Part I: The Race<\/p>\n
I can honestly say, this is the first time I\u2019ve ever written a blog post hooked to an IV.\u00a0 But I\u2019ll get to that later.<\/p>\n
On Saturday, I ran the Berryman Marathon.\u00a0 Back in January a couple friends had enticed me into signing up since they were doing the 50 miler.\u00a0 Coming off of Arizona, I didn\u2019t feel like doing much.\u00a0 And while my usual motto is, when given the choice, choose the longer option, I didn\u2019t think I should push it so I opted for the marathon.\u00a0 (That just sounds silly now)<\/p>\n
On Friday night, after I closed up shop with James in Town and Country, I hopped in the car and drove to Potosi, a rural community on the edge of Mark Twain National Forrest, where they have a Super 8.\u00a0 I checked into my room and was in bed eating pie by 10pm.\u00a0 I had everything laid out and ready to go.<\/p>\n
At 6:15 I rolled out of bed and began race prep. I dressed in my running gear and went down the hall to the ice machine so I could fill the bladder of my hydration vest.\u00a0 I grabbed my bottles of Scratch out of the mini fridge that I had mixed the night before and added them to the pockets of my vest, which was also stuffed with Huma gels and Gu.\u00a0 It was supposed to be humid, so I was going to be prepared.<\/p>\n
Eventually I took my stuff to the car and went back into the lobby to grab some breakfast.\u00a0 Or some coffee at the very least.\u00a0 I was greeted by a gal in running gear who asked if I was headed to Berryman too.\u00a0 I confirmed that I was.\u00a0 While I drank my coffee, we chatted about previous races and our thoughts for the day.\u00a0 She was hoping to finish between 4 and 5 hours.\u00a0 I was hoping to finish.\u00a0 While I was the more experienced of the two of us, I wasn\u2019t sure what to expect of this course and I knew that I hadn\u2019t properly trained for it.\u00a0 So I set the bar low and my goal for the day was to go out and have fun.<\/p>\n
By 7:30 I was in the car, driving the 25 minutes to the course.\u00a0 My race started at 8.\u00a0 The thing about trail races that is very different from the huge races downtown is that you don\u2019t have to get there an hour and a half early.\u00a0 At Berryman, like many others, you basically pull up, get out of your car, slap on your race bib and away you go.<\/p>\n
I saw several friends at the start.\u00a0 Rosie and John had already started the 50 mile at 6:30, but Rosie\u2019s husband Alex greeted me with a hug.\u00a0 I handed off my keys to Megan and Seth to put in the Fleet Feet truck for safe keeping.\u00a0 Then I gathered behind the starting line with some of the girls from the tri club and a few seconds later we were running.\u00a0 About 10 steps in I knew it was going to be a slow day.\u00a0 Not that I hadn\u2019t already figured that out from lack of training, but the humidity was at about 99%.\u00a0 It settled over us like a blanket.\u00a0 An oppressive wet blanket.\u00a0 It was making my legs feel like lead.\u00a0 It was then that I knew my body didn\u2019t have it that day, my mind was going to have to do most of the grunt work to get this race in the books.\u00a0 But it\u2019s not like I\u2019ve never had to brush that feeling aside, and so into the forest I ran.\u00a0 I stuck right behind Tara and Donna for the first 5 miles or so.\u00a0 We broke apart at the first aid station, which was good for me, because then instead of mindlessly staring at Tara\u2019s shoes, I started to take in the majesty of the forest.\u00a0 It really is an unbelievable trail.\u00a0 Tough, but beautiful.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m not really sure when it started raining, but it felt amazing!\u00a0 The cool water on my face felt refreshing and it made running seem easier.\u00a0 It also made the creeks rise, so where in the beginning I was able to jump from rock to rock to get across without getting wet, it wasn\u2019t long until I would just trudge right through, soaking my shoes and socks.\u00a0 There\u2019s something to be said about the thrill of returning to youthfulness, playing in streams, enjoying the woods, exploring and the satisfying crunch of gravel under your feet.\u00a0 This was the fun I had been seeking.\u00a0 Yes, I was going slower than usual and no I hadn\u2019t adequately trained for this race, but it was reminding me of what I loved to do.<\/p>\n
