“Diet and Exercise to reduce BMI”

I ate six Keebler elf cookies on the way to work this morning. It was THAT kind of morning, you know, when you find yourself absent-mindedly perusing the mail left on the table and come across some information from the doctor you saw last week for bronchitis. Remember that story? The hot, older, South African doctor who treated me kindly and prescribed an in-office breathing treatment for my acute bronchitis after taking a walk-in same-day appointment from a stranger who had never been seen in that clinic? Yeah, it was a letter of discharge notes from that visit, that rambled on about my acut sinusitis and bronchitis and the medicine he prescribed. And then, there it was, at the bottom of the list of treatment recommendations:

Diet and Exercise to reduce BMI= 30.1 (bolded added by me)

Nice.

A lovely little note from a doctor I’ve met once, with instructions written instead of verbally given (or even inquired about) with the general statement of “hey fatty, why don’t you eat less and get some activity to lose some weight.”

Awesome.

Way to ruin my perfectly good morning.

And it just got me to thinking about all things weight related. Now, I understand that I could stand to lose a few pounds, but what that insensitive line didn’t ask, or inquire about, was WHAT AM I DOING or WHAT HAVE I TRIED or ANYTHING about my current diet or weight situation. Because, he doesn’t fucking know me, so he wrote on a piece of paper that I need to change my eating habits and get some exercise.

I am annoyed and embarassed because it was handled so poorly. I actually wanted to cry, which is why I ate those cookies. But seriously, this issue has come up before and I want to talk about it.

Before Potamus was conceived, I had reached this ghastly weight of 230 lbs. Somewhere in my mind this had been the weight that I told myself “geez, if you ever reach 230 you need to put the pizza down and start figuring some shit out.” So I did. I lost nearly all of that weight in hopes of conceiving our child, which was done a few months later. I lost it slow and steady with a combination of eating low-fat options and walking, sporadically. As a woman who is over 6 feet tall, I figure that if I were 200 lbs I’d be okay with my weight, and if I were a solid 185 I’d be SMOKIN’ HOT.

The BMI says I should weigh 160, though, which is what I weighed as a adolescent volleyball/basketball player who worked out 3 hours a day for 9 months a year. I don’t think that will EVER happen again. Seriously.

But what this doctor’s passive aggressive note about diet-exercise didn’t take into account, the things that I am doing to lose weight and the struggle it has been to get the baby-weight off. I did Weight Watchers around the beginning of my maternity leave, and nothing happened. I have only lost 20-25 of the pounds that I gained during pregnancy.

DESPITE BREASTFEEDING.

It’s been 14 months people and the weight has not ‘dropped off’ like they promised. I guess I’m following in my mother-in-law’s footsteps, where the weight didn’t come off until after she weaned. I am committed to breastfeeding even if it doesn’t help me lose weight. And I have been eating healthy, eliminating dairy and watching portion control, and exercising (ala 5k training pre-bronchitis days). And I mostly avoid those cookies-in-the-car binges.

I don’t know what else to do. I am not about dieting, and I have been getting exercise. And someone who wants to judge me, like the doctor, without forming a relationship and asking what I have tried and trying to create a plan for change, is not helpful. At. All.

I know that I want to lose the weight, especially since we’re planning on trying for baby #2 in the near-ish future (another post for another day), I don’t want to balloon to an unmanageable weight.

Sigh.

 

Thoughts? Advice? Funny stories of junk-punching a-hole insensitive doctors? Anything?

Running with Bronchitis

I haven’t felt this shitty since I was in high school and first diagnosed with asthma (so THAT’s what was making my otherwise in-shape body puke after every warmup in volleyball). We had moved to Eastern Washington a few years before and so it was a surprise to find the beginning of 10th grade with asthmatic symptoms that continued through the rest of my short-lived high school sports days. I ended up hating to run, which I attribute to a combination of mean coaches who yelled (not my kind of motivation) and the inability to breathe. I was put on various inhalers and pills to manage my deteriorating lung capacity and limped through the rest of my teenage years with a wheeze and a shake.

Truthfully, I hated the medication. I never felt like it did anything to help and what I noticed was all of the shakiness and heart-racing that accompanies inhaling random chemicals into my lungs. When I started college I vowed to make a change, and went back to my interest in yoga and began working really diligently to use yogic breathing techniques to augment my asthmatic tendencies. After getting a job at the American Lung Association, as an asthma educator, I learned that despite a few years of not taking medication, my lung capacity was quite diminished. The doctors asked me why I didn’t take inhalers and I told them that I had gotten used to belly breathing and was quite pleased with the results, despite what my spirometry tests said.

It’s been over 10 years since I’ve had to consistently take inhalers, and only rarely in that time have I had to even use a “rescue” inhaler or even felt symptoms of my asthma. Granted, I never tried running. So I was pleased when I began this couch-5k journey and found that I could run, slowly, gaining strength and didn’t have any of my old asthma symptoms. Being out of breath was because of working hard, and my lungs didn’t seem tight or wheezy.

But then I got bronchitis, the day after my first 5k, and I haven’t been able to run since. I’m hopped up on inhalers and folding laundry makes me tired. I’m supposed to “run” a 5k this Sunday and am worried that the combination of bronchitis, not being able to train, and it being at 6 AM, that I’m going to have a negative experience that’s going to reinforce my old belief about running, which is, that I am not cut out for it.

I go back and forth. Truthfully I have enjoyed running these past few months. But I also acknowledge that I haven’t been running long enough to really miss it. Yesterday when I came home, let the dog out, raked some leaves and played with Potamus, I was pretty content and didn’t miss my Tuesday run. Maybe that’s because I’m feeling so crummy in the lung-department, though, so who knows.

Question runners: what prompts you to get back to running when you’ve taken, or been forced to take, a hiatus?

How I ended up cooking dinner naked…

My kid eating Triscuit minis off the floor should have been the first sign that the night wasn’t going to go as plan. No, wait, Grandma telling me that Potamus only took a 45 minute nap at church daycare  and didn’t eat much all day, was the first sign that the night wasn’t going to go as planned.

And then there was him playing in the recycling bin as I desperately tried to rustle up some food for this budding  picky eater connoisseur. Desperately steaming broccoli and defrosting blueberries, I shoved a pretzel roll in his grubby little hands and got him to calm down for two seconds to finish the prep process.

Meanwhile, I had started the chicken cooking for our dinner, and got all the pans and noodles out for that prep. His dinner was winding down when I got this awesomely bright idea to try and cut his hair while he was in the high chair. Because this blog isn’t old enough, you all didn’t witness my “I pulled a Britney before Britney” hair cutting experience of 2003, but needless to say, when the whim happens, the trim happens.

Dog clippers in hand, I begin buzzing away on my boy’s hair. He tolerates it for about 4 minutes until he gets a fistful of broccoli/hair casserole and promptly begins freaking out, crying, rubbing his eyes (which just gets hair in them) and generally being unhappy. With my chicken and sauce bubbling and noodles boiling I rush him back to the shower to get him cleaned off.

He had a poopy diaper.

I strip down in 3.4 seconds, run to turn down the boiling-over-pot of noodles, and jump in the shower with poop-bottom-boy who is crawling around the bathroom occupying himself with toys and generally smearing poop nuggets all over. I jump in the shower, get him all scrubbed off, and throw a towel around us while dashing (safely, in wet feet) down the hallway to the kitchen to stir the noodles and chicken. Standing there for a second to catch my breath, Potamus reaches his head down and begins nursing.

And that’s where the story begins, folks.

Stark naked. Baby nursing from my bare breast. Cooking chicken and noodles for dinner.

It was a scene from National Geographic if I ever saw one. Probably why those women keep there boobies bare, saves on laundry and lets you get some spaghetti cooked. Not that they cook spaghetti, but whatever. I manage to dash down the hallway, get him in his jammies, and make it back to finish up the final process of dinner making. Where he then proceeds to nurse from my other boob.

