Week 6 Marathon Training Thoughts
I nearly didn’t write a blog this week, because there’s not much to write about with relation to actual running. But then I realised, that’s the whole point of doing this blog – the realities, ups and downs of training for something.
This week has been a definite down. If you read last week you’ll recall I mentioned I had a cold. Well as the week went on I thought I was getting a bit better. However, I got to Saturday and woke up with what a thought was a sinus infection, that quickly progressed that evening to a very chesty cough with a wheeze. After a pretty scary night of not being able to breathe well at all and constant use of my blue inhaler, I called 111 and was sent to the local hospital with my symptoms where I got told I had pneumonia with asthmatic response! Wonderful. I was sent home with a magic steroid and reliever inhaler that helped me to breathe again as well as antibiotics, and I have been off work and exercise since. As I am writing this I am on day 3 of time off work and I very rarely have any time off work for illness so this is when you know it’s necessary!
So obviously I have not been for a run this week. But I thought I’d write up my thoughts about the situation. The above picture was taken after a short walk to the post box yesterday to post my Christmas cards. This was my “run” for the week and it was plenty!
Sometimes your body forces you to rest if you don’t take it.
I had been feeling under the weather with a cough and coldy symptoms for 8 days before this struck me down. And although I had gone a little easier in training and not pushed quite as hard, I didn’t stop training. I also didn’t stop working. And my job is coaching – so very much people facing, giving out lots of energy to others, lots of movement, standing and spending time in a cold warehouse style gym. Not ideal if you’re already not feeling well. Plus, this year has been FULL ON and recent weeks have been very busy with not a lot of downtime. So maybe it’s just coincidence, or maybe my body’s immune system was run down and getting this illness has forced me to rest on purpose so that I stop for a little bit and reset. Maybe had I slowed down more when I first started feeling ill, perhaps I wouldn’t have gotten THIS ill, or maybe I would, I will never know, but it might be something I am mindful of in future, even if sometimes there’s not much we can do about it.
Physically resting is one thing, but mentally resting is hard!
My body knew it needed to stop, but my mind had other ideas. I said to someone yesterday that I think I've been a little bit in denial at how poorly I’ve been, and I think it’s because there have been things I have wanted or needed to do that I didn’t want to not do. When trying to sort cover with work, for some reason I was only thinking about 1 day I’d have off, whereas my boss (thankfully) sorted 3 days of cover. Which is a relief because I have needed it. I don’t like putting other people out who might have to work more to cover me, so my guilt set in pretty quickly. But then I started coughing and remembered there is no way I could be working.
On my first day off I found it hard to accept in my brain that I needed to sit on the sofa and watch a Christmas film, rather than doing something productive. Our lives are so fast paced and there is so much expectation on us to always be doing something or working towards something that it’s hard for us to stop and allow ourselves time to rest. I see so many things on Instagram about how other animals hibernate but humans don’t, about how it’s ok for cats and dogs to sleep during the day, but we don’t… etc. Animals know to listen to their needs but we ignore it. So I reminded myself of this and did a little compromise – I would watch the Christmas film and then allow myself to do something productive that was on my phone that didn’t involve me moving around or exerting energy. I have also let myself sleep anytime I needed it. Today I woke up at 8am. That’s about an hour later than my normal waking time. Instantly there was a pang of “oops”. But then I reminded myself that for 4 nights in a row I had extremely broken and minimal sleep due to coughing and not being able to breathe so it’s ok to have some extra now! I AM ALLOWED TO SLEEP! Plus, if you do try to do more much your body instantly reminds you that you’re ill - I changed the bedding this morning and I was so breathless afterwards and I have been coughing LOADS since. Definitely not ready to run yet!
“Argh! I’ve not been able to run properly for two weeks… I have no chance in the marathon now!”
This is an example of an irrational thought that being ill and unable to train has caused. This sentence can be changed to “argh I have not been able to run properly for two weeks. This is not ideal, but it can’t be changed. I still have a chance in the marathon, I just need to get better first and then get back to training and do what I can”. This is an example of changing an irrational thought to a rational one, and is a way of having some control over our thought processes. Being aware of irrational thoughts is important to try and prevent yourself spiralling, and being able to accept and change them to something more rational can help you deal with a situation.
Another way of looking at my situation is to take elements of mindfulness and a psychological approach called acceptance commitment therapy. Yes it’s rubbish that I’m poorly. Yes I am frustrated and a bit worried that I am behind in my marathon training, but that is ok. These feelings are a normal response to the situation and I am allowed to feel this way. I don’t need to be positive all the time. This is acceptance of how I feel, and I am doing so without judgement of myself. I would then make a commitment to what to do going forward. And that involves getting myself better properly, so that I can then reapply myself to training and try to get to where I would like to be. If I try to rush back too soon, I might hinder myself further.
So hopefully by my next blog I might have some better updates for you! Although my achilles still isn’t happy either but one problem at a time… ;) I am working on my rehab for that at least. I hope you have a great week of training and if you are also poorly and unable to run, I feel you! I am lucky I have had this cutie looking after me:
