Thursday, February 5, 2009

Toil and Trouble

Some of you may know that I have a defective stomach. I mean, that's not medically sound at all, and since I've never actually been to a doctor about the various stomach problems I have, I'm not entirely sure what goes on in there. All I know for sure is that it ain't right. I highly doubt that most people with functional GI systems stock up on nausea medication on a regular basis and tend to go through bottles of Pepto bismol at the rate most people go through a quart of milk!

I kid, I kid. Slightly. My stomach has problems. I need to see a doctor. It has prevented me from running for the past two days. I've had to limit my food intake to BRAT-diet type foods (bananas, rice, applesauce, toast, tea--innocuous, bland, low fiber foods). Anything else I eat makes me unhappy.

Life has been a bit out of order since I decided to not run the National marathon. I really appreciated reading your training ideas and tips. I think I am partially going through a period of adjustment to not having anything to train for, partially still adjusting to my work schedule, and partially just getting a bit depressed from the other partials in my life (see first and second items). The result is that last week I made it to the gym once, and the week before I don't think I made it at all. I've been once this week, and would really like to run tomorrow, Saturday, and Sunday. I just don't feel like myself anymore these days. I feel so bad about how inconsistent I have been with everything, and feeling this bad just makes it harder for me to get back into a rhythm. I tend to end up thinking, "If I can't run 25-30 miles this week then I shouldn't bother running at all." Productive, right? Because that's when I end up letting the week go by without a single trip to the gym.

What I am going to try instead is to just get up and move for 20-30 minutes a day, whether it is going for a run, lifting weights, or just going for a walk. I just need some sort of movement to pull me out of this slump and get me moving again. My guess is that, most of the time, this 20-30 minutes will turn into 45-60. If it doesn't, though, that's alright.

Who knows? Maybe the stomach problems will go away when I start feeling better about other stuff. One can but hope.

5 comments:

SueWho said...

I think your plan to just move for 25-30 minutes a day is a great start. You are right - it will turn into 45-60 minutes eventually, maybe sooner rather than later. You just need to jumpstart your active-self back into gear and this is a good way to do it.
Also, even though you are not currently training for anything, I hope to see you at a couple of 5Ks this spring and summer =)

jlou said...

I have a defective stomach too (and I have a clinic-sized Pepto supply in my purse to prove it)! Without knowing the gory details of your particular problem (or going into mine), I will just say that fiber helps mine tremendously. 6 capsules of Metamucil a day and I'm nearly human. That being said, I see you're avoiding the fiber and probably with good reason, but if you've never tried beefing up your fiber intake it might be worth a go. I find it helps me with any number of stomach-related unpleasantries.

Rachel said...

I think that the moving 25-30 min is a great plan! I have been doing this lately to try to get more motivated.

The Alien said...

Sometiems we go through so much trouble creating excuses for not running, and even spend more time worrying about how bad the next workout is going to be than what the workout would have actually taken us... I know it's happened to me (more often that I would like to admint!!), and the best way to get rid of it all is to just go out and do it. Forget about all the excuses, just go out and have fun. Because you know that once you start running it's going to feel great, and all the things that were making you worry just go away.

And forget about 25 miles weeks, it's not like you're training for a marathon right now, just go out and start running for whatever time it feels right for you that day. It's fun, you know you love it and you will feel great afterward!! So have fun running tomorrow, no excuses :p

Irish Cream said...

Yuck . . . I feel you on the tummy trouble, Em. It's the worst! But I definitely think that just moving for 20-30 minutes a day is an awesome way to jumpstart things. I think most of the time, just getting out there is the hardest part, and once you do that, you'll be good to go. Hang in there!! :)