Seriously.

Realizing what a crazy ridiculous situation this was, I almost began laughing. But the noodles were done and I needed to stir it all together. Unlatching boy-wonder before he was fully finished caused a fit of toddler crying rage, despite my trying to distract him with a song and dance number (all still naked, btw). I go to cover the noodle dish with aluminum foil, to keep it warm, since Boof is running late, and the whole roll goes crashing to the floor and spreads out a good 4 feet of foil that I have to crumple roll back up. All with a crying baby.

About the time I would start to cry, I settle him down with an episode of The Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, and am able to get some underoos on this naked lady, and eat my dinner (probably without chewing, but whatevs).

Boof walks in the door, just as everything calms down and I am clothed, nobody is crying, and even the dog is behaving.

Yeah.

Thanks Universe.

The Signs are EVERYWHERE: why I might need to dial back my “screen-time”

Signs.

I used to be one of those people that would look for signs everywhere. I would think to myself, “hmm, should I do this or that,” and then I would wait for a sign to show up leading my in that direction. When I met Boof I learned that not the whole world worked that way (what? people don’t go to India because they had a dream? And then the next day there was a talk about India? And then you saw a sari in a shop?). I guess, other people in the world don’t go looking around for confirmation from the heavens or fortune cookies or the internet for advice on which way to steer their ship.

But I do.

I mean, I’ve tried to ignore it, but those little internal proddings toward a direction feel right and I usually stuff cotton in my ears. And then I put a pillow over my head. And then I should “lalalalala” really loudly to drown out the still small voice that says, “hmm, maybe you should or shouldn’t do this particular thing.”

So, for the past month I’ve been irritated with all things…media. I’m talking about the Queen Bee (Facebook) and the wannabee’s (Pinterest) and the allure of the minions (DVR and Netlifx). Because, I have turned into a media junky. Seriously. If you cut me open and found Facebook beating instead of my heart, I wouldn’t be surprised. I look at it ALL the time. Once I tried to “give it up” and found myself checking it 2 minutes later. I am the equivalent of the woman on TV happily smoking through her trach-hole.

But let’s be honest, my irritation with all-things media gets directed at Boof. I seethe on the couch (while facebooking), resenting him playing Angry Birds instead of chatting with our son. When he turns the TV on to some mindless channel to pass time I feel like thousands of nails are on the chalkboard. I mostly am feeling this irritation because it’s something that I don’t want to be doing anymore, but it is WAY easier to focus on what HE is doing/not doing. Because removing a plank from my own eye is rather heavy and time-consuming and that little itty bitty splinter over there just needs some tweezers…

I digress…

So of course I’m frittering away my time on Facebook when I should be grading the stack of essays, and come across THIS article, which is entitled The Unplugged Home, and chronicles a family who lives in a house with all things old fashioned, like rotary dial phones and manual (what are they even called?) clocks that don’t flash or blink. And they do things like:

grind their own flour for pancakes, then flip through a print edition of the  newspaper over a hot breakfast.

Whoa. I think that’s going a BIT far don’t you think? I mean, I would say that I felt pretty damn pleased with myself on Saturday when I vowed to not watch TV until Potamus was napping (11am) and baked myself some homemade banana bread from SCRATCH. But it certainly didn’t involve planting my own bananas and grinding the flour. Boof has been extra tolerant of my foray into “artisan vegan cheese” making from scratch for my dairy-free attempt, but he might start to wonder who I am if I am suddenly elbow deep in home-made pancake flour. I mean, seriously. Though, my yard does need a good clean for spring. I guess I could do that.

Trying to not get hung up on the extreme screen-free aspect of the article, I did contemplate what my life could be like without a TV (or if it’s turned off for more hours during the day). But then I also wondered if I would go batshit crazy. Because, most days I do enjoy spending time with my little love-bug, but I also enjoy a good foray into the adult-conversation realm and facebook is full of that. Right? And there are always adult things, like pictures of shoes, and homemade crafts, calling to me on Pinterest. Surely that is more exciting and adult than spending time actually making crafts…right?

So, about 56 seconds after I read the almost-but-not-quite-becoming Amish article (or so I’ve dubbed it), I went on my merry way…graded a few papers…checked Facebook…popped on WordPress to look at some blogs.

Gasp.

Another one.

Seriously Universe, you’re starting to be a LITTLE BIT ANNOYING. Because there I am, perusing my Reader and I’m struck upside the head with the article It’s time for me to go to rehab over on Keeping Up with the Holsby’s. Funny. She sorta puts what I had been thinking into words. Like when she says:

I can check every damned thing all the time wherever I am. Problem is, I do. On the toilet, in the supermarket queue.

In my car. At the lights.

Invariably, I’m not missing anything but I just like to be reassured of the fact

Can I get a hand-raise for those of us who check at the lights? Please? I need to know that we’re not the only ones. I alternate between putting on mascara (one eye at a time) at lights and checking Facebook. Because I might miss something important. Which is why when I am really tired or really drunk (shh, that’s never happened) I have a hard time going to bed because I DON’T WANT TO MISS A THING (cue cheesy Aerosmith right now).

Wait. It gets worse.

After leaving a fun little comment on aforementioned blog, I headed over to Huffington Post to get some distraction from the nagging signs swirling about. Intrigued by the title: Why My Son’s Perception Of Life At Home Surprised Me, I mindlessly clicked on the link. Too Much Screen Time was what it was actually entitled when I clicked through. Damn you Huffington Post for tricking me into thinking this was going to be some cute, fluffy story about weird dinner tastes or quotes by children. But it got me thinking….what does Potamus see?

I know that he crawls around the house with his old cell phone, pretending to jabber away in it. I know he notices when I’m checking my texts behind his back when we’re watching Mickey Mouse Clubhouse or he’s playing with a toy. My gut (and the signs) are telling me I should make some changes.

But…

Am I ready?

 

Breastfeeding a Toddler

Potamus is 14 months old, and I have crossed over into the extended breastfeeding camp, surpassing my original 12 month goal. While exhausted some nights, wishing Boof could take over for all of the parenting duties, I am mostly really pleased with still following the baby-led weaning philosophy. While we’ve been weaned during the day for many months now, I have noticed this super flexibility in our breastfeeding relationship that doesn’t feel like the urgent nurse-on-demand offering from when he was small and I was worried about it going okay, and the rigorous every two hours all night nursings that accompanied the back-to-work-forced-day-weaning that happened when he reverse cycled and refused a bottle.

This flexibility has become more of a relaxed state of mind in this stage of the journey. We were day-weaned, which is what I felt comfortable with as a mom of a year-old baby/toddler. Night nursing only would involve the two of us (plus Boof), and nobody would really need to be bothered by the nursing of an older child. It kept mama happy and baby happy. He’s finally learned the art of the sippy cup, but still only drinks water and prefers yogurt over milk.

But there have been some times lately, like with Potamus not feeling well, that I offer the breast to him. It’s after I get home from work, or when he wakes up from a nap, or on my days off, when I am trying to put him down for a nap. And he has even begun to ask for it in his own way (and by ask I mean, just help himself), like when we’re in the shower together. We’re happily playing with the foam bath shapes, sticking them to the wall and he looks over at me, surveys the goods, and then dives in to boobie #1. Squatting like a little frog-man, he fully nurses and then goes back to happily playing with his toys.

What I love is those little snuggle moments. Like after his nap, when he’s rested but still sad to come back to reality from dreamland, and nestles on up to me, tears still in his eyes, and gets a little comfort. Sometimes playing with toys works, sometimes listening to some really bad 90’s music works, and sometimes he just needs a little nursing snack (as we call it), to feel grounded.

We’ve settled into this easy baby-led weaning place, and I love it. My snuggly, wiggly, big baby still needs me, and I am happy to oblige.

Times I feel like a Badass Mama

There are days when I struggle, and then there are days when I wake up and make a blanket for with my kid.  And then, to feel increasingly more like a badass mama, I whipped up some homemade banana bread with the rotting fruit on my counter. I even decided to fore-go the walnuts, since Boof’s not a big fan (though, he’ll be lucky if there’s any bread left by the time he gets home from work).

My awesomeness might wear off this afternoon, since I’m having difficulty breathing (yay bronchitis), but so far Potamus is down for a nap and I’ve started a delightfully creepy Seattle-based crime shown on Netflix. Well, it’s not THAT good of a show, but I’m a sucker for all things local, and the appeal of streaming an entire season in one afternoon is pretty neat-o.

I’m not sure where my attitude adjustment really came from, but I read this quote on pinterest yesterday:

remember you are not managing an inconvenience, you are raising a human being. -kittie franz

I’ve got to admit. I sometimes think of motherhood as an inconvenience. I often want to just do my own thing, and raising a munchkin is pretty much the opposite of free-time. But when I take moments to not get so wrapped up in television/facebook/reading a novel/putting on makeup, I realize that this is actually pretty darn fun. AND my kid is pretty darn independent, to be honest, and I enjoy seeing him toodling around the house cooing to himself and trying new inventive ways of climbing into a cabinet or endlessly putting toys in his shoebox. And, how can you not love the sweet post-nap bed-head?

How to get an emergency doctor appointment without having to wait very long…

This advice is born from my fear of telephones. True story, in college I used to order Pizza Hut pizza ALL-THE-TIME (like, three times a week), but I hated calling on the telephone, so I would walk-in. I found the service to be MUCH better this way, and didn’t have to get over my telephone anxiety. While now I know that I CAN make phone-calls, I still tend to prefer online or in-person activity, which has come in handy when trying to get a doctor appointment.

Sometimes, doctor emergencies just CAN-NOT-WAIT. Like, yesterday, when I had been teaching and felt like dying, and walked in to a family medicine practice on my long lunch-break. Sounding like a cross between James Earl Jones and a sex-phone operator, I made a pretty sympathetic candidate, and I have found that (used sparingly), doctor offices are always able to accommodate a patient at the last minute if they are standing in their lobby looking like death and sounding like Darth Vader. Sure I could have called for an appointment at my regular family doctor, but she tends to get busy and I didn’t want to wait. I didn’t have anything to lose, so I chanced it, and it worked. The lovely middle-aged (ahem, handsome) South African doctor immediately prescribed me an inhaler and antibiotics for my bronchitis and gave me a nebulizer treatment in the office. Such service!

Last night Potamus was up every 45 minutes coughing, unable to catch a breath and then going in to full-on-banshee-baby-wailing. My normal inability to handle middle-of-the-night wakings of this sort went out the window. Full Mama-Bear mode was turned on. He slept on my bronchitis-wracked chest. All he wanted was mama. Poor Boof, he couldn’t console him at all. And once he fell into deep sleep, I laid next to him in our bed (he hasn’t done this since 10 months old, about) listening to his breath. Extremely concerned, I decided that I was going to pack him up first thing in the  morning and head out to get a doctor appointment. If not at our pediatrician’s office, at the urgent care clinic that just opened up down the street.

Our pediatrician office is small, 3 doctors, and they are always PACKED! But I got there 5 minutes before they opened, and stood there in the rain pathetically, bedraggled and clearly a sympathetic character. They were able to squeeze me in at 9:15 with one of the doctors. Success! I have found that not wearing full makeup, and certainly not having well-brushed hair is helpful, both for getting appointments for myself AND now for my child. While this office has squeezed us in before, in the afternoon, after calling, I had to wait over 1.5 hours in the lobby while they were seeing other patients. While this could have happened this morning, I have noticed a tendency toward more urgency when they hear the real predicament.

