The Other-Other F Word

It happens to the best of us, and usually hits like a freight train carrying a whole load of acme anvils. The flu. No, I'm not talking about the cold/flu viral sinus thing (I was lucky enough to kick that sucker back in January). No, I'm talking about the other Flu. You know.

Sunday I was riding the high of my Saturday run and excited to start a week of "spring break" wherein I would be responsible for one class and no work instead of 3 classes, work, and an externship. I made a fabulous recipe I'd been DYING to try, and some ridiculously gluttonous Oreo-Chocolate Chip cookies. perfection.

And then Monday morning I woke up and got so sick I thought my insides were going to be on the outside. I threw up for 5 hours straight, took phenergan, then threw up for another hour before finally my innards finally gave up their siege. Needless to say - it was not what I had planned for Monday. By the time Tuesday rolled around I'd survived entirely on Gatorade and stubbornness. Tuesday was lost to recovery.

Wednesday I was feeling a lot stronger and got so far as to eat some fruit snacks (YES!) without any issue. Excited by my progress but not quite ready to run, Josh and I took a nice long walk. I was famished. I turned to my favorite sure-fire "easy belly" meal - a plain white bread sandwich with turkey only. It tasted amazing.

This morning as I packed my running bag for a nice after school run....well, I thought Monday might repeat itself. I felt nauseous, my stomach cramped, my arms and legs were heavy. I searched the pantry for anything that sounded or looked appetizing. Fruit loops? Nope. Granola bar? Nope. Et tu, applesauce? Yeah...definitely not. In short,  today has been a big step back. Back on the hydration train so hopefully the guts get what they need to start chugging along the solid-food highway again.

So here's my question to you!


I have to competing interests/feelings at the moment:

1. I've accepted the fact that there's absolutely no way that I will be getting my 35-38 miles in this week; BUT
2. I have a 17 mile long run scheduled saturday and I don't want to "lose my fitness"

Of course I'm aware that missing one long run won't screw me out of 11 weeks of relatively good training. On the other hand, there's only 6 more weeks of training and this 17-18mi long run is a big step to getting me to my goal of 20 pre-marathon miles. Some options I've considered:

• Do it - Do the 17 and don't worry at all about how long it takes. Stop when you need to, drink lots of water, and walk if you have to
• Spread out the mileage - do 9ish on Saturday and 9ish on Sunday
• Maximize Minutes - Don't worry about mileage, focus on minutes. 17-18 miles would take me roughly 3.5 hours. Rather than get in "miles", focus on spending 3.5 hours doing some kind of cardio
• Get over it - After a week of not running at all, trying to get in 3.5 hours of cardio of any kind is kind of stupid. Do what you can, worry about the rest next week. 
• Move the step-down - Next week is a "step-down" week with a goal of 14mile long run. Move that up to this week and do 17 next week. 

I'm thinking some kind of combo of Move the step down and doing the cardio rather than all running. But I want to hear from you! What's your gut reaction?

Throw it out there (or up there, har har) and let me know what you think!

Sidelined by sickness

I think I set a land speed record this morning for the rubber boot shuffle! While some of you have been dealing with "winter" for awhile now, we here in the bluegrass have had an unusually mild season speckled with just a few sub-30 degree days. Needless to say, I was not excited when I saw this:

"Feels like 5 degrees" = Feels like face breaking off into tiny shards. All I could think on my shuffle into work was, "You people run in this?" No thanks.

Last weekend I spent a few hours with my folks watching a UofL game that ended in double overtime sadness. Around half-time my dad started complaining of a sore throat & stuffy nose. 24 hours later I too had the sore throat and stuffy nose to go with my post-Basketball loss depression. When it comes to being sick I'm kind of odd. I can deal with pain no problem, but when it comes to stuffy-runny-pressure-cold/flu-related crap, I'm in agony. Worst of all, I hate cold medication. I know it's the only thing that will fix me up, but the hangover feeling I get from almost any kind of cold/flu medication just makes me feel abysmal.

Rather than get too depressed about being sick during training, I decided to go on the offensive: lots and lots of Vitamin C, multi-vitamins, fruits & veggies, water, pseudoephedrine, and rest.

3 Zero's in a row? Blah!

While I hate to see blanks in my training, I think my tactics may have worked. I woke up this morning with (mostly) clear sinuses and only a little cough. Thank God my sinuses finally opened up, I felt like a drunk sailor wobbling around most of Wednesday. Not really the professional sort of appearance I was hoping to put out.

Today is a planned rest day and I'm hoping I'll be able to get some sort of run in tomorrow. I have 6 miles scheduled, but I'm flexible. Just can't wait to get moving again!!

Food Journal Notes 
Last week I noticed my stomach was getting kind of upset after meals that involved a lot of dairy. Not just dairy, but straight milk (i.e. chocolate milk recovery or milk in a smoothie). I bought my first ever carton of soy milk and I have to say, I'm totally happy with it! Tastes awesome and no bellyaches. Jury's still out on yogurt or cheese yet. Greek yogurt doesn't seem to bother me, but cheese does. Any thoughts - does one have more lactose than the other? Weird.

Happy Friday the 13th everybody - hope you're safe and warm wherever you are!
Do you run when you have a cold? How sick do you have to be to cancel a workout?

"Is this a....what day is this?"

I would've bet you a million dollars around lunch-time that it was not Monday. Well, not a million, but a solid $50 (which in law/grad school world is a million). It's felt like Tuesday all day long, which is a plus if you consider I basically skilled Monday, but it will definitely be a minus when I realize that there will be 5 full days in this very full week.


Part of it may be that my routine is a little off. Wow, I started writing about how my schedule was off - got 4 or 5 solid lines down too - until I finally realized, wait, my schedule isn't off! That's exactly the kind of day it feels like I'm having. Twilight zone.


Anyway, up on Today's schedule was the Plyometric Cardio Circuit. I have mixed feelings about this particular workout. On the one hand, it feels like it works all of the muscle groups (as in I never get quite too sore in my butt/legs to NOT do the next move, i.e. Plyo Cardio Resistance). At the same time, I still feel too weak for the plank work at the end to really get much out of it. Nonetheless, I powered through and managed to eek out a workout.


I was a bit surprised at how low my hear rate was throughout the workout. Usually I'm up in the 170's for a good portion of the workout - not true today. Somehow I just couldn't get going. Add to that the fact that I started getting a little woozy and I think the 'ugh' feelings from later last week are officially 'blah - sicko' feelings. I made sure to refuel and hydrate really well in an effort to say "thank you body, you're the best!"


Speaking of fuel, I made my homemade Oatmeal this morning and I had one thought: why haven't I been doing this all along?! Sure, buying all of the ingredients in advance is a bit of a pain, but I now have 13 individual oatmeals ready to go. I'm going to play a bit with the recipe and I'll post. 


For now - rest, rest, and fluids! I had this grand ambition of going "medication-less" this week but it seems like that may not work out. I'm taking the alka-seltzer cold/flu tablets; seemed like a less invasive way to medicate.

How do you cope with being under the weather? Any secret tips for quick recovery?