Adventures of a Born Again Gym Bunny

Another fitting ending

2009-03-03T20:55:00.002Z

Over the last year I've been contacted by a few people through Facebook so I know that people are occasionally still happening across my musings and experiences and getting something from them.

So that has led me to come back to post a quick update on where I am. Because I have News.

First the not so predictable stuff. I'm currently training to make good use of my Good for Age place at London. I've also got a couple of other marathons (ok, 3 other marathons) and an ultra on the cards this year, with possibly an extra marathon in Autumn. My running has been a bit up and down over the last year, and I've had a couple of injuries, but I'm still sticking at it, and there are still things I want to achieve.

My weight is up from my lowest but manageable. I'm comfortable with it and I'd rather give myself a few treats and gain a few pounds than spend my life depriving myself. And I keep it in check. Mainly.

But the News is that I seem to have broken out of a rather too long spell of singleness and found myself a bloke. It's still early days (we've been seeing each other properly for about a month, but have known each other for and been flirting outrageously since last August), but what's important isn't so much who he is and whether it will last, but what it's taught me about my relationship with my body.

To get straight to the point, I'm far more comfortable with nakedness and the physical side of things than I ever thought I'd be. One of my big problems in the past was that I didn't want anyone to see my body. And even when I lost weight I worried about saggy skin, and my head took a while to catch my body up.

After a few fumbling experiences in my early 20s (and I mean very fumbling and furtive) I embarked on pretty much 10 years without even so much as a kiss. While I didn't like myself I didn't expect anyone else to either.

But this time my thought process was more "well, why wouldn't he like me. After all I'm pretty fantastic". That shocked me.

What also shocked me was my willingness to shamelessly use him for his (sub 3 marathon) body. After waiting for so long part of me wanted it to be for someone special and permanent. Saving myself for The One as it were. But without completely writing him off now (because he's actually lovely and every time I learn something new about him it's something I like), I'm quite comfortable with the idea that I will learn all I can from him to get myself back on the wagon, and if it doesn't work out move on with more confidence than I've ever had.

The only problem is that *ahem* cross training can distract me from an early morning run...

This really is it...

2008-05-28T20:30:00.002+01:00

OK, I said I was giving up blogging here, but I've got to a fitting end to this whole thing, so I thought I'd round it off with a bang.

Finally, after seemingly endless attempts, I ran my good for age marathon time.

3:44:05.

I made it by 55 seconds, but I made it. I'm not just a former fattie, or someone who's playing at running, I've hit an objectively set target that applies to everyone. I'm Good.

(and on the For Age side, I'm turning 30 on Saturday, but at least I know I'm good for it...)

There's still a whole lifetime of maintenance and running and doing stuff ahead of me, but I'm in a nice place right now. I'm not doing any more marathons before London 2009 (I posted my application today - guaranteed entry!) so I'm going to relax for a bit, make the most of life, and just enjoy the person I've become.

Thanks to all the people who have said they'll miss me, but I think I'm ready to fly away and live this thing on my own.

A picture that says more than I ever could

2008-04-22T19:48:00.004+01:00

You may have noticed that I've been quiet recently. I've not even blogged my FLM result for god's sake. (3:48, if you were wondering)

It's not that I'm depressed, or hiding, it's just that I seem to be too busy living life these days to talk about it. I've run out of new things to say, and I just don't have the desire to sit down at the computer and spill it all out.

So I've decided to call it a day. Not the running and the maintaining (although I have a bit of acquired weight to lose at the moment, my clothes are getting scarily tight), but the blogging about it. I'll still be around on t'internet, on Facebook and so on, so if you want to find me, hunt me out there. I'll also leave this up, just in case anyone finds it interesting. But I won't be adding much to it.

Which got me to thinking that maybe I ought to do a big, emotional goodbye. Thanking everyone who's commented and read, and even met me over the past few years. Everyone who writes a blog I read, even if I don't always have time to write comments. You've been a source of constant support, letting me know I'm not alone in this, and not crazy to believe I could do it.

In terms of where I am now, I have to thank Jen for taking this photo of me during FLM. For me, it sums it all up. I'm maybe a bit bigger than I want to be, but I'm fit, I'm a marathon runner, and more importantly than that, I'm enjoying it.

I can run a marathon with a smile on my face. I may not quite be good for age (yet! I'm having another go in Edinburgh at the end of May), but I'm not bloody bad for it either.

She knew

2008-04-03T18:05:00.005+01:00

In grandma's last good spell she kept on going on about the 3rd. Whatever she was saying, it kept on coming back to the 3rd. She got it right not once, but twice. I'll have to remember to take special care on the 3rd of each month, and to tell my family to do that too.

The routine was the same. The 11.55 phone call (almost exactly the same time). Quickly having my lunch before leaving the office, while phoning round and spreading the news. The phone call to my sister to confirm when it was all over.

To be honest, I think in reality the damage was done on Monday night. Everything since then has just been holding on, to see if there was a glimmer of hope. There wasn't, and this afternoon they took the ventilator tube out. From there on, it was inevitable and quick. I'm becoming a bit of an old hand at the whole process, sadly. Twice in four months.

There's a difference between me and Annette. She would rather not be there. She takes more comfort from visiting the funeral home and seeing them dressed, and made up, and not in pain any more, looking 20 years younger. I don't. I find it easier to cope if I'm reminded of why it's the right thing to just let them go. If I'm there, it reinforces in my mind that keeping them alive is no good to anyone, and that you have to accept it and move on. I suppose that's the difference between a death you've been preparing for for a while, and a sudden, traumatic one, but over the past few days I've been firmly of the belief that even if the doctors could save him, it would almost be cruel to do it.

So goodbye to the strongest man I've ever known. I started doing the sums in my head. He's always been disabled while I've known him, but it was only when I started to think about it I realised how young and vibrant he must have been when polio hit him. He can't have been too much older than I am now, in his 30s somewhere I would imagine. He poured so much energy into being this campaigning pillar of the local society that maybe I sometimes felt awe and respect rather than love. Or maybe that's just a different type of love.

He held on for the wedding. I'm shocked now that he actually drove over there and back in the state he was in (his car is adapted, and my grandmother doesn't like driving it, so if he's going somewhere and has to go in that car, he tends to drive it). He didn't make it to the ceremony, and that's when I realised something was really wrong, but he made it in the evening. When I saw him a couple of weeks ago he was getting confused, and iller, but he kept on coming back to one thing, "the wedding was lovely".

Last night I had a bit of a heart to heart with Annette, to tell her that she couldn't blame herself. Yes, the wedding took the last bit of strength he had out of him, but that was his choice. You could tell that he was tiring of life in some ways, the weekly hospital visits, the fact that there was no hope of a cure. If one thing didn't get him, the cancer would. It seemed to me when I saw him then that he was trying to tell us that the effort, and what it took out of him, was worth it. That he would have, and maybe did, give everything just to be able to see it. The wedding date was actually chosen to give grandma the chance to be there, as it turned out he only made it by a month, so an early wedding was worth the effort anyway.

I've ordered a black armband, which I intend to wear for FLM. I don't know how I'll cope with the emotion of the day. I got my place on the evening of grandma's funeral, and I'm guessing that the race itself will be a couple of days after or before his (mum is due to arrive anyway on Wednesday, so I imagine we'll wait until she gets here). Hopefully it will spur me on, although I'm not discounting the possibility of being a teary mess at the beginning or the end.

It's funny how running helps me cope though. We left the hospital at about half 3, and it was a lovely day. I couldn't face going back into the office (which is about 10 minutes from the hospital), and I had some running kit in my bag (let's face it, when don't I?), so I got changed and went for a 4 mile run to get some space in my head. I spoke to Annette, and they were going for a walk on the beach with the dog, which I suppose fulfils the same need, a bit of space, and air, and movement. (Although answering the phone to hear "I'm in bed with Chris and Aston" probably conjures up images I didn't want in my head - she's my little sister after all!). Hopefully FLM will help me deal with things in a positive way.

History Repeating?

2008-04-02T21:21:00.002+01:00

On 3rd December, Mum got on a flight, dashed from the airport, and made it to grandma an hour or so before she died.

Dad is arriving tomorrow. It will be the 3rd. All the signs are that it won't be much different.

In a lot of ways that would be a good thing. For the past 2 days he's been in intensive care, sedated, on a ventilator, and with nothing that could realistically be called a life. Even if he makes a miracle recovery and completely regains consciousness, he's got so many medical conditions that we're talking about another month, maybe two, of pain, treatment, confusion and so on.

Where he is, he's getting the best care imaginable (in the process giving the NHS a bit of a reprieve in my mind after all the bitterness about how grandma was treated), everything is very dignified and professional, and peaceful. There are worse ways to go.

In our minds I think we all came to terms with it last night after a frank discussion with a doctor. I'm surprised, to be honest, that he lives to see another day, and that dad will (or should) make it back in time. He's been clear about his own wishes in the past, and I think this is the moment where we have to face up to the fact that decisions have to be made. The ventilator can carry on breathing indefinitely, but is it fair on anyone for it to do that?

It's funny though, the way all this brings us closer together, makes us see sides of people we didn't know existed. I sat having a conversation with Annette and realised what I've missed while she's been living abroad. We think the same way on so many things, and it's so nice to have a sister again. You see that what you might have taken as coldness or emotional distance isn't that, that there is emotion there, just a different type. You hear your father trying to hold back tears, and realise that he does care after all.