Now, once you know this information, it’s important to use it wisely. I only use it on a very rare occasion when it seems like there’s no other option. I always express my gratitude to the receptionist/booking nurse, because I’ve been on the receiving end of emergency requests and when someone expresses thanks it has always made me feel so much better. I also try to make the appointment as quick as possible. I sum up the symptoms in a very brisk 30 second recap, let them get down to business and make their decision so they can move on to the next, scheduled patient. Yesterday’s doctor appointment lasted 15 minutes since I took a breathing treatment, but I was with the doctor for probably 3, and same goes for today. These aren’t times to ask for special requests or for more information on things unrelated to the task at hand. In. Out. Done.

Potamus is now motoring around our floor, in seemingly good spirits. He has a sinus infection and a slight ear infection. He should be better soon, and  I am about to turn Mama-Bear mode off and take care of myself. Hopefully the two of us will take a sweet nap this afternoon, because I am freaking exhausted.

Oreos, goldfish crackers and suicidal thoughts

I am not in a good place. The past few days have been filled with little sleep and lots of coughing/hacking/wheezing. This cruddy cold has really taken a toll on me. Last night I slept from 8-10 and then was up until 3:30 AM coughing/throwing up mucous and contemplating death. There’s nothing scarier than being so full of pain from sickness that I begin to think of ways out of LIFE. It is irrational, and in the light of day the anger/fear/complete exhaustion with the current situation, is gone…but those hours that I laid in bed, coughing and thinking of all the ways I could off myself is scary. I know that Boof was lying right next to me, and I believe I would have woken him up if I had gone beyond thinking to action (like trying to take a bunch of sleeping pills), so I believe I was safe, but it is scary the depths of my mind.

I think I should refrain from watching news shows (such as the story of Mindy McCready’s suicide yesterday) before I go to bed. I think the emotions of news stories crawl inside me and get mixed up with my own feelings. I am worried that my sickness is going to be bronchitis because of my asthma, and am hopeful that I won’t have to begin using inhalers again. yogic breathing has controlled it for over 7 years, but this feels so crappy that I would welcome the shaky albuterol feeling.

Part of my exhaustion is due to a lack of nutrition in the past few days. Being sick has decreased my appetite for anything other than goldfish crackers and oreos. Which basically sums up the past week of eating, even before I was sick. Something happened in my quest toward dairy-free and veganish eating., and I can’t quite explain what. But my momentum toward trying new foods and packing healthy salad lunches with Israeli couscous and garbanzo beans and olives, went back to my old habits of simply eating snacks all day and letting my blood sugar get so low it crashes and I get crabby and can’t think through a simple task like picking something for dinner.

While I’ve maintained my mostly-dairy free diet, it isn’t with enthusiasm or even mindful awareness. And the choices of dairy or nothing has tended toward nothing, which has left me zombie-like. I can’t seem to regulate my emotions and begin to re-pick healthy choices that will leave me full of energy. What I’ve mostly eaten is oreos (vegan) and goldfish crackers (not). It is this strange metaphor of my life boiled down into two little snacks. I also realize that I make these choices as if I were 5 years old, and can’t seem to figure out how to make adult eating choices, let alone figure out what the hell to feed my child beyond tortellini with red sauce.

On Running my 1st 5k: Reflections & Lessons Learned

Today I finished my first 5k! It’s what I’ve been training for since Christmas, and now that I am home, sitting on my couch getting ready to hang out with some friends, I feel awesome about my accomplishment. But, I must admit, I learned some things along the way that were surprising (and some just re-confirmed some things I already knew about myself but had forgotten).

Run how you train.

I got caught up in the magical excitement of the race that I got a little carried away with myself. Because this was a first annual 5k it wasn’t organized into groups based on how many minutes it takes you to run a mile. Instead it was broken down into two groups: runners & walkers. Because I am seeing myself as a runner, I ran with the runners.

That was a mistake.

