I was feeling the heaviness of COVID-19 this morning . . .
My husband said, as he often does when I’m in a mood, “Go for a run, Sara.”
I followed with my usual responses, “I can’t. I’ll leak.” or “I don’t want to. It doesn’t feel good.”
I’ve been with my husband since 1999 (and married for almost 16 years). He can give some tough love – “So you’re just going to make excuses, huh?” and “You know how you get better at something? You just start doing it.”
His comments, especially when it comes to exercise (since that’s MY expertise) rile me up, so I said, “Fine, I’m going to go.”
“Oh and do my route,” he adds. Side note: Running is my husband’s jam. It’s one of the few things he does for himself, and though not super consistent, he has a 4 mile route that he does on a regular basis. He did his first marathon just a few weeks before baby #4 was born. So yes, he knows a little bit about running . . .
Feeling annoyed yet slightly motivated, I changed into my new Reebok running shoes, grabbed my air pods, and headed out to prove to him and myself that I could start working towards my goal of wanting to run again.
I casually walked the first 8 blocks, taking in the sunshine, and checking my phone. I quickly remembered the website MapMyRun that I used pre-kids when I used to run up and down the West Side Highway in NYC. Figuring they have an app now, I quickly downloaded it. I challenged myself to run 10 blocks to hit the half way point where I’d turn back and probably walk again. I put on the Dear Evan Hansen soundtrack and started to jog.
Yes, the first 5 blocks felt annoying, and I could feel my pelvic floor not holding up, but it got better quickly. Running on the balls of my feet helps a lot with keeping things a little less impact and better on my pelvic floor (Thank you years of barefoot training). At the 10 block mark I felt surprisingly good, walked for 2 blocks, and then started up jogging again. As my music built momentum, so did I and I eventually hit a run, and in the final blocks I even sprinted a little. I stopped and walked a few blocks from home, but when I realized that I actually still felt pretty good I jogged the rest of the way home.
I’m not going to lie – I’m pretty proud of myself. My goal this week is to fit in 2-3 more runs like this. I also plan to keep track of my running progress because I really do want to get better, and I feel like if I put this out there into the world I will get better.
So here’s my ideas for tracking my runs (Please let me know in the comments if you have additional suggestions:
Date: Saturday, May 2, 2020
Distance: 2.53 miles
Length of time: 33 minutes
Listened to: Dear Evan Hansen soundtrack
Feeling: Good not great (7 on a scale of 1-10)
Overall: Surprised at how far I went and how I felt
Due to COVID, we are only allowed to go outside for two hour and can manage to spare 10 minutes for running, is it sufficient ?