Changes

So much has happened in the past month!  Dad did get listed with UNOS and his local transplant service. We've talked about insurance... One if those sticky stubborn areas and he will be making a change in October. His next big decision is "advance directives". Dad now knows the importance of these documents after talking to friends and watching switches at birth. That has made my job easier on this front, but I've also been asking him for the past 10 years to complete something like this so I would at least know what to do in that case. I know it's hard to think about but good to have. So he will complete this soon. I tried not to influence his decision about who to give that information to; it's most likely me. 

I've been working on getting an intermittent leave of absence. I had the one form filled out and I see cps has changed vendors for fmla's. So I have a new form that needs to be changed😏😏

I started running recently. I feel great when I start but my motivation is terrible. I got a friend for that and we are meeting every week. That's nice it holds us accountable and I've been sharing with my doctor. 

I'm going to Las Vegas in the next few weeks. Summer is quickly winding down.

Abby 

Motivation

Yesterday, my friend, MHD, and I met up to talk about some upcoming races that we're going to be involved in. We have both already signed up for the Chicago Marathon in October, but we thought we would need some practice as the marathon is about 7 months away. I already did my first 5K with a time of 48:50 and was happy that I finished in under an hour. MHD and I are going to run in another 5K in May. We'll see if her plans can be finalized for that race.

Today, I ran for 2.09 miles and had a pace of 14:22/mile which is pretty good for a beginner. I'm not looking to shave my time off just yet. I'm working on getting the endurance part right now. I ran for about 30 minutes continously. I haven't quite met this goal, but I'm really close. I'm walking about 2-3 minutes only during the run. So I'm running close to 27-28 minutes continously. I think I can be proud of that accomplishment. I found that watching the clock was harder for me. It's easier if I can just decide on a distance and run the distance with the short breaks in between. So, that's what I've been doing lately. Last week I ran 2 times with 1.05 miles each and this today I ran the 2.09.

In other news, I'm glad that I finally have the motivation to start running again. I'm glad that I just have motivation for things period. I think knowing that spring is just around the corner and the weather is in the 4o's and 50's makes it easier. Taking antidepressants makes things alot easier! From the two periods of depression that I've been through, this recent one was by far the most difficult one I've been through. I had never been in a situation where I couldn't get focused on anything, work related or life related. That was really frustrating for me. Then, as the medicine started working, I could begin to relax knowing that I would be able to get my work done, which had been piling up for the past 2-3 months.

Running for 4 minutes

Today was the first day that running for 4 minutes continuously did not bother me. I'm right in the middle of my training to get up to 30 minutes of consectutive running and today is really the first day that I thought I might make it! Tomorrow, I'm walk/running 3 minutes, and 5 minutes. That will be the first time that I will be hitting 5 minutes especially after having the 4 minutes run feel like nothing!

I'm not seeing much improvement in the weight department. But, I can see physical changes in my body and I always feel so energized after a run, even if I'm exhausted!

I signed up for two races. They are both 8k's which is close to 5 miles. I know that's a long time, but there weren't any races that I could sign up for that would be shorter than that coming up anytime soon. So, I decided to do the 8K even though I may not be physically ready for it, just to get an estimate on my time. Once I'm running at 30 minutes, I'm going to start working on the 8K training guide and begin working up to a half-marathon and marathon training program. I might be in the 8K training guide for a while. I'm thinking I'm going to sign up for either the 8K or half-marathon race in March for St. Louis.

Long Term Goal

So, I think I'm going to try running. I've thought about this for a while and listed it (run in a marathon, lose weight, etc) in my list of must do's before I die. Sometime before the school year ended, I had researched about half marathons and thought that I might want to train for several half marathons before I tried to run a full marathon. If, by next year, I see that I'm not ready, I'll continue doing 10K and half marathons in order to make sure that I'm ready to do a full marathon before October of the following year.

My long term goal is to run in the 8k Shamrock Shuffle at the end of March. 8k is approximately 4 miles (I looked it up). I've been researching some websites that offer beginning running programs and I'm going to start this weekend. My first week will consist of: a 10 minute walk, a 9 minute walk and a 1 minute run and getting to a 5 minute walk with a 1 minute run twice. If I make it through this week, I'm going to buy shoes. Or should I buy shoes first? I get paid next Friday, but want to start this running business soon. I'll see how my shoes hold up and if I'm uncomfortable or in pain, I'll buy some shoes. Now, if I'm not feeling up to increasing my runs the following week, I am free to continue the first week's program of 5 minute walk, 1 minute run twice for a few of those days. I just don't want to build up so fast that I'm really not able to keep up. So, first long term goal: run 4 miles for the Shamrock Shuffle by the end of March. (I'm not even worrying about how fast I'm going here, I just want to be able to do it).