The runners started off fast. I “kept up” for the first 1/8-1/4 of a mile (out of the starting gate and down the road) out of pride. It was the beginning, and there were people on the sideline cheering, and I didn’t want to look like Ms. Slow-poke right from the get-go. So I ran fast. And spent the rest of the time trying to recover from my basic sprint at the beginning.

Boof said, later, that I probably would have felt better if I had run faster than the walkers, instead of spending my time trying to ‘catch up’ to the runners. He was right.

Another aspect of running how you train, is remembering pacing. I normally train without listening to music. I’ve been focusing on my breath and my footfall, and the sound of the gravel under my foot. A few days ago  I ran to a local talk-radio podcast, and found that was a good distraction without getting me out of my groove.

Today, though, with all of the hype and music blaring through the loudspeakers I decided to listen to some upbeat music to help keep me motivated. Sadly, as a former band-nerd, I can’t really run/walk to a different beat than music. This made portions of my race faster than I would have liked, and made me more tired than normal. I didn’t get into the zen-like place that I’ve been getting to lately. I was running, but I had lost my connection to myself in the process.

Self-talk
A little less than half-way into my run was when I noticed the self-talk going crazy. It was like during transition in labor, when my mind raced and I couldn’t “get it together.” I just noticed myself spinning out of control, saying things like “I am never doing this again. This is stupid,” and “even that girl in jeans and running with a purse is faster than me, I suck.” When I pushed through the middle third of the race I was fine, but it was that part that made me feel like I was breaking and like I should just quit.

Know the course

I had heard, from family members who ran cross-country in high school, that part of the 5k course was hilly and hard. But I hadn’t really looked at my route before this morning, and so I found myself running blindly, with little ability to pace myself. They had written, in chalk, at the 1 mile and 2 mile mark, but there wasn’t anything in between that. I found myself having a difficult time knowing how much time had passed, especially since the sound of music was drowning my own sense of time, and I think if I had run the route before I would have known to save energy for certain parts and where I could expend a little more energy.

Have an incentive

Boof was at the finish line, camera in-hand. When I saw the ticker-time board running, and realized that I was 45 seconds from completing the race in my goal-time (45 minutes, because the next 5k I run it’s MANDATORY…dum dum dum), I gained this new found speed and stamina that pushed me through to the end. And this afternoon I am taking a sweet trip on the light-rail downtown with some friends and their 2 boys, and we’re going to drink beer and eat burgers and have a fun time. A hard workout rewarded with some playful fun.

I’m really glad I did it. I’m really glad that I chose THIS run as my first one. It was low-key, all about community support, and was inexpensive and super-local. I may do more races, but it’s nice to have this one close to home be where I started out. Even if I don’t keep running extensively, I can see myself running this race annually to support my neighboring city!

I finished 97 of 103 women, with a time of 44:47. I ran for more than 2 of the 3 miles, and my goal had originally been to run 1.5 miles. And, the sun came out. What more can we Seattlelites ask for?

I guess I’ll sleep when I’m dead

It’s been a rough few days of little sleep and LOTS of whining (from both mama and son). And so, today, on my day off, I figured that I would let the house go a bit, and rest while Potamus rests. I haven’t done that since maternity leave, and by God I deserve a mid-day sleep.

But karma had other plans.

I had nestled into our comfy (and empty) king-sized bed. I had let my mind wander, and get drowsy, and didn’t pick up my cell phone at all. I got up to pee once (or three times, whatever), but felt relaxed and hopeful, for at least an hour long nap. But then, I heard crying. I tried to ignore it. The whimpering got louder. I prayed he would go back to sleep, that it was just some rustlings on his way back to dreamland. Alas, after ten minutes I realized he meant business. I had let my guard down, had almost been asleep, and now, wide awake with a messy house and a fussy toddler.

At daycare Potamus naps from 11-1, sometimes 1:30. With grandma, yesterday, he napped from 8-9:30 and from 2-4:30. Today, for me, he napped from 11-12.

I feel like crying.

And, to top it all off, all he will eat is graham and fishy crackers.