I have been resorting to my old ways of coping though. With evenings spent in the hospital, the takeaway at the end of the road starts to look like an appealing option, as does a bit of beer or wine to help me wind down. It's not ideal, I should be eating nice, clean stuff before FLM, and doing the whole body is a temple thing, but I'm only looking at the next couple of hours, not something that's 10 days away. And anyway, there are things which are more important than running.

Here we go again

2008-03-31T22:24:00.002+01:00

It looks like I might have a bit of an enforced taper on my hands. Today's club run was cut short at 4 miles when I ran past my grandparents house, popped in to find out the latest update and was bundled into a car and down to the hospital where I spent the rest of the evening. I knew he was in hospital, which was why I stopped in in the first place, but apparently his condition had gone downhill during the day.

From the conversations with the doctors, it sounds like there might be some decisions to be taken. They may be able to do things, but the question is whether they should. In the doctor's words, he's the sickest man in the hospital at the moment. Depending on the results of a brain scan, they may be able to do something by putting him on a ventilator in intensive care, but if they did they're not confident they'd get him off it.

A year or so ago he sat us all down and gave us his instructions. He's told us all, more than once, that he doesn't want to be kept alive artificially, that he wants to be DNR. I think it might be getting to the stage where we have to respect his wishes.

When I spoke to my dad he sounded like he was on the verge of tears (and I hadn't passed on the full details of the conversation with the doctors at that stage) and searching for flights.

So in the next two weeks there might be rather more sitting than running, but I'm damn well going to do that marathon, it's for his charity after all and I can't think of a more fitting tribute.

Warm Fuzzy Feeling

2008-03-29T18:21:00.003Z

Last month I decided that I'd spend my 30th being pampered in a spa, and that even if no-one turned up for it other than me and my sister, I'd have a lovely day and it would beat the queues at the airport.

However, I decided to break the habit of a lifetime and actually attempt to arrange something that other people would turn up to, rather than just doing my normal thing and doing what I want, when I want to do it.

When we were little, Annette was the one who had parties and friends, while I was the one who played with the older sisters of her friends, or tagged around after her. Even as we got older and forged our own lives, I kind of assumed that her friends were better friends than my friends. she had big birthday parties. I had meals with my family. Or I went on holiday. I started to believe that my friends were people I'd come into contact with, who tolerated me while I was around, but who wouldn't miss me if I wasn't there. This is the flip side of my fear of invisibility I guess, that even when people acknowledge my presence, it doesn't make a huge impact on them, and that if a better friend comes along they'd dump me in an instant.

The fact that I think like this doesn't mean it's true, however, and this week I've been quite frankly stunned. When I decided on the spa plan I knew that it wasn't cheap, and that when you get to your late 20s/early 30s, summer weekends get booked up months in advance with weddings and hen dos and christenings and so on. I didn't know whether I could realistically expect anyone to pay over £100 for the privilege of consoling me as I entered my 30s. In the end I decided that I'd do a two-stage thing, with the spa and a meal, so even if I didn't have many people in the day, I could at least be a bit sociable in the evening.

But instead, having sent out emails to various people, I've been stunned by the number of people who do want to come, and who have already paid up, in full, in advance, to join me. In fact, and there's a bit of childish sibling rivalry here, by my calculations I have more people coming to my 30th spa day than my sister did for her hen do spa day at the same place. Maybe people do actually want to spend time with me after all. I can't even begin to describe the warm fuzzy feeling that has given me.

It's almost enough to take away the pain of nearing my entry into my 30s...

There is no such thing as bad weather...

2008-03-24T20:38:00.002Z

...only the wrong clothing.

You'd have thought I'd learn. Last March I went on a weekend away to do a 20 mile race in Wales, followed by a bit of white water rafting. It snowed.

This year I planned a weekend in the Lakes, and found a 10 mile race on the way. Guess what? It snowed.

But it was fantastic. I'd chosen somewhere relatively remote, where I could cut myself off from the world, and while the snow looked fantastic on the hills, it mainly came down overnight which meant that during the day I could just enjoy it without being caught in too many blizzards, and I could just relax and enjoy it.

There was no mobile phone reception, and no tv reception. No internet in the village (or at least I'm sure the hostel had it on the office computer they had, but there wasn't exactly a cyber cafe, and I didn't feel the need to beg to check my emails). Life reduced itself to the simplest of elements. Eat, sleep, and walk enough to build up the need for each of those things.

I spent most of my time walking at lake level. I made a couple of attempts to get higher, but when I encountered icy rocks on a scramble up one route, and increasingly deep snow on another, I decided that this close to FLM I'd rather not tick off any peaks, than attempt to do it and hurt myself in the process. I got high enough to take some good photos, and to get my heart rate going a bit, but I mainly stuck in the valleys at pub level.

It's amazing how quickly you can forget the stresses of life, by walking, and eating, and drinking. I didn't run (other than the race on the way up there), but in terms of time on my feet I reckon it will be good for marathon training.

The hostel thing was surprisingly good. It's all I need, to be honest. It's quite nice staying somewhere where everyone else goes to bed at 9.30 and gets up at 6.30 too! I'm not so keen on the snorers and the kids running round, but it was bearable. Everyone seemed to be scarily feet and lean though. Real hill walking types. They kept asking whether I was into fell running. No, no, no, although I'm starting to see the appeal. In theory if not in practice. But what I will be putting back into practice is hostelling. I picked up a map, and I'm plotting my next trip.

The weekend also confirmed that I'm not a driver. I hired a car. I drove it to the lakes. I parked it in the hostel car park. And I left it there. I walked all day on Saturday. On Sunday I walked a bit, got the bus over a pass that was too snowy to attempt, and then walked the rest of the way to Keswick. I got the bus back. I didn't even consider driving. And on the subject of Keswick - I got there and wanted to get back to the peace of Buttermere. It was so busy! Keswick is hardly a metropolis, but I just craved peace and quiet, to escape for the weekend. And on that basis, it ticked all the boxes.

And back to the weather. I think it says something that I've finally acquired enough technical kit, and enough understanding of how much I sweat doing various activities, that I managed to dress myself so I was precisely the right temperature the whole time. Wearing running tights under slighly more flattering trousers is definitely the way to go! Yes, the weather had an effect in terms of the walks I did, but it didn't stop me getting outside for pretty much the whole weekend, which was the point.

Exploring

2008-03-20T20:08:00.002Z

This will be the first year in ages that I haven't gone abroad at Easter. Over the past three years I have had Easter trips to Cologne, Amsterdam and Paris, and further than that I can't quite remember, but I doubt I stayed at home.

I'm not quite staying at home this year, but there won't be planes involved for a change. This year I'm heading to the Lake District for a bit of English tourism. Looking at the weather forecast I might start regretting that idea, but there's nothing wrong with spending a long weekend snuggled in a pub with a good book looking at the view!

I'm going back to my penniless student days and staying in a hostel. Not that I can't afford a B&B, but I kind of like the idea of actually meeting people rather than staying closeted in a single room and only emerging for breakfast. After staying with someone I barely knew in New York and getting on with her really well, I just thought I might give it a go. It's cheap, it has a restaurant and a bar, and you never know, I might meet like minded people. I haven't stayed in a hostel since I was in Rome in 1999 (when in a strange foretaste of what was to come, I got there and discovered it was marathon weekend. I thought they were all nutters).

The original plan was to do some hill walking, but with the weather forecast and the niggliness of my leg this close to FLM, I think I might stick to more sedate pursuits. Whatever I end up doing though I'll try to take some pictures and report back after the weekend.

---------------------------------------

In other news, here comes this month's charity appeal. I'm on a club place at London, but have a promise to my grandfather to fulfil. And if I'm going to do it, I'd better get moving because my visit at the weekend confirmed that he really isn't well. Doing it next year won't work.

He got polio years before I was born, and I've only even known him in a wheelchair. Since he got confined to the chair, he's been a tireless campaigner for better disabled access to facilities and so on. It's rubbed off. For someone without a disability I have a strangely detailed knowledge of what makes a good disabled bathroom. Some of them are great, like the fantastic disabled toilet we found in Spain, the only problem being that you couldn't actually get into the building to use it. I try not to discuss them unless I'm in the company of my family. Although in New York I did surprise a few people with my appreciation of what facilities Matt would need. Grandpa got an OBE for what he'd been doing back in the late 70s, and has carried on for nearly 30 years since then.

As well as the national stuff (he's judged things like loo of the year competitions) he's also been heavily involved with a local disabled living centre. He's a trustee of the charity, and he still takes an active interest in the running of the place even though he's over 80 now. And a couple of years ago I promised I'd raise money for them if I ever got a place for London. I have, so now it's time to come good on that promise.

Unfortunately, since he got so ill he hasn't managed to do much of the arrangements for putting me in touch with the right people to do publicity and so on, and I'm wary of inducing donation fatigue by pestering everyone so soon after New York. I'm really not looking for anyone to subsidise what I'm doing, I'd be running the marathon anyway, and none of the money will go towards the cost of my place, or any freebies provided by the charity. But if anyone does feel inclined to donate (and there are some people who on hearing that you're doing a marathon ask who for - it's them I'm aiming at mainly), it's nice to have somewhere to direct them towards.

Even if I only raise £50, I will be happy that it's £50 which is going to a good cause. I've seen first hand what a good job they do, and how much work it takes to keep them going. They're not a big charity and don't have golden bond places or snazzy running vests. But that doesn't mean they're not a lifeline for people who need them.

The name of the charity is the William Merritt Disabled Living Centre, and unfortunately they haven't registered with justgiving so I can't give you a link for online donations. Which means that my chances of obtaining donations via an internet appeal are slim because anyone generous would have to write a cheque and put it in an envelope. However, there's no harm in mentioning it. More information about the charity, and an address for donations, can be found on the website.

Blast from the Past

2008-03-16T19:22:00.003Z

Today I had a bit of a blast from the past.

Blast from the Past 1 - Sport Relief

I blame Sport Relief for who I am today. The very first thing that got me running was doing the Sport Relief mile in 2004. I didn't do much training, and it shamed me into realising how unfit I was. I got a flyer for a free day pass at a gym in my goodie bag, which put a seed in my head and, having done the run on the Saturday, I was a signed up gym member on a trial 6 week contract by Monday lunchtime.

I didn't do the mile this year. I didn't do the 3 or 6 mile options either. While it's a fantastic event, both for fundraising and getting people moving, I've moved on to bigger things.

Blast from the Past 2 - Hurting in Huddersfield

A good year after that run, I did my first 10k. What I didn't write there, because it wasn't particularly exciting, was that after the run I went straight to watch a rugby match in Huddersfield, and sat through the match alternating between disbelief that I'd done a 10k, and soreness in my legs, dehydration and all the other downsides to a first long race.

Well, today we played away at Huddersfield, and I found a race which fitted in really well with my marathon training. So I did the race on the way to the match. Only this time it wasn't a 10k, it was a 20 miler. A hilly 20 miler. And not only have I moved up to running 20 milers, I ran it at a much faster pace than I did that 10k. That's only natural because as you run, you improve, but it still underlined how far I've come. And how the soreness in your legs never quite goes away if you find the "right" race.

Ms Cellophane

2008-03-15T20:33:00.002Z

Today I went through one of my recurring nightmares. I've been having a horrible time ordering my car. I am constantly amazed at my inability to get salespeople to sell me a car I want to buy. They don't need to do the hard sell. I want it. I can afford it. I just want someone to take my order.

Last week I went up to the garage and there were no salespeople, so the trainee took my details and said someone would phone me back on Monday. I would have been happy to wait, but assumed that as he'd said someone would call me back, that would be fine.

On Monday, no-one called. When I phoned them they seemed most uninterested. They asked whether I'd looked on the website to get a price. Erm yes, but the website doesn't take orders, does it? Oh, they can't do that over the phone, I'll have to come in. But if I make an appointment there will definitely be someone to see me. So I arranged to see someone at 11.30 today.

I got to the garage at 11.30 today. I was told the guy I wanted to see was with a customer, but would be with me in 5 minutes. At 12 I started getting pissed off. At 12.30 I spoke to the receptionist again, who said he knew I was there, but she'd try to get someone else to see me as soon as possible.

At 1 I started pacing round the showroom. At 1.15 I was on the verge of walking out.

The problem is that the car I wanted is brand new. I mean brand brand new. I've only ever seen 3 of them, in the showroom. There's no second hand market because even the brand new ones haven't arrived yet to be sold for the first time. It's a franchised dealer or nothing, and this was the franchised dealer. If that was the car I wanted, short of going to another town (on public transport), I had to buy it from them.

I'm not the sort of person who gets irate and hard to ignore. I tend to sit there getting more and more frustrated until I finally walk out. I remember one particularly painful experience in Budapest when I tried to go out for a meal. I travel alone and don't think anything of eating alone. But the waiting staff seemed convinced that I was waiting for someone. No matter how much I tried to get their attention, they wouldn't even bring me a menu. Other customers tried too, and I still got nowhere. Even though the meal was fantastic (and had it not promised to be, I'd have been long gone), the thing I remember is the service, and being ignored, rather than the taste.

It's stupid in a way, I used to spend a lot of time trying to make myself invisible, unobtrusive, on the basis that if people didn't realise I was there they couldn't be deliberately mean to me. And if I really wanted to be noticed, then I could just make more of a fuss. I shouldn't take it personally, it wasn't just me. I saw at least three people walk out of there because no-one was paying them any attention. But still by the end of it I was practically in tears I was so frustrated. I was alternately wondering why I was putting up with it, and then getting pissed off that I couldn't just go down the road to another garage to get the same car.

In the end though, the trainee from last week spotted me. He couldn't actually take my order because he isn't qualified to do the FSA stuff when they try to sell you finance and various bits of insurance, but he actually made an attempt to go through the car options on the computer and get a list of what I wanted for when someone was actually free to take my order. I was pleased to see that even though someone else did the official stuff, it still got counted as his sale because he was the only person in that place who even showed any glimmer of understanding what customer service is.

I just hope the car is worth it! And worth me having this song stuck in my head all day.

If someone stood up in a crowd
And raised his voice up way out loud
And waved his arm and shook his leg
You'd notice him

If someone in the movie show
Yelled "Fire in the second row
This whole place is a powder keg!"
You'd notice him

And even without clucking like a hen
Everyone gets noticed, now and then,
Unless, of course, that personage should be
Invisible, inconsequential me!

Cellophane
Mister Cellophane
Shoulda been my name
Mister Cellophane
'Cause you can look right through me
Walk right by me
And never know I'm there...

I tell ya
Cellophane
Mister Cellophane
Shoulda been my name
Mister Cellophane
'Cause you can look right through me
Walk right by me
And never know I'm there...

Suppose you was a little cat
Residin' in a person's flat
Who fed you fish and scratched your ears?
You'd notice him

Suppose you was a woman, wed
And sleepin' in a double bed
Beside one man, for seven years
You'd notice him

A human being's made of more than air
With all that bulk, you're bound to see him there
Unless that human bein' next to you
Is unimpressive, undistinguished
You know who...

Cellophane
Mister Cellophane
Shoulda been my name
Mister Cellophane
'Cause you can look right through me
Walk right by me
And never know I'm there...
I tell ya
Cellophane
Mister Cellophane
Shoulda been my name
Mister Cellophane
'Cause you can look right through me
Walk right by me
And never know I'm there
Never even know I'm there.

Hope I didn't take up too much of your time.

Failure?

2008-03-12T20:59:00.003Z

My other reason for feeling a bit self-pitying at the moment is the car thing. I've made my decision (although I've not actually committed myself to ordering it yet - the appointment is made for Saturday though), and looking at it logically, I know that it's the sensible thing to do.

But every time I walk into the house, my bike looks at me and reminds me of the high hopes I had last year.

I really wanted being car free to work. I had a stupidly optimistic belief that public transport, cycling and the occasional hire car would be the answer to my prayers. I would whizz in and out of work on my bike, racing past the queuing traffic and gaining quads of steel. The sun would always shine, and it would never be so windy that I could barely stay upright, let alone get any forward momentum. I wouldn't be shamed into admitting that I can run home faster than I can cycle the same route. I would enjoy the mile walks to and from the bus stop, and the extra exercise that involved.

But I don't, and part of me is beating the rest of me up about that. I can't even ride a bike well enough to be able to do a 5 mile commute. Since about November I've probably commuted on the bike twice. The rest of the time it just sits there, staring at me, reminding me how crap I am at cycling.

Although when I get the car, I'm planning to leave it at home one day a week, that day will be used to run to work, not to cycle. All dreams of doing a triathlon have hit a huge reality check. I'm just not a cyclist. I don't find it easy, I'm not particularly confident in traffic, and when I take the bike to work I spend the whole day dreading the ride home. Even though I know I can't be good at everything, it still annoys me that cycling is one of the things I'm not good at.

I wish that I could have made being car free work, I really do. Buying a car emphasises the fact that I couldn't. I don't know why I don't give myself credit for at least trying, for sticking it out as long as I have, and for still being prepared to wait a couple of months for the right car to be available, rather than simply jumping at something I can drive away today, but I don't.

Sorry, I'm just wallowing.

A big dose of self pity

2008-03-11T19:54:00.002Z

Today hasn't been a good day. First of all my legs felt really niggly on my run this morning and I had to give up after 0.75 miles rather than risk making it worse, then I got some not great news about my grandfather.

I think he's right that the cancer won't have time to get him. It seems like heading over to St Annes for the wedding took a hell of a lot out of him, and he's struggling to recover from the exertion. He's been in and out of hospital since he got back, and it doesn't sound particularly good. I'm only just about getting myself back together after the last bout of terminal illness, and I'm scared to death that we're about to go through it all again.

I spent the afternoon thinking about chocolate and wine, resorting to the old tactics for taking my mind off stuff and consoling myself. I wish I was one of those people who loses their appetite when they go through stress, but I'm clearly not. I did manage to talk myself out of it, reminding myself that I wasn't hungry and it wouldn't help, but I have a horrible feeling that I know where this is going.

It was one of the most painful parts about the wedding, seeing my uncle saying goodbye to grandpa before flying back to America. No-one said anything, there were no hugs or tears, but I suspect that most of the people round that table thought that it was probably the last time they'd see each other. That's what that side of my family's like, hiding emotions and keeping a stiff upper lip. No big, teary speeches or goodbyes, just a quiet acceptance.

I'm hoping to get up there on Saturday, but I'm really not looking forward to what I might find.

Car?

2008-03-07T19:50:00.001Z

Sometimes everything moves into alignment, and what was a good idea doesn't seem to be as much of one any more. At the moment I'm considering giving up my car-free status. Gasp!

Everything comes down to time at the moment. I'm starting to realise that time spent commuting on public transport eats into time I could spend better doing other things (conversely for long distances, public transport seems a better use of time because even if it takes a bit longer I can actually settle down with a book or a newspaper rather than worrying about the driving part).

I've been car free for five or six months now, and I've got a better idea of the journeys I would prefer to drive, and the journeys I prefer to do on public transport. I spend my life complaining about how little time I get to spend in the house, and started to realise that saving a couple of hours a day on public transport would make a huge difference. Now that I'm entitled to free parking at work it makes a lot of sense to use it, particularly as the cash alternative is paltry in comparison. Maybe the money I'd spend on a car for commuting would be worth it, for buying me that extra time to do something other than work, training and travelling during the week. I could leave the office and be home in 20 minutes rather than it taking an hour or more, and I wouldn't need to rush to get away before the buses get irregular in the evening.

I always said that I'd see how it went over winter, when I use the car less, and I've stuck it out for longer than a lot of people would manage. It's been fine, and in some ways I've liked being car free. It's got me running to work which has been fantastic for marathon training, and it's got me thinking about whether I need to make journeys. But it's also cut me off a bit. Little jobs that need a half hour trip out in the car to do become half day expeditions, and particularly in bad weather when waiting for the bus isn't appealing, I tend to put them off. With less frequent buses in the evenings, things have to be put off until Saturday, and then I have to find a Saturday when I'm at home. Visiting my grandparents is a bit of a chore, with changes of buses, and I suspect I may need to pop in more often than I do at the moment over the next few months. Getting back from running club on the bus means that an hour long run takes all evening, without even having the opportunity to pop into the club after the run for a drink. (On that subject, the fact that I can have a drink if I'm not driving is more appealing in theory than in practice, and I can probably count on the fingers of one hand the times I've taken advantage of the opportunity. Certainly they're infrequent enough that leaving the car on those days isn't going to be a problem).

I'm hoping that I'll still think carefully about when and how to use it, and I'm planning on buying something small, green and efficient rather than a status car. Because I've got a good idea of the journeys I will want to make in a car, I know that realistically I want a little city car that will do my 5 mile commute and trips around town cheaply, rather than something that is at home on the motorways. I use trains for most of my longer journeys anyway, and don't see why having a car should change that.

I'm not in a desperate hurry, but I want to start the ball rolling. May looks like the ideal time to take the plunge - pay rises kick in in May, and I finish paying off my credit card debt in May too. If I get round to sorting out my remortgage that will also free up a bit of cash. It would also be quite a nice birthday present to myself. I've done a lot of research over the past few weeks and really focussed on what I am looking for in terms of the car itself and how to pay for it. I've worked out the numbers and the budget, and I've worked out which cars come closest to ticking all my boxes. Now it's time to brave the dealership to see whether I can get the car I want for the price I want to pay for it.

Fingers crossed!

Wedding

2008-03-04T19:13:00.002Z

It was fantastic, absolutely brilliant. It was so nice seeing everyone again, all together in one place, in celebratory mood. I seemed to become a different person. Pampered for two days, with a posh dress, my hair expertly done, proper makeup, sleek eyebrows and the nails from hell (I hated them and took them off as soon as I could, but they did look nice), and surrounded by people I knew I felt myself oozing confidence and chattiness. One of the dive instructors who had come over from Spain said that I seemed like a completely different person in my own environment. And the strange thing? I was still on that high when I got back to work yesterday, and was more efficient and got more done than I have for months. Maybe the wedding has rebooted my mojo?

Is it really vain of me to be glad I was thin? Those photos are the ones which will be dug out again and again for years to come, so I'm glad they caught me at close to my best. Seeing one of Annette's schoolfriends made it hit home. She was always probably a bit bigger than me, but when I started shrinking, she probably went the other way. She did a reading instead of being a bridesmaid, one of the unspoken reasons being the fact the dresses didn't come in her size. She lives in Budapest so it would have been hard for her to make the hen do, but at the time the others said she wouldn't have come anyway because of swimsuit anxiety at the spa. She's lovely, lively, pretty, but you could see how much harder the little things are than they are for me today, and it reinforced the fact that I don't want to go back to being that person.

Remarkably despite five days of pretty much continuous eating out, drinking and merriment, I didn't gain any weight while I was away. The main difference seemed to be that I ate big meals but didn't snack, whereas normally I'm more of a grazer. It's good for keeping my energy levels stable, but does perhaps lead to me eating a bit too much because the second I get a bit peckish I start thinking about where my next nibble is coming from. Whereas over the weekend I'd go for hours between meals, and then have a nice restaurant meal with a glass of wine once I'd worked up a bigger appetite. Something to ponder. Unless it was the dancing that made the difference!

There were downsides too though. I will admit to having a bit of a blub at the ceremony. Part of it was seeing my little sister all grown up and married (and looking absolutely gorgeous) but it was more than that. Singing one of the same hymns as we had at the funeral didn't help, and the theme of the day really hit a nerve. Forget about colour schemes, the theme that got me was the charity angle. We had donations to cancer research instead of favours, all the men wore "make today count" pinbadges, and we had a collecting tin, together with taking some photos for a cancer research press release. And it turned out that it was more relevant than we imagined. The day before the wedding one of mum's cousins (I use the term loosely, as I don't know the exact relationships) died of cancer. I wasn't particularly close, but he was one of the people on that side of the family my grandad and mum were closer too, and he'd gone through a lot of the journey with grandma. There was also the godmother who was diagnosed with breast and lung cancer, looking thin and frail but remarkably well considering.

And there was grandpa. We've known that he's had various health problems for years. He caught polio years before I was born, and I've only ever known him in a wheelchair. He's had various ailments on and off since then, and recently has had a problem with his blood. He keeps on getting blood transfusions, but nothing seems to sort it out. He's getting frailer and frailer, and didn't make it to the ceremony because of the effort involved in getting in and out of the car in gale force winds. He made it to the reception because it was closer to their hotel, but the church was a car ride away and he wasn't up to it.

What we didn't know, and what only came out after a half-remembered conversation at the reception, and some follow up questions, is that he also has cancer. It's slow growing, and the doctors are working on the assumption that the other stuff will get him first (they can't operate anyway because of the blood problem - it wouldn't clot properly), but it's still there. Back again for another bite at the family. Great.

Licence to Compete

2008-02-26T19:21:00.001Z

In my wallet there is all sorts of useless stuff, but there's one thing I'm quite proud of. My England Athletics "Competition Licence". Or as I like to think of it, a driving licence for athletes. Apparently, it "confirms my eligibility to compete as an individual in all competitions held under UK Athletics Rules".

In some ways it's a bit of a misnomer. Or certainly for distance running it is. You don't need a competition licence to run in most of the events I do, because you can run as an unaffiliated runner and just pay the £2 extra. If you have a competition licence, you're certainly not forced to use it by entering races. And if you do turn out, there's certainly nothing in the rules that says that you have to actually be competitive...

There are some events I've done which I probably do need the licence for, the northern cross countries are the ones which spring to mind. And maybe if I was good enough, I'd need it to compete at more elite events, or for track and field stuff. So maybe not having a licence would be a good thing, if it meant I was ineligible for that type of torture. But overall I like having it, and I take it out and play with it. I don't like it because it's actually any use, it's more the fact that I am a registered, approved, properly licensed athlete that puts a smile on my face.

---------------------------

On a different subject, I despair at the state of school sports in this country. When I'm out for a run, it's quite pathetic that the local chavs can only keep up with me for a matter of metres before running out of steam. Particularly when I've just run up a nasty hill the day after a half marathon PB.

Obviously, I don't want them to suddenly get impressively fit, because for my own safety I prefer to be able to outrun them (particularly when there's a pack of them as happened last night on a record three occasions). But it would be nice if their sprint pace was a bit closer to my easy run pace...

Make Friday Count

2008-02-25T21:46:00.002Z

My sister has been finding this campaign rather appropriate recently. I'm not suggesting that everyone should use the extra day to get married and make a donation to Cancer Research instead of expensive favours, but it's still a nice idea, to challenge people to do something a bit different with the extra day.

So, it's Wedding Week. I was over in St Annes at the weekend for things like the Final (or First, depending how you look at it) Dress Fitting to be taught how to lace it up (the dress actually only arrived on Saturday morning, one of the hazards or organising a wedding quickly!), and checking that you can't see my bra under my dress. I also managed to sneak in a half marathon PB on Sunday morning, being dropped off at the start by my sister on her way to pick up the mens suits.

Everything is pretty much in place and ready to go, and I just need to get through to Wednesday evening at work, then I can switch back into wedding mode. This week's main jobs involve trying to sort out my skin (why oh why did it have to erupt now?), getting a sleeping bag for Thursday night's girlie sleepover (done this lunchtime), remembering to buy some tights, trying to fit my long run in on Wednesday evening so I don't need to do it over the weekend, and trying not to catch a cold (I got a stern telling off on Sunday morning that if I dared catch a cold while racing she wouldn't be happy. I then switched to a long sleeve top and sweated my way round the course).

I also need to work out what I'm actually meant to be doing as part of my bridesmaid-ly duties. On the basis I haven't been to a wedding for 13 years, let alone participated in one, any tips or advice would be most welcome!

Meanwhile I'll just carry on getting excited.

Rugby players

2008-02-21T22:56:00.002Z

2 posts! You're honoured...

I remember when I first joined the gym I had that nightmare that I'd walk into the gym, everyone would be super fit and they'd just laugh at my pathetic attempts. It didn't happen, but all I can say is that it's a good job my first morning in the gym wasn't this morning.

My gym is a hotel gym, and it's a hotel that tends to be used by a variety of sports teams. I've bumped into a few familiar faces in reception (and had moments of panic when I realise that an international rugby team is sitting by the windows that separate the pool from the restaurant as I emerge in my bikini). However, I've never walked into the gym to find six or seven professional rugby league players working out in there. Usually they do their training at facilities outside the hotel and just wander round the other bits of the place while I'm in the gym.

This morning it was Melbourne Storm, over in Leeds for the World Club Challenge next week (the same day as the wedding, as it happens). I think it was more of a post flight loosener than a proper training session, but boy did those guys look big and muscle-bound. I'm pleased to say that instead of running to hide in a corner, I wandered round happily in lycra and did my stuff. It's my gym after all, and they're not going to intimidate me out of it. Besides, I was wearing my Amsterdam t-shirt, and how many of them could run a marathon? Judging by their efforts on the treadmills, I'd at least hold my own in the distance running department (although they would clearly slaughter me on upper body strength). I'm an athlete too, you know...

And I am. That was one of the things that really struck me during the Great North Run. These guys might have their talents for one sport, but they're not superhuman. Their eyes were just as disbelieving when I said I run sub 4 marathons, as mine are when I'm watching the punishment they put themselves through on the pitch, or the weights they lift in the gym. OK, I'm never going to reach the top of my sport, but neither am I right at the bottom of it. I am more than good enough for the casual runner to say to me "you're fast, then" when I tell them my times.

It was quite amusing really, at one point one of them kicked over a water bottle (instead of using a sports bottle like the rest he'd clearly just grabbed a bottle of water from the mini bar which had no lid on it) onto my mat while I was doing sit ups on a ball. There I am, sitting on my ball while a professional rugby player on his hands and knees wipes the area round my feet with a towel. That doesn't happen every day, you know! (Neither does the sight I got when I went back in there this evening to dump some stuff in a locker, which was various rugby players in nothing more than pants - they've got a room behind reception they use, and for some reason they leave the door open while they get up to all sorts of things I don't want to imagine...)

Anyway, I'd better stop rambling. I've been out for a curry with running club and am a little more pissed than I should be.

Silence

2008-02-20T21:11:00.002Z

I've been a bit quiet recently. I don't seem to have felt like sitting down at the computer and writing about stuff. It's not that there's anything bad going on, and I keep on thinking "ooh, I should write about that", but I never quite get round to it. I'm not in the house much at the moment (blame marathon training for that!), and when I am I tend to have other things I want to do that don't involve the computer.

Plus I'm deep into the final stages of wedding preparations. This time next week I'll be packing my bags and getting an early night in readiness for an obscenely early train to St Annes next Thursday morning for a 10am nail and eyebrow appointment. And in 10 days my little sister will be a married woman!

It will be an emotional day, and she's planned some things that may set me off (and will certainly set my grandfather off) - cancer research pin badges as favours for a start, and then her bouquet is being saved to put on the grave the day after, but it will also be lovely to see family and friends I haven't seen for ages. My American uncle, the godmother who's got the evil double whammy of breast and lung cancer, the people who lived next door to us until we moved when I was 6.

I'm just hoping it warms up a bit. That bridesmaid dress isn't particularly substantial, and if it's as cold as it has been for the past few days (yesterday on my run my eyelashes froze and I had to pick the ice out of them at the end), I'll be taking one of my emergency foil blankets with me!

Today I...

2008-02-11T21:40:00.000Z

...ran with the fast group!!! woo hoo!!!

The back of the fast group, but the fast group nevertheless.

I also started to waver on my "only one mara this year" plan. I didn't get into the GNR again, and then noticed that a mara I've been considering was actually the same day. And obviously not running a half is a reason to run a full...

Loch Ness here I come?

Surprisingly Chilled

2008-02-10T19:27:00.000Z

I have to admit, I wasn't looking forward to this weekend much. Ages ago I arranged to go down to London for the first Wigan match of the season, where I was meant to be a guest of honour with the rest of the New York team. But the person who was organising it left Quins, so that wasn't going to happen, and the rest of February got horribly booked up meaning that a weekend away was the last thing I fancied.

But still, they're my team, it was booked, so I may as well go. But onstead of doing my normal "must do as much as possible in 48 hours" approach, I decided to relax a bit. I didn't stay in central London, and based myself in Richmond instead. I travelled down on Friday night meaning that although I had to pay for an extra night in a hotel, it would give me time for my long run on Saturday morning. I didn't worry about all the things I wanted to do in London. They will still be there next time (or, given that next time is the marathon, maybe the time after that). I just spent the weekend relaxing and spending some time with myself without the distractions I have at home.

The weather was perfect, so I had a lovely long run on Saturday (longer than I intended, but I picked up the pace towards the end so clearly not too long), I went to the rugby, and I went to the cinema. I sat in cafes reading the paper, and I ate. All stuff I can do at home, but never seem to get round to.

I didn't do the old "I'm on holiday so calories don't count" routine. Even though I'd done a long run and mentally gave myself some leeway, the back to basics approach seems to be working. I craved vegetable soup and salad rather than cake and hot chocolate. Since I got back onto good food I can really feel the difference in myself, so I didn't want to eat stuff that wouldn't make me feel good.

Even though I didn't really do much other than wander, sit and eat, I feel like it was a weekend well spent.

It also got me back into the swing of the rugby a bit. Recently I've felt myself drifting away from the RL world a bit. I've barely paid any attention to the transfers and friendlies during the off season, and if I'm brutally honest, it no longer has the place in my life it once did. I used to arrange my social life round rugby. I'd meet friends at games, I'd organise my life and my travel round the fixture list, and I'd go to two, even three, games a weekend to meet up with various people. It made me feel like I belonged, and it was who I was.

Now, running ticks a lot of those boxes. I try to fit them both together (like travelling down on Friday to fit the run as well as the match in), but if one has to give way then it might be the rugby. It certainly is on those weekends when I have a target race which clashes with a match.

I no longer need to use a rugby team as my proxies when it comes to sporting achievement. I don't need to pin all my hopes on them. I'd rather get GFA for myself than see them win the league, if I had to choose. Both would be lovely, of course, but I don't need to live out my dreams through other people. I'm starting to see rugby more as a filler like films or music. If there's something good on and I have time, I'll watch it, but if I have something more important I might do that instead.

I just feel a bit disloyal, as though once you're a fan you can't just switch off and desert them. Actually, at the game, once I'd worked out who half our players were, I started to get back into it again and enjoyed it more than I was expecting to. Let's see whether I enjoy the resumption of the Friday night trek to Wigan though...

Dreaming of Summer

2008-02-04T19:37:00.000Z

The days are getting brighter, the super league season is here, and it's time to start thinking about summer again. Proper summer (as opposed to "summer rugby") is still a while off, but I need something to look forward to. This year I think it's time to tackle another item on the to do list - camping.

I've been vaguely thinking about it for a while, but I've been galvanised into action by a wedding invitation. The venue is on a farm and there isn't really any accommodation on the doorstep. There are places in surrounding towns and villages, so I wouldn't be entirely bed-less, but they're a taxi ride away and I have an irrational fear of taxis. But the venue has camping facilities for wedding guests, and it's in July so there's the hope that the weather might be decent for it. Apparently some other people are going for the camping option, so it wouldn't just be me. I think it would be quite fun to stagger from wedding reception to tent without having to worry about how to get back to a hotel - and I think it will be mainly the guests around my age who are camping, so the company should be good.

For one night it probably wouldn't be any cheaper than a hotel, on the basis I'll have to buy all the equipment, but once I've got it, I may as well use it. That's led to me looking at my diary and coming up with other ideas for times I can go with a tent at the weekend. The plan is to go away somewhere for a trial run before the wedding to get the hang of putting the tent up on a day when I've got more time to faff around, and also so if I really hate it I have time to try to find a hotel.

I've started to realise that I'm more of a country girl than a city one, and I like getting out and getting some fresh air. What I don't like is the way guest houses and B&Bs in the Dales and the Lakes require minimum stays at weekends (particularly the Dales which are a bit too close for me to justify staying over on a Friday night as well as Saturday), and I'm not a huge fan of the single supplement either. (On the other hand I am a huge fan of the second B in B&B). But a nice walk, with a tent and a campsite within staggering distance of a pub waiting at the end of it, is starting to sound like a good idea for spur of the minute weekends away in summer.

I really like the idea of camping, so let's hope I like the reality just as much. And let's hope we get a slightly drier and warmer summer this year so I can make the most of it.

-----------------------------------

Speaking of weekends and summer, over the weekend I think I came to a decision. Almost every year I spend my birthday on holiday. Quite often I spend it alone in a random foreign city. I never attempt to organise anything with my friends. I don't know why I'm so insecure, but I don't dare plan anything for fear that no-one will turn up. I have this irrational belief that they have better things to do than to spend time with me. I can't remember the last time I had a proper birthday party. Maybe when I was at primary school.

But no more. The joy seems to have been taken out of short breaks by air by the tightened security at airports and the removal of those few remaining frills by the low cost airlines (and who thought that a check in desk was a chargeable frill...). I went through a phase where I would look for somewhere, anywhere, to go, just to escape being home alone. Then I started to realise that if I was trying to run away from something at home it wasn't working, because it came with me. As I started to feel more comfortable with myself, I lost the desire to run away. The enjoyment started to go out of it a bit, even once I'd braved the stupidly early check in, the horror of the airport, and the constant selling on the flights.

So instead I'll be at home for my birthday, it's my 30th (yikes!), and it's a Saturday. Everything is nicely lined up for a celebration. I've toyed with various ideas, but think I'm actually going to surprise myself with my choice. This post really does go from one extreme to another. I've never really been one for being pampered, but I really enjoyed the spa on Saturday and think I'm going to use my birthday as an excuse to go back. Annette says she'll come with me, and I'm coming up with a list of friends who may be up for it. Then a nice civilised meal at a restaurant in Leeds in the evening which I'll invite more people to, even if they can't justify the expense of the spa during the day (so many people seem to be getting married at the moment, and with all the hen dos there are only so many spa trips and weekends away a girl can afford). If it's just me and Annette, so be it, but I'm starting to actually have a belief that there are people out there who would come to my party if only I'd get round to organising one.

Let's face it, because I'm not going to get married any time soon I don't have that excuse for getting everyone together to celebrate. I may as well make the most of the opportunity I do have.

Hen Do!

2008-02-02T08:34:00.000Z

This weekend is my little sister's big hen do. It's one of those events that isn't going to come round too often (we hope!) so I'm throwing myself into another weekend with people I barely know. Actually, that's a bit less true than the last couple of parties I went to where I really didn't know anyone other than the host, as I've met them on occasion, but I've never been out with most of her friends.

Last evening was a relatively sedate dinner at her best friend's house just outside Leeds. Today we're going for a spa day, then it's up to Newcastle for a night out before I leave them and head to Rochdale for Sunday lunch with some of my own friends (which had been planned before she decided the date of the hen do). Fingers crossed it will all be fun and I won't be too tired come Monday, as there's a lot of driving to add to the partying (although I've got a nice upgrade on my hire car so will be doing it in comfort).

That sort of schedule isn't very conducive to marathon training so I planned ahead and did my long run on Wednesday (believe me, setting out to do 15 miles when it's already dark isn't much fun, although when I finished I was glad I'd done it), and I've also done my interval and tempo runs for the week. That leaves me with 3 - 4 miles easy. I was considering doing it this morning before setting off, but it's snowing, so I might take one of the two back up options. One is that both the spa and the hotel have gyms, so if I have a spare half hour I could jump on a treadmill. The second is that skipping a 4 mile run and giving my body a bit of rest isn't going to kill me and may well be a good thing. So I'll enjoy myself and not get hung up on it.

Last night something hit me though. I was driving up to Louisa's, and it took me a good 20 - 25 minutes. The roads weren't that busy, that's just how long it takes with all the junctions, roundabouts, traffic lights and so on. And then I realised that I have been known to run there (well not to her house, but to the canal bridge that's pretty near it). And that on the occasions I've run there it's roughly half way through my run. It felt like quite a long way when I was driving it, even though when I run it I don't actually think of it as being that bad.

My measurement of distance when I'm running is getting good though. I'm quite good at setting off for a run with a mileage target in mind and picking a route that will be the right length without actually checking it by measuring it online first. I sometimes adjust it on the run, but it's rare that I find myself miles from where I want to be with no energy left in the legs. If I want a 6 mile run to work rather than 5 or 7 I think a bit, come up with one, and it usually works out right.

Anyway, enough rabbiting on, I must go and get ready for a bit of pampering!

Mojo

2008-01-29T20:39:00.000Z

It seems to be coming back. I had a really good day at work today (leading a negotiation all by myself, against the head of legal at a household name company - and coming out of it quite well), and I had a fab interval run this morning. I even got a smile from the new Runners World, when I saw tips from "one of the UK's top ultra runners", and realised that I've beaten her in two 5ks since Christmas. OK, so the ultra runner part of that probably indicates that 5k isn't her best distance, but I'll still feel a little smug about it for a day or two. And, finally, the back to basics approach to eating seems to be paying off, I was (finally) down a couple of pounds this morning. I just need remember not to start eating to celebrate...

But I still have moments where something makes me have a quick moment of remembering. My meeting was in Warrington, where we used to go a lot with my grandparents when I was little. And every time we went, they used to tell me that it was the first place I ever saw snow. Who do I have to tell me that now?

And then watching Blackpool Medics. It's not the sort of thing that I normally watch, but I had my reasons. We saw the film crews around the hospital a fair amount while she was being treated. And I'd heard that they were with the ambulance crew that came out when she had her first real dementia type episode while I was in New York. They refused to take her to A and E because it was a Saturday night, bonfire night, and the last night of the illuminations, and they said that A and E was possibly the worst place for her to be in the state she was in. And lo and behold, they showed footage of the other jobs the ambulance crew went out on that night (and the voiceover said pretty much the same thing, that it could be a busy night with drunkeness and injury). Even though we knew they wouldn't show her as they didn't actually film it, it was still odd to see the same crew, wondering whether that was just before, or just after.

The programme did wind me up though. It was all cheery, look at how the hospital is helping these people. All the positive, happy stories, the ones where things turn out in the end. That's not the whole picture, and the hospital isn't just this nice place where people get made better. Sometimes that just doesn't happen.

It never rains...

2008-01-25T19:48:00.000Z

Sometimes it really does feel like we're lurching from crisis to crisis. My mother has managed to get herself banned from driving for a year. No, it's not for doing anything stupid behind the wheel, it's because she fainted earlier today, and my grandfather's doctor (who she's never seen before as a patient) decided it was an epileptic fit. To be fair, her medical records do mention epilepsy, but on the basis she hasn't suffered a fit for years (I can certainly never remember her having one), and she has drugs which manage it to be on the safe side, she's not convinced he's right. But she's flying back to Spain tomorrow and can't get a second opinion from her own doctor for another month. To be fair, he hasn't taken her licence off her officially, but clearly no insurance company would pay out if she drove against his advice so it's as good as a ban until she gets it checked out in more detail.

The ironic thing is that my grandfather has a history of strange seizures, and the same doctor has absolutely no problems with letting him keep his licence. Given that he also has cataracts, I know who I'd rather have driving me...

Meanwhile, I'm engaged in a running battle with the New York people about making up the shortfall in my sponsorship. I have no problem with doing so, but because of grandma's illness I'm a bit behind schedule and wanted to do a bit more chasing up of people who said they'd donate before making up any remaining shortfall. Having not heard a word from them since New York I went to them at the start of the month with a clear proposal of what I planned to do and the timescales involved.

They ignored me for a while. Then on Wednesday they demanded payment by the end of the month, which basically means paying it myself because I am seeing most of the people I planned to chase in February, and can't get money off them within a week. I didn't think that was a particularly reasonable attitude from them. If they wanted to impose a deadline they could have mentioned it the first time I contacted them, not a week before. In fact, they could have chased me in November or December rather than waiting for me to get in touch to sort things out.

I've come to the conclusion that it's not about the money any more, they still hold a grudge about what happened in New York, and they want to threaten and bully me into doing things their way rather than accepting my way of dealing with it. Their emails have got more and more stroppy, despite me taking every effort to keep emotion out of things. It's about power, not about money.

But they've picked the wrong person for a fight. I don't go out looking for fights, but I don't run away from them either if anyone is stupid enough to pick one. Particularly when the fight is on home turf as it were, involving threats of legal action. I've not worked in a law firm for six years and not picked up a trick or two.

Essentially I've worked out a way to get the timescales I want while leaving them almost no comeback. It is almost perfect in every detail, and will sort things out relatively quickly (because to be honest I don't want to spend any more time stressing about it, and I don't want to remember the argument more than the good things that happened while I was over there), while making it clear that I've got the upper hand this time.

Oh yes, two can play their little game...

6 weeks on

2008-01-22T20:05:00.000Z

Yesterday it was part 2 of the funeral. Having had the funeral service and cremation, it was time to bury the casket with grandma's ashes in, so it was back to Abram church for another service. (Incidentally, I realised that of my first 3 days holiday this year, two of them involve church services - not bad considering before December I hadn't been to a church service since a carol service in 1998!)

I hadn't actually realised how much the whole thing had hit me back in December until I was able to compare how much emotionally stronger I feel now than I did then. I managed to get through the service without crying, and I managed to get through lunch without attacking the buffet as though I'd never seen food before. I even managed conversation instead of just shovelling food into my mouth. I actually realised that I was coming out of that long dark tunnel at last. I'm not there yet, I still have moments where I feel down, but I'm getting there.

I think part of it is the fact that I've got my life back again. I've fallen back into a marathon training plan, which is going pretty well at the moment, and has given me some structure back again. I have free evenings and weekends which I have spent having days out and going to the cinema. I've met up with friends I haven't seen for months. I can make plans more than a day in advance without feeling like they might need to change at any minute. Even my evenings seem longer (and I've just realised why - it's because I don't spend them on the phone discussing the developments of the day).

I've even finally got round to one of the things I've been vaguely promising myself since I first hit goal. Admittedly it's only happening because it's part of Annette's hen do, but I'm finally going to a spa for some pampering. I always baulk slightly at the cost, it always seems a lot of money to be spending on myself without having anything tangible to take away, but my little sister is only (hopefully!) going to get married once so I don't want to be whingeing about money for her hen do.

The stupid thing is that I'm still worrying about my body and revealing a part of it for treatment, but it's not anything to do with stripping down to my undies for a massage. No, it's the fact that the hen party package includes a pedicure, and my feet are made for running not for tarting up. Not least because while I'm there I'm planning to use some of the relaxation/sitting around time to hop on a treadmill and get a run in, because it will be my only chance during the weekend, so either the pedicure will involve feet "fresh" from a run, or the run will involve wrecking the newly pampered feet!

Roundup

2008-01-19T18:35:00.000Z

Interesting developments at running club. There has been a revolt in the slow group because over recent months, more and more people have started going out with them. This means that as well as the genuinely slow, a lot of the people who are nearer the slow end of the medium group have started running with the slow group. Typically on a club run well over half the people there, maybe even two thirds will go out with the slow group, leaving not many to run with the other two groups.

So the slowest of the slow have asked for the slow group to be split into two, so that there are now 4 groups. As I tend to run in the medium group, that shouldn't affect me, but it got me thinking. Why weren't the faster end of the slow group moving up to the medium group, instead of annoying the slowest people? And then it hit me. The medium group is getting faster. The chairman of the club always used to lead the medium group, but now finds himself trailing behind, and has said that he might go out with the faster half of the slow group.

And then on Monday something else hit me. Mid way round the run, the faster runners normally end up doing a slightly longer route. As usual we split up, some of the medium group and most of the fast group. As we got near the leisure centre I realised something. One of the fast group was behind me. Is the problem with the slow group partly caused by the fact that I'm too scared to attempt to run with the fast group? (OK, it's not just me who runs at roughly my speed in the medium group, but should someone in that little group take the lead in trying to run with the fast lads?)

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On Thursday I had a meeting followed by lunch with a client in the sports industry. Conversation turned to different approaches towards making people fitter, healthier and thinner, both in this country and abroad. At this point one of the clients started talking about his sister, who has just lost seven stone. Can you imagine, he said.

I struggle to know what to do in that situation. Socially, I'm more relaxed about coming clean about it, but in a professional environment I'm not always convined that it's appropriate to share details like that. I'm their lawyer, and I'd rather they didn't think about or discuss my body. I didn't want to come across as sounding like I was trying to go one better and turn it into a competition "seven stone, that's nothing, I lost eight". How do you say that yes, I can imagine perfectly well, without going into territory that doesn't fit the client-lawyer relationship?

The client was a long term client too, one of those where I know perfectly well that I've met them before, but they have no recollection of meeting me. I know that I sat in on meetings when I was a trainee and took notes, but I haven't seen them for a few years. They don't realise that was me, and they don't connect the two people.

I just went quiet, I still struggle to know what to say sometimes.

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Another situation in which I struggle to know what to say. I had my appraisal and Joanne used the P word. Partner. Apparently the support for my associate application was unanimous among the partners in Leeds, which I hadn't realised (and I keep thinking of random partners who I hadn't realised had even noticed me, let alone supported me). But I don't know whether partnership is what I want, even if I did think I was capable of it. It's not a short term thing, but an interesting thought to ponder.

Revolting Runners

2008-01-15T16:39:00.000Z

It seems as though the prospect of me running round the civic hall in lycra has proved enough to force Leeds City Council into a rethink. I don't blame them, it's not a pretty sight, particularly when I'm angry! OK, so it wasn't just me who was going to turn up, there was a planned protest tomorrow night with representatives from all the running clubs in Leeds, and I was going to be one of them. But it looks like we might not be needed after all. Which is a good thing, but in a strange way I was almost looking for it, it would have been good fun and a chance to meet some of the runners from other clubs I talk to on the internet but haven't actually met in person.

No firm details yet, but it looks like we have a half back - in September this year, but any time is better than nothing.

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At work at the moment all the talk is of the impending office move. I unofficially know where we're going (having been told by a partner before that partner realised she wasn't meant to tell anyone), and at first it sounded good - it's literally next door to my gym, I was worried about the prospect of being the other side of the city.

But then I realised that this has downsides. The latest rumour is that they're negotiating a corporate rate at my gym. Again, this should be good. I get my gym membership cheaper. Buuuut... my gym is where I go to escape from work. A swim in the morning chills me out and lets me forget about the impending work day. It wouldn't have the same effect if I could see a partner in swimming trunks sitting in the sauna. That sight would more likely have me running for the exit. Except it wouldn't, because to escape I'd have to get out of the pool and reveal myself complete with swimwear. The same goes when I'm sweating it out in the gym. I don't want to be doing it in the company of anyone from work.

This isn't being a being ashamed of exercising, or thinking I look like an idiot when I'm on the treadmill thing. They know I run and work out, and I'll happily wander through the office in running kit if I get out of the office, change, then realise I've forgotten something. But when I'm exercising that's my space, my time, and I don't want anyone from work encroaching on it.

And if that wasn't a good enough reason, I'm trying to block the minefield of showers and changing rooms out of my head...

Realistically I know that the office move won't make anyone join a gym. They'll still have to pay, even if it's a bit cheaper than normal rate, so if they don't want to pay in the first place it won't change their minds. And if they're already a gym member, they might not think that mine is the sort of place they want to move to. The new office isn't far enough away from the old one to make that much difference, and mine doesn't offer all the classes and whizziness of the big gyms in town. But still I feel protective of it. It's my gym, and I like it just the way it is.

The other move related stress, which I'm trying to ignore for now, is the lack of microwaves in the new place. How will I live without porridge and soup?!

Success

2008-01-13T16:05:00.000Z

I had a surprisingly good time last night, although I'm still not converted to Thai food really. Don't get me wrong, I didn't hate it or anything like that, but if I was going to choose somewhere to go out to eat, or to get takeaway from, there would be lots of types of food that ranked higher on the wish list than Thai. I suppose at least it's one less thing to have cravings for! (btw it was Sukhothai in Chapel Allerton)

But, from a being chatty and nice to people I'd never met before point of view it was an unqualified success. I'd normally avoid putting myself in that sort of situation like the plague, but I actually got on with everyone really well, and didn't feel that I was out of place because I was the only running person there. I wasn't left sitting in a corner or having no-one to talk to, and I went on to the pub for a drink after the meal ended when, if it had been a disaster, I'd have been running at top speed to the bus stop.

It was another of those evenings though when you realise that people just don't know. Liz, whose birthday it was, must have missed the great coming out to running club moment a few months ago, and for some reason assumed that I'd always been a fast runner. And talking to one of her friends, he used the words skinny and (unless it was a drunken mishearing) tiny, then blinked with disbelief when I told him how much I'd lost. You could see his mind ticking over as he tried to visualise where it used to be.

So I must remember next time I go out with people I don't know, it's one way to make sure I'm the centre of a conversation...

Save the Leeds Half

2008-01-11T19:14:00.000Z

I remember a day in May 2005 when I was getting to the stage where I was nearly ready to run my first 5k (Race for Life). I'd just about managed 5k on the treadmill for the first time.

I made a weekend trip to the gym and saw all the preparations for the Leeds Half. That put a thought in my head that changed my life. It was the first time I ever really considered taking my running further and building up from being a treadmill jogger and charity event participant to being a Runner. With a capital R.

My mind started ticking over, and I came up with a vague plan to build up to a 10k then a half. As it turned out, I did run a half (or three) in 2006, although not Leeds because I was on holiday, but I finally lined up at the start for the 2007 race as I'd planned two years earlier. It isn't the most scenic half I've ever done, and it wasn't my fastest, but it was significant for me to have achieved that aim.

But, it seems, it's a good job I managed to fit the race into my Edinburgh training schedule last year, because the council have scrapped it for this year and, once a race is scrapped, who knows if it will ever be revived. I'm gutted, and more than a little annoyed about it. They've already tried to kill my club 10k race by refusing to let us run it on the roads, and now they're taking away the Leeds Half too.

They claim that they are still committed to running, because they've got the new Jane Tomlinson 10k and the Abbey Dash. I'm sorry, but those are both 10ks, and they're both overtly charity focussed. They're not the same type of event by any means, and if anyone thinks that a charity 10k is a suitable replacement for a half marathon they're clearly not a runner. To use the Jane Tomlinson race as a way of killing off a long running half seems like an appalling "tribute" to someone who was far better known for running endurance events than 10ks.

A campaign is afoot to save the race, with emails flying all over the place, a facebook group, and there's talk of doing a protest "unofficial" Leeds half on the date it would have taken place. Which led me to wonder whether I've turned into not just a runner, but a militant runner...

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Meanwhile, my quest for sociability continues with a shameful confession. I am going for my first ever proper thai meal tomorrow for someone's birthday. It's something that I've never really fancied, but the time has come to take the plunge and see what I've been missing.

When I've tried thai inspired things in pubs or as ready meals (back in the day when I did ready meals) I was never that impressed, so never really gave it a go. If I'm going out for a meal in Leeds I have so many places that I absolutely love that I never take the risk of trying this place, even though everyone says it's really good. But as someone else has chosen, it's time to take the plunge.

Tips and suggestions of what to try would be more than welcome!

Apart from the food side of it, I'm a little concerned that I'm only going to know one other person there (ie the person whose birthday it is), but I'm working on the assumptions that conversation round a table is an easier way to get to know people than mingling in a bar, and if they're people who are friends of one of my friends, they should be the sort of people I'd like. You never know, I might even have a really good time.

---------------------------

Operation clean up my eating continues, with a week in which I have made no trips to Starbucks (not even for camomile tea, which was last week's half way house), a mere one trip to the vending machine, and drunk precisely 0 units of alcohol between Monday morning and 5pm on Friday. I'm still eating up my christmas goodies, but not bingeing on them, and I'm craving fresh fruit and veg more than I am chocolate.

I wish I'd taken a photo of my shopping before I put it away too, I'm even tempted to scan the receipt for posterity. Even by my standards it was a remarkably clean shop and very colourful!

Colour Control

2008-01-09T21:14:00.000Z

I seem to be getting slowly but surely back on track. I'm steering my snack choices away from chocolate and flapjack, towards fruit and veg, and my drinks away from hot chocolate and wine towards camomile and fruit teas. I even managed to persuade myself to cycle into work yesterday for what seems like the first time in months, and my gym going is fitting back into more of a routine.

I've come up with a new little challenge for myself. I always respond far better to aiming to do good things, rather than aiming not to do bad ones. One thing I always make sure I do is get my 5 a day, the problem recently has been the other stuff I supplement them with, and the little cheats I use to get them. Simple solution - raise the target, meaning that there's less room in the eating plan for anything else. So I now have a little table to fill in every week with the days of the week in columns, and rows for eight different colours (red, yellow, orange, green, blue, purple, white, brown/black), and the aim is to fill as many of them with fruit and veg as I can without always having the same thing for each colour.

Which then leads to me pondering whether beetroot is red or purple, and what colour a pink lady apple is. Some colours are harder than others, and I appreciate that I can't always get them all, but at least I can identify gaps and try to fill them. It's not scientific, but I quite like the structure as a way of making sure that I don't eat the same five fruit and veg every day. It turns my post lunch snack attack into a treasure hunt for something that's a different colour, rather than a furtive trip to the vending machine.

I'm actually surprised by how much difference I'm noticing. My energy levels do seem much more steady, my snack cravings are fading, and my skin does seem to be improving. I'm not sure that my weight has moved very far (if at all), and my mood still goes up and down, but if I'm feeling even just a bit better about myself, which I am then that's a start.

Ilklely Moor baht shoes

2008-01-06T16:52:00.000Z

Today I decided to make the most of my new found spare time, and the fact that the weather was relatively decent, to have a day out. For the first time in ages I felt like I had the energy to spend a free day actually doing something rather than just curling up and trying to get some rest.

So today, it was time to have some adventures with a metrocard. One of the things I like about public transport is the ability to do point to point walks rather than having to get back to your car at the end, so I got myself a day train/bus card, and I headed off. I had an idea of what I wanted to do, but I knew that the ticket gave me the flexibility to change my plans if something else took my fancy.

After getting the bus into town I got the train to Shipley. I had a bit of a wander along the canal, keeping an eye out for any signs of old lock keepers cottages, and made my way to Saltaire. I had a bit of a wander round, although it was pretty quiet at 10am on a Sunday morning.

From there I walked up Shipley Glen, up to Dick Hudson's (a pub) at High Eldwick. I'd heard that this was a popular stopping off point for walkers, so decided to indulge myself with lunch.

From there, it was a trek over Bingley Moor and Ilkley Moor, via the Twelve Apostles, down into Ilkley. I was starting to get a bit more confident in my footing, and in the waterproofing of my trainers, when a muddy patch was rather deeper than I expected, and sucked my shoe right off. By the time I had turned round to retrieve it, having just about found somewhere dryish for my other foot, it was sinking and filling with mud. I had to rummage around in the gloop to find it! Yuk.

So the rest of the walk was a bit of a muddy squelch, and the state of my trouser legs and shoes meant that I decided not to venture into Betty's for a well earned cake at the end. So I just ended up getting the train and bus back home.

I can always tell when I've had a good day out in the fresh air, if I start falling asleep on the train home. Today definitely met that criteria, even though it wasn't even 4pm I was definitely drifting off. I think I'll have a nice hot bath later to try to de-mud my foot a bit, and then I think I'll sleep like a baby!

Never to early to start planning

2008-01-05T18:37:00.001Z

And on a different subject. This, being 2008, I need to decide what the hell I'm doing for my 30th birthday. OK, so it's not in the next month or so, but I like to plan ahead...

At the moment I'm trying to be more sociable. I went to a friend's birthday party last night and I'm going to another one on Saturday. Usually I'd have whinged about the cost of having a car to go up there last night, or the cost of a meal that I don't really fancy, but if nothing else, what happened over the past few months has taught me that this whole life thing is all about people, the connections you make, showing people you care, rather than counting every single penny. I can afford it, so why not do it?

So, I'm currently weighing up two "themes". There's either the traditional piss up, or there's the "I'm a sad fitness freak and I'm going to do something stupidly challenging" option. There haven't been any moves towards sorting something out for the Stockholm mara (which is on my birthday), so I've been pondering other options.

Option 1 is easy. Food in Leeds, drink in Leeds, collapse in a heap somewhere.

Option 2 looks like, if it happens, it will probably be this: it gets fantastic reviews, and can be combined, being a saturday, with a night in a hotel and a few drinks afterwards - except I don't know how many of my Leeds friends I'd be able to persuade to head up there with me, and I might be in the horribly scary position of needing to find people on the running message boards who are running it, and bullying complete strangers into celebrating my 30th.

Decisions, decisions...

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In other "fitness challenge" type news, I almost signed up for a triathlon the other day. It looked perfect, then I checked the date and I'm already committed that weekend. back to the drawing board then.

Moving On

2008-01-03T19:01:00.001Z

A month on, and I'm starting to see light at the end of the tunnel. For the first time in months I have clear weekends in my diary, a bit of time, a bit of space, and a bit of energy to put into the parts of my life that I put on hold in August and never really managed to pick up again. I've already been to running club as many times in January as I did in December, and I'm planning a day out at the weekend doing something fun. It's been a while since I've done that. As I pick the pieces up and put them together again, I feel like it's time to go back to basics.

So this morning I had an encounter I wasn't looking forward to. The post-Christmas date with the scale. Since November I've been slowly but surely gaining weight through parties and comfort eating and drinking lots of wine. I've still been running a fair amount, but some of my other exercise has been a bit erratic - so although my running miles have been similar, I haven't been swimming or cycling anywhere near as much as I used to. Before Christmas I'd made it up to 155, and was a little concerned as to the effect christmas might have had. My clothes are tighter than they should be, and I know that I'm eating too much.

To be fair, it wasn't actually too bad. 156, so only a pound gained from the festive pig-out, even if I am about 8lb up from where I was before Amsterdam. 8lb isn't a disaster. I could still gain a stone or so and be a healthy weight, and it's a mere drop in the ocean compared to the 104lb I'm still down from my heaviest. At my lowest I was wondering whether I'd be better off carrying a few more pounds to fill me out a bit. But I don't want it to turn into 10, or 12, or 14, or 104. I know that what I'm eating now is too much, and not good enough quality, and that if I carry on doing it the regain won't stop here.

I also feel like I should be able to run faster if I'm lighter. There are studies on this, apparently. I don't necessarily want to go much below my Amsterdam weight, but I don't want to be slowed down by being too far above it. Every second counts if I want to get under 3:45. (Although having said that, I won a 5k in a new PB time on Saturday, so I'm hardly slow at the moment).

I know that this sounds remarkably like a new year resolution type thing. This year I want to lose weight, and all that sort of stuff, but it's more about getting back to doing what I used to do, and what I know I should be doing, rather than starting anything new. I know how I need to live to maintain my weight and train properly, I just need to lose a few bad habits that crept in while I was distracted. If I lose the habits and stay this weight, that's OK, but I don't want to keep the habits and carry on edging upwards on the scale.

So I declare war on...

1. Snacking. It keeps my hands busy, and keeps my mind off other things, but it isn't good. Half the time I'm not even hungry, but I want to do something. A bit of fruit, fine, but I must not raid the chocolate machine at work every afternoon, and I must remember that when people bring sweet goodies in for the office to share, there should be some sharing going on rather than me hoovering it all up, picking up a bit more everytime I go past. In the evenings I may need to reinstate my "shut the kitchen door, go upstairs and put the burglar alarm on downstairs" routine, or simply make sure there isn't quite so much rubbish to snack on in the first place.

2. Starbucks. The espresso machine at work was broken for ages so I started going to Starbucks for my caffeine fix. But once I was there instead of getting the nice, low calorie, espresso I'd have had at work, it somehow turned into toffee nut hot chocolate. Full fat. Huge. With cream. And a cake. And I know that doesn't have caffeine in it anyway, but it didn't stop me ordering it. My objection to this one is financial as much as it is weight related, as all those drinks and cakes make a dent in the budget. Now the free machine at work is working again, I should be able to kick the calorie and fat filled drink habit.

3. Alcohol. My comforter of choice. I'm sure I'm not alone in having had rather too few alcohol free days in December, I'm sure, but I can't carry on like that. If I get thirsty in the evenings I need to remember that herbal tea can be as warming as mulled wine, and that I don't need to put a slug of brandy in my (low calorie) hot chocolate (without cream). I'm not going to give it up entirely. I half considered an alcohol ban until London, but with Annette's hen do and wedding as well as various parties sandwiched in there I'm not sure that's realistic. I will, however, aim for moderation and reinstate my "not during the week" ban. And I will try to control the tendency to eat everything in sight once I get a bit tipsy.