Just before the 14 mile aid station I caught up to Donna.\u00a0 She was walking, so I slowed to walk with her for a bit.\u00a0 Her stomach was off and she was having a rough day.\u00a0 Mine wasn\u2019t the stomach, but we probably could have started a club.\u00a0 We approached the aid station and when I was ready to take off, Donna waved me on.\u00a0 She was done.\u00a0 \u201cHave a good race,\u201d she hollered after me.\u00a0 \u201cThanks!\u201d I waved.\u00a0 And I heard someone from the aid station ask if she wanted a ride back in the truck.<\/p>\n
And then, I was alone in the woods again.\u00a0 The terrain was rough, so there were several times throughout the day that I turned an ankle so hard I felt it down to my toes and all the way up the lateral side of my calf.\u00a0 That would probably hurt, I thought to myself, if I hadn\u2019t taken that Aleve earlier.\u00a0 However, the Aleve was not only masking the ankle pain, it was also hiding the bigger, more serious issue.\u00a0 While making them worse at the same time.<\/p>\n
As the race went on the hills seemed tougher, I don\u2019t know if that was the course, my body, or the fact that the sloppy conditions were making it more challenging.\u00a0 I walked a lot of the uphills, I ran the down hills and the flats.\u00a0 As I cruised into the aid station around Mile 17, I saw Tara. I told her that Donna had gotten a ride back to the finish; she said she had a feeling that would happen.\u00a0 As we took off again, I vaguely heard one of the volunteers giving directions about when we get to the road the trail is only a little ways up.\u00a0 When we got to the only actual road we would encounter that day, there were 4 of us, Tara, me, a random guy and a random girl.\u00a0 We saw the arrow that appeared to point across the paved road directly at a gravel road, so down the gravel road we went.\u00a0 About half a mile down, a big white pickup truck pulled out and almost blocked us.\u00a0 The driver got out and said, \u201cThis here\u2019s a dead end.\u00a0 Whatchya\u2019ll doin\u2019 out here?\u201d\u00a0 We explained that we were looking for the Berryman trail.\u00a0 \u201cWell, ya won\u2019t find it down that way, that\u2019s just Joe Bob\u2019s farm.\u201d\u00a0 Good thing he intercepted us.\u00a0 He couldn\u2019t understand why in the world we were looking for a tiny little trail in the desolate weather we were experiencing, but he told us generally where we needed to go.\u00a0 He offered to drive us up there in his truck, but we politely declined.\u00a0 Nobody likes a cheater.\u00a0 But I can\u2019t honestly tell you that none of us thought about it for half a second.<\/p>\n
Usually around mile 17, 18, 19 of a marathon, your brain has to do a decent job of convincing your body to keep running.\u00a0 Even worse at that point of a race and you realize you\u2019re not even on the course.\u00a0 You\u2019re running to get back on course, I can assure you it\u2019s more than a little deflating.\u00a0 But, just as I said in that moment, what\u2019s a race without a story?\u00a0 We plugged along on that gravel road until we got back to the paved road, which we began to follow.\u00a0 And about 10 steps up, we came upon another spray painted arrow on the road.\u00a0 If only we had seen that sooner.\u00a0 Ah well, such is life.\u00a0 It wasn\u2019t long until we ducked back into the woods again.\u00a0 We trudged up a hill single file with the rain coming down. \u00a0Tara disappeared from my sight again shortly after that.\u00a0 And eventually so did everyone else.\u00a0 It\u2019s funny how that works, one minute you\u2019re in the midst of a crowd, the next minute you\u2019re in solitude with a bunch of trees.<\/p>\n
I continued my strategy of walk up, run down.\u00a0 There were times that I was literally running in a creek bed, slopping through mud puddles.\u00a0 It was amazing.<\/p>\n
A lot of the latter part of the race is a little blurry.\u00a0 Looking back on that now, understandably so.\u00a0 I don\u2019t recall ever feeling bad, other than tired.\u00a0 I remember a lot of telling myself to just keep putting one foot in front of the other.\u00a0 I even passed a few people in the last mile or two.\u00a0 And then, just as we were about to come out of the woods, there were Tara\u2019s shoes right in front of me again.\u00a0 Just like I don\u2019t\u00a0 I don\u2019t recall exactly when it started raining, I don\u2019t remember when it stopped either, but it wasn\u2019t raining when we came out of the woods and ran through the finish.\u00a0 Despite running completely different races on the same course, we\u2019d seen each other at the beginning, the middle and the end.\u00a0 Two races with times that were just seconds apart, and we spent most of the day not together.<\/p>\n
