FAITH:
To get the church ready for 40 Weeks of Community, the worship service today was focused on the church's Celebrate Recovery program. In CR, people suffering from any kind of addictions or hurts come together to share with and support each other as they find healing in God's truth and love. I've never been, but it seems very similar to what I had at school with the Eating Concerns group.
Let me tell you, I left church today feeling like, "YES - that's what church should be." People from CR took turns sharing their testimonies, some of them with gut-wrenching stories about their very personal struggles, very real and honest accounts of how different problems led them to seek comfort or security in worldly, but natural things that we can all identify with. They talked about how that did not fill them and only left them going down a spiral until they realized that they needed help and found healing through CR. We all struggle with stuff, every one of us has something that burdens us and chains us down, and we want to keep it inside for fear of what people will think, of what that'll do to our image, but as long as we struggle with it on our own, with our own power, with worldly means, stuff usually gets worse. When we bring those things to the light, though, people can come and help us and support us, through prayer, counseling, and just comraderie - telling you that you don't have to go through it alone. It's like a fight - if you keep your issues under wraps, the Enemy has you all to himself, and he'll do all that he can to convince you to keep the problem hidden, so that he can wreak all kinds of havoc on your life and your faith. But get help, and not only do you get fellow believers to come and fight with you on your side, but you're allowing God to come fight with you, too, and the Enemy doesn't stand a chance. Those people who shared did something very counter what the world wants us to do - they boldly stood up and told people about how God was working to rescue them, and God was glorified BIG TIME.
FIT:
So the run... last week, I wimped out on the post-church run I had planned because after I left the building, it felt too cold and it was rainy - what a wimp, haha - never again. I was determined to today, injury-prone spots willing, since I haven't run outside in... 3 weeks! I miss being out in the daylight... can't say "sun," since it was raining. Any daylight is good, though. I think there may be something to Seasonal Affective Disorder (clever, whoever named it), so I try to take advantage of my only chance to see the sun on weekdays by eating/reading out in my car, rather than staying in my windowless building. So after church, I ate a Protein "and Greens" Bar (250 Cal, much of it from PB
Anyway, temps were "feels like" 34ish, so I started off with my Philly tech tee and a fleece on top, a visor to keep out the rain, soccer sox, and 3's w/ Stab. I chose the 3's because they are already stained... not "dirty" really because there's no dirt you could knock off of it, and I knew I'd be running through very deep puddles and mud (and so I wore them to church... nobody looks or cares - I like comfort and practicality).
So I went to the gate between the church p-lot and the high school, but the path was a 20-ft long clay/mud puddle maybe 8in deep, so I started to climb the fence. It took quite a bit of balance, and on the other side, it was a farther drop than on the church side, due to some erosion from the rain water. So on my jump down, my right hamstring got snagged by the chain link, and my mind just went back to the people who were sitting in their car watching. It stung, but when I rubbed my hand along it, there was no blood at the time.
So I started running, and everything felt pretty good. My inner calves had been sore during the service, but no biggie. There are quite a few deep puddles and rain drainage creeks to plod through, but that just made it epic. I listened to my iPod during the runs - new podcasts I'm trying out, since I've listened to probably 150 hours of Phedippidations and have caught up with all the shows that interested me. I like Dirt Dog's podcast - he's an ultrarunner, getting ready for a 100er - so cool. Anyway, it was pretty, just watching the rain come down all over the huge football/soccer fields, with the wooded area in the background. Just as I finished my second mile, total surprise... I LOOKED UP AND SAW A BILLY GOAT right next to me on the other side of a fence - no joke. He had a blue collar with a bell around his neck, and I just stared at him in shock for maybe 10s before I just started laughing at the randomness of it. I thought he was just a stray animal that left a farm or something, but it was actually a pent up area where the school must've been keeping 2 goats for some class. Never saw them before on my previous runs, and I definitely did not expect it. He probably thought I was coming to feed him, because on the rest of the loops, he stayed in his hut with his other friend, to stay out of the rain. Poor goats. They're my friends now.
So the run went on, with the rain shifting between periods of moderate rain, downpour, and total stops. Downpour is always the funnest, but all are nice. For miles 5 and 6, I finally started to develop some nagging spots, but since it was cold, I couldn't really feel them, and just the excitement of the run made me want to keep going. I love the part of the course that goes through the wooded trail. I don't like the steep downhills, though, since it adds pounding. The last couple loops around, things got pretty slippery, with the mud and the leaves, so I had to be very careful to not slip and fall flat on my back, but I made it. I stopped at 6 miles, when my legs felt banged up and tired enough to not feel safe doing another. It was a slow run due to the mud (even on flat ground, it's sometimes like you slip back a couple inches each time you toe off) and the puddles, but it was good practice for stabilizing muscles, and it was just FUN.
Afterwards, I had to walk back a ways onto the course to retrieve my fleece, which I ditched after 2 mi. It was wet, but I was all wet anyways. The fence scrape wasn't enough to draw blood, but it did kind of expose capillaries a bit, so that my shorts got stained, kind of, although it's hard to tell with the reddish mud splatters on it. Oh yeah - know what? There was another gate 25 ft to the right that I totally forgot about and didn't see, haha, so I took that way on the way back. Luckily, I had a big plastic sheet in my trunk, which I used to cover my seat for the drive home, to protect it from mud and water. I turned up the heat, since I was getting cold. Assessing the damage afterwards, things seem okay so far, hamstring included. I took a warm shower and refueled with milk, spaghetti with marinara and garlic, a carrot with hummus, and a banana.
Splits> 18:23 (mi 2), 9:17, 9:14, 9:07, 9:03... so I sped up as I went... that's good. The first loop was especially slow as I had to figure out where the trail turned (since sometimes multiple clearings look like trails) and how to manage large puddles (some hesitation at first, but eventually just plowed through, leaving my sox and shoes water-logged, adding the weight I had to carry, making the times even more understandable). Ave: 9:11/mi, including the points where I hesitated, and maybe even the goat staring.
I was somewhat surprised that things went okay today because yesterday, I bought a stepper to give me more flexibility with some of my exercises, and I did the workout CD that came with it. It was actually of a decent quality - from Gold's Gym. I did 2-legged squats, which I haven't done in forever - over a year, maybe 2 years, since my knees usually can't handle it. My left knee was crackling, but things seemed okay enough to go through with it. There was also a lot of upper body work, like planks and pushups - more hardcore stuff than I'm used to, so my arms are sore - it felt good running with sore arms today. I didn't run that day b/c my left achilles hurt to walk on in the morning, so yes, today was surprising.
The day before yesterday, a 60 min strength session> 275 crunches/side, 40/40 leg lifts, billy bands, PT elastic bands - 35/side, 35-25-20 quad dips, 25-20 pillow, 30 pushups w/ arm raises, 15 tridips, 30 superman, 2min 6in (record matched), 2:00 plank, 1 min side planks. I noticed that my quads and shin muscles were more defined than before, so maybe the tiredness and increased hunger from this week was a result of my body building up. I've gained about 4lb since the beginning of this year - only 3 weeks. Some of that is prob from regular bio fluctuations, but muscle mass is probably part of it. Yay quads, especially with those squats.
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