With a little more than a month left until relay day – I am filled with delicious anticipation and also a little dread. Training is going horribly and I am starting to feel some pressure. I know all will be good as soon as I get the race adrenaline pumping through my veins, but I do hate being unprepared.
My husband and I started the no sugar no grain diet recently. I have what you may call a “CARB OBSESSION”, so I felt that saying no to sugars and grains would be a good step toward eating healthier. Left to my own devices, I will eat nothing but carbs. All. Day. Long.
Being on the diet hasn’t been too bad. The worst part has been missing sandwiches, candy, and the sluggishness. I am having a hard time pulling in energy while I’m running. It could be mental, but it may also be that it is so hard for me to consume enough calories throughout the day (read: I’m so sick of meat and cheese!!!).
I’m going to start trying a natural sugar boost before my runs to see if that helps me go longer than 2 miles at a time. I feel like I am slogging through a thick mud during every run. Maybe some natural sugars will help mandarin oranges, apples, grapes, carrots.
After a week on the diet, we had a “cheat day” that consisted of me stuffing four pieces of pizza into my face. The next morning the tendonitis/arthritis/whatever it is had flared up and my hip joint on the fritz again. I hadn’t run in the past two days so I knew it couldn’t be the running that had caused it. It had to have been something in the pizza… something like gluten.
I’m still not 100% sure what caused the flare up. All I know is that it usually takes a month to get the inflammation down enough for me to run on it again. I didn’t touch a complex carbohydrate for the next four days and after that, there was zero pain in my hip. Makes me think I’m on to something.
I looked up gluten intolerance on the internet. I don’t have any of the symptoms other than inflammation in my joints. I have been grasping at straws for the past two years to find out the cause of my hip pain. I’m hopeful that this is it. I can give up sandwiches and pizza if it means being able to run without pain.
Right after the hip fiasco, I went for a three miler with one of my best running friends. We went out at a slow pace but I just couldn’t keep myself together. I hate to say that we walked most of the way. Luckily it had nothing to do with my injury – just that I am so out of shape.
I am having a hard time finding gaps in my schedule right now to run. I’m in college full time this summer. I don’t know whose idea it was to cram 12 weeks of coursework into 8 weeks of classes, but I am pretty unhappy with them. The struggle between kids, (who are home for summer break and will not give their mom a break) housework, dinners, training, gardening, etc, etc, etc has left very little time for me to chill the heck out once in a while.
Regardless of all the stress, the diet, the schoolwork, and my surly children – I am so excited to run Hood to Coast again. The closer it gets the more pumped I am.
I am hosting my team the day before the relay for a BBQ and van decorating. I can’t wait to see the ones I know and to finally meet the ones I don’t. Relay buddies are forever.