I was so glad it was done.\u00a0 And even more glad I had signed up for the marathon and not the 50 mile.<\/p>\n
Then there was a medal around my neck and I went to grab a bottle of water.\u00a0 There was a great spread of food, that I couldn\u2019t even think about enjoying until I changed into dry clothes.\u00a0 I glanced around looking for Alex, but saw no sign of him, so I wondered if Rosie had decided to call it a day after 1 loop.\u00a0 I couldn\u2019t fathom doing that a second time.<\/p>\n
I hiked up to my car, changed into my flip flops, made my recovery drink, took off my empty hydration pack and began stripping off soaking wet clothes. \u00a0Once I was dry and the Gu brew was gone, I started back towards the food.<\/p>\n
I joined the other runners in the pavilion, downed a big cheeseburger, lots of chips, some cookies and more water.\u00a0 I was tired, sore, but I felt good.\u00a0 The girl next to me noticed my tattoo and asked which Ironman I had done.\u00a0 I can\u2019t remember which one she said she had completed last fall, but we both agreed that we thought that one standalone trail marathon was harder than the marathon at the end of an Ironman.\u00a0 It took me 6 hours and 1 minute.\u00a0 Even in Arizona, I was solidly under 6, at about 5:20.\u00a0 It had been a tough day, one that I wasn\u2019t truly prepared for.\u00a0 But I\u2019d made it.\u00a0 And something I had thought about on that course was how often are we ever really prepared for the hard stuff?\u00a0 We aren\u2019t.\u00a0 There really isn\u2019t much we can do besides take things as they come and do the best we can under the circumstances.\u00a0 Ah, and wasn\u2019t that a prophetic thought\u2026<\/p>\n
Part II: The Aftermath<\/p>\n
On the drive home I wasn\u2019t in any hurry, so I plugged my address into my phone GPS and let it take me home by way of the back roads.\u00a0 Hilly, twisty, turny roads with tiny little churches, grand houses with big white fences and fields full of wildflowers.\u00a0 I enjoyed the ride home as much as the race, maybe more.\u00a0 And by then the sun was shining.<\/p>\n
I got home, unloaded the car, showered, and I was feeling pretty good about myself making 6:30 church.\u00a0 I grabbed a cup of coffee on the way in to keep me awake.\u00a0 As we stood to start singing, I felt it hit me.\u00a0 A wave of dizziness passed over me.\u00a0 I wanted \u00a0the singing to end, I was desperate to sit down.\u00a0 Finally we did.\u00a0 I was shifty, fidgety, unable to focus.\u00a0 I was so tired, but it wasn\u2019t an ordinary tiredness.\u00a0 I felt like I was going to pass out.\u00a0\u00a0 I fought to maintain through the service.\u00a0 I survived.\u00a0 Then I drove home, grabbed more water and curled up on the couch under a blanket with my jacket still on.\u00a0 I was shivering.\u00a0 My heart was racing.\u00a0 It occurred to me that I hadn\u2019t peed more than twice that whole day.\u00a0 Once in the morning before the race and once after the race.\u00a0 That\u2019s it.\u00a0 I recognized some of the signs of dehydration and I started getting worried.\u00a0 After talking to my mom, we agreed I should consider having someone take me to the ER.\u00a0 I called Vega, who lives just a couple miles away, but he was over in Illinois so he suggested I call Heather.\u00a0 I did and she came right over.<\/p>\n
I had turned on the movie Wild, which I\u2019d been wanting to see, because I knew it would hold my attention and keep me alert as well as anything.\u00a0 I kept refilling my water.<\/p>\n
When Heather arrived, I had already started feeling a little better, so we decided to sit tight and see how things went for a while.\u00a0 We hadn\u2019t seen each other so we caught up on each other\u2019s lives and the time passed quickly.\u00a0 Before too long I was going to the bathroom frequently and things seemed to be returning to normal.\u00a0 I sent Heather on home and I climbed into bed for the night.<\/p>\n
