I planned to have an actual blog post for you today, but it’s Finals week for me and after work and finals… I don’t really have much brain power left. However, I did just get the race photos from the 10k I ran over the weekend (blog post here) and holy crackers did I have a pretty ridiculous photo.
Wanna see?
I have no idea how I got that much air in mile 4 or 5… but I look awfully happy, don’t I?!
Or maybe just crazy. Because I totally registered for another 10k in 6 weeks…
No matter how many times I say I’m going to actually prepare for a race… I don’t. Whether it be my first 5k after popping a baby out of my hooha (find it here) or my first 10k ever (here’s that post) I always register with the best of intentions, and then do literally nothing to prepare.
Well, I did it again.
I got all registration happy in January and registered for the Sole of the City 10k. I figured, I had PLENTY of time to do a bunch of warm-up runs. And then, months went by and I ran ONCE. Yeah, that’s right… I banged out a whole 2 ½ miles in the middle of March and was pretty darn proud of myself.
I kind of ignored the fact that I’d signed up to run 6 ½ miles. And that worked pretty well for me, until the weekend before the race. That was the do or die time of ‘should I go on a practice run or just sit on the couch so I don’t hurt myself before the run?’ Wanna guess which I chose?
Yup, couch potato.
In the days leading up to the race, I started feeling a little nervous. I wasn’t sure if my 40-year-old body could deal with the shock of running 6 ½ miles. So, I ignored it some more.
Then, the day of the race came. When in doubt, wear a cute running skirt…
I’m not going to say it was a perfect race… because it wasn’t. Around mile 2 I felt kind of pukey with some acid reflux, which thankfully worked itself out within a half-mile or so. And I was certainly slower than I wanted to be. BUT. I did it.
Here is my friend Lindsey and I after the race:
And here is the most Baltimore photo in all the land:
That’s a ton of Natty Boh boxes, in case you are trying to figure out what you are looking at…
After the race, I used the Physique 57 Massage Roller from my Spring FabFitFun box and I really do feel like it helped my calves not feel so ouchy. My knees hurt later that day, but nothing that some extra strength Tylenol couldn’t handle. On Sunday I was sore, but honestly didn’t feel that bad. I remember feeling much worse after the Bay Bridge 10k in the fall.
So, rack up another win for my ‘no preparation’ races. Guess I should find another one to register for soon…
If you’ve been following along on the blog, you’ll know that I found out in early-September that my cholesterol was crazy-high. Like, OHMYGOD high. So, my doctor put me on a low dose of medication and had me meet with a nutritionist to figure out a diet to help lower it back down the normal zone.
I followed that diet pretty faithfully for September, October, November and December and was actually looking forward to getting my follow up blood test on December 20th to show that I had finally gotten everything under control.
Except, I had NOT gotten everything under control.
When I got my results back the following week, my cholesterol had actually gone up higher. I was crushed.
I had followed the diet so well and only had a couple servings of red meat over that last month. I felt like I had been depriving myself of food I enjoy for so long…but it was worth it, because it was making me better.
So when I found out that it wasn’t helping, I fell off the wagon a bit.
I didn’t go out and devour 30 steaks and gorge myself on fried food, but I did have way more than my share of cookies. I ate my feelings away. And then, ate some more.
I felt pretty terrible. Not only that I had failed at getting my cholesterol under control, but then I followed that up with failing on my special diet.
I finally had a chance to talk with my doctor a couple weeks later to put together another plan of attack. I had done some reading and found that losing weight could positively affect cholesterol. In the course of following the nutritionist’s diet, I’ve lost about 7 – 8 pounds since September. My goal is to lose 10 more pounds over the next few months, in the hopes that it helps my cholesterol lower down a bit.
I’ve recommitted myself to the healthy diet (with only a couple servings of red meat a month), but I’m also keeping an eye on the sugar I ingest. And cutting back on treats. And adding regular workouts.
I’ll go back to the doctor for (yet another) blood workup in 3 months. So, after a bit of a setback I’m working towards yet another goal of getting this damn cholesterol under control.