. I drank as much as I could, but I was out of food and BEYOND out of energy. My knees and feet were shredded, and I could feel all the places where blisters had popped, as they were sticking my feet to my socks.

When I saw Larry and the kids at 20, I was a wreck. I had to say goodbye to my parents and the kids, as my parents were taking Ryan to her soccer game. Part of my motivation to go fast was so that I could go watch her play, but it was clear by that point that I wouldn't finish in time to get to her game.

Larry
Larry gets his own section here. He was my ROCK. He didn't understand my desire to run a marathon in the first place, but he still supported me by being a solo-parent through many a weekend long-run and by listening to me gripe and complain about aches and pains and exhaustion for many months. He supported me in so many ways through the entire training period, but nothing could compare to what he did for me at the race. He was my sherpa (he carried my water and bananas), he was my entertainment (telling me funny stories to keep my mind off the agony), he was my encourager when I wanted to quit (telling me I could do it, to stay strong, to run when I can and to walk when I can't), he was my physical support (when my broken knees couldn't handle a downhill on their own, he would literally let me lean on him), he was my therapist (letting me cry), he was my communicator (keeping my friends informed of my progress when I was too tired to pull out my phone anymore) and he was my best friend in the world (always. and he didn't judge me when I had to duck behind bushes to pee, thanks to his truly stellar hydration efforts)  Even with him there, the last six miles were more grueling than I could have possibly imagined. Without him there, they would literally not have been possible.

We have had some hard times in our marriage--Zane's illnesses as a baby, stress over work, stress over soccer (yes, that's a thing), stress over life. And it's easy to kind of disconnect sometimes and think that even though I have him there, I am kind of going it alone through things that are hard.  When I saw him at 20 miles, I knew that he was the only person in the entire world who could get me to the finish line. And I realized I didn't just mean the race.

FINALLY. Finally. fine-uh-lee. It was time to head up the final hill and round the bend to the finish line straightaway. As we rounded the final turn to the finish line, the course volunteers made him get off the track, as only registered runners can enter the final chute and cross the finish line. I cried and asked them to let him come with me, but they were firm. So I finished the race looking back over my shoulder at him. I didn't want my medal until he could join me. But they wouldn't let him meet up with me until well after the finish line and after the finisher jacket/shirt tables. When I finally got to him again, I couldn't even express my gratitude to him, though I tried in a exhausted, incoherent way.

Good grief. I'm not a crier in general, but I can't even write this post without crying.

Anyway, the marathon is done. And I will never run another one. I'm sticking to the occasional 5k turkey trot from this point on.  But I learned so much about myself during this process. I am weaker than I realized, but I am also much stronger too. And I'm reminded of how much of my strength comes from Larry. When we are old and gray and sitting in our rocking chairs in our nursing home someday (when I am only mildly less continent than I was yesterday), I will still remember what he did for me yesterday. And I will probably still be wearing that damn medal around my neck.