I woke up around 1am and stumbled clumsily with marathon fatigued muscles into the bathroom.\u00a0 When I returned to bed, I had a hard time going back to sleep.\u00a0 I tossed and turned a lot.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t feel right but I couldn\u2019t put my finger on it, so I chalked it up to post-marathon yuck.<\/p>\n
I finally got up around 8:30 the next morning.\u00a0 My muscles hurt more than they should have.\u00a0 True I hadn\u2019t trained very well, but this seemed like an excessively miserable state.<\/p>\n
I made my way to the kitchen and shoved a bag of lays potato chips in my face.\u00a0 Yes, for breakfast.\u00a0 Don\u2019t judge me.\u00a0 I knew I needed salt.\u00a0 I chased them with a bottle of lemon lime Gatorade Silas had taken one sip of and then left in the fridge.\u00a0 Typically I loathe lemon lime Gatorade, but on that particular morning it tasted like the nectar of the gods.\u00a0 Again, I should have suspected that something was awry.\u00a0 I downed an orange Gatorade and some other easily accessible items.\u00a0 I avoided coffee, because I feared the feeling of my heart racing the night before was due to the quantity of caffeine I had consumed.\u00a0 Pre-race coffee, caffeinated gels, cola at the aid stations, coffee at church.\u00a0 It was a lot even for me.\u00a0 I settled in on the couch to study for my Monday exam, this week testing on the Urinary system.\u00a0 Oh, the irony.<\/p>\n
As it closed in on 11 am, I got ready for work and headed out the door with enough time to stop for a burger on the way, I was craving one.\u00a0 I swung by 5 Guys and Fries, got stuck behind a whole baseball team and was shoving fries in my mouth as I drove the rest of the way to work.\u00a0 I pulled into the parking lot and in a cumbersome manner dragged myself and my supplies (food, water, Gatorade) into the store.<\/p>\n
We were slow for quite a while.\u00a0 I told Hannah about the race.\u00a0 I used the massage rollers.\u00a0 I wanted to lie down.\u00a0 I wandered aimlessly.\u00a0 Hannah was helping a customer with a Garmin when a guy came in for a shoe fitting.\u00a0 Hannah knew I was going to have a hard time getting up and down off the floor, so she had already offered to take fittings first, but she was helping someone, so I sucked it up and did what I was there to do.\u00a0 I did have to explain to my customer that I am not typically so inflexible that it takes me 5 minutes to get up off the floor.\u00a0 He was kind about it, he probably should have laughed, I\u2019m sure I looked absurd.\u00a0 After those 2 customers left, the entire store was empty.\u00a0 I was freezing, so I put on my jacket. Hannah and I were over talking to James and Ronette.\u00a0 I really wanted to just go to sleep on the couch on the SBR side.\u00a0 I went and stood halfway out the door.<\/p>\n
James looked at me quizzically, \u201cAre you cold?!\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m freezing.\u201d<\/p>\n
At this point, Hannah started insisting I go home.\u00a0 We were mostly through the day, the \u201crush\u201d was likely over and I was pretty much useless to anyone.\u00a0 So, I followed Hannah\u2019s orders and I went home.\u00a0 The drive was one of those drives where you get to where you\u2019re going and you\u2019re like, huh, how did I get here?<\/p>\n
I went in the house and resumed my position on the couch under the blanket, jacket still on.\u00a0 When B showed up about an hour later with my requested can of soup, I hadn\u2019t moved and I probably looked like death.\u00a0 I had quickly escalated back to worse than I had felt the previous evening.\u00a0 I don\u2019t recall that I said much for the next hour as I dozed on the couch.\u00a0 He asked a couple different times if I wanted my soup, but my appetite had become a thing of the past.<\/p>\n
He sat down on the couch at my feet.\u00a0 I finally looked at him and said, \u201cI don\u2019t think I can fix this myself.\u201d<\/p>\n
B asked, \u201cAre you ready to go to the hospital?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, I\u2019m done suffering.\u201d<\/p>\n
We gathered my purse, a blanket, my phone charger, things I would need in case we had to be there a few hours.\u00a0 I wasn\u2019t planning on days.\u00a0 I figured we\u2019d go to the ER, they\u2019d give me a bag of IV fluid, maybe a prescription for an antibiotic and send me on my way.<\/p>\n
B dropped me at the emergency door and then went to park, I was already in Triage when he came in.\u00a0 I told the nurse my symptoms, she drew some blood and started an IV and put me back in the waiting room for a bit.\u00a0 I was glad I had brought my blanket.\u00a0 I was shivering again.\u00a0 B went and asked the nurse for another blanket for me.\u00a0 A nurse told him she would bring one over.\u00a0 The longer I waited, the more I shook.\u00a0 I was freezing, I actually had a fever of almost 103. Eventually, B went back to the nurse and got a blanket that felt fresh out of the dryer.\u00a0 It was heaven.\u00a0 But with the shaking, came the nausea.\u00a0 So then B had to go ask for something for me to puke in, just in case.\u00a0 If you\u2019re wondering, I never did. Finally after the longest hour ever, they took me back to a room and not too long after the doctor came in.\u00a0 \u201cYou know your body well,\u201d he said.\u00a0 Turns out I was severely dehydrated, with a kidney infection to boot.\u00a0 They planned to give me a couple more bags of fluid and some antibiotics.\u00a0 That right there was enough to confirm the decision to come in.\u00a0 They needed to run more tests, so they took more blood.\u00a0 And then I was admitted.\u00a0 More confirmation I had done the right thing coming to the hospital.<\/p>\n
I got to my room just after midnight.\u00a0 I was exhausted.\u00a0 It took a while for that to change.\u00a0 My temp would ebb and flow, waves of nausea mixed with episodes of violent shivering, vitals every 4 hours, midnight round of antibiotics and shots in the belly, 5am blood draw for labs, one day would flow into the next with the hope of going home tomorrow.\u00a0 I started feeling like the little boy who cried wolf.<\/p>\n
My diagnosis was Pyelonephritis.\u00a0 What are the odds that I know exactly what this is because there was likely a question about it on the exam I missed Monday.\u00a0 My kidney infection allowed the infection to be sent out from my kidney into my body through my blood.\u00a0 Had I ignored my symptoms longer, I might not have lived to tell the tale.\u00a0 Scary, but true. \u00a0The good news is RRG rambles on.\u00a0 However, I may not be running much for a while.\u00a0 But that\u2019s ok.\u00a0 I\u2019ve got a lot to focus on.\u00a0 And after 4, almost 5, days in the hospital, I\u2019ve got some catching up to do.<\/p>\n
Something Rosie texted me the other day was, \u201cTake care of you.\u00a0 Remember: your face mask first.\u201d She\u2019s right.\u00a0 I know everyone calls me supermom, but what good am I to my kids, or anyone else, if I don\u2019t take care of myself?\u00a0 This was a good reality check that while I know I am capable of pushing through the pain, there are times that I probably shouldn’t.<\/p>\n
So apparently, the moral of the story is, I\u2019m not superhuman.\u00a0 Huh. Who knew? \u00a0\ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n
As for Berryman, we’re on for a rematch.\u00a0 Someday.\u00a0 When I don’t have a potentially life threatening infection.\u00a0 As for this weekend, be certain I won’t be traveling too far from the couch.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Part I: The Race I can honestly say, this is the first time I\u2019ve ever written a blog post hooked to an IV.\u00a0 But I\u2019ll get to that later. On Saturday, I ran the Berryman Marathon.\u00a0 Back in January a couple friends had enticed me into signing up since they were doing the 50 miler.\u00a0 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"aside","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[9,10,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-720","post","type-post","status-publish","format-aside","hentry","category-lessonsfromrunning","category-memorablerunningmoments","category-randomthoughts","post_format-post-format-aside"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/s4eO4v-berryman","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/720","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=720"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/720\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":722,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/720\/revisions\/722"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=720"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=720"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=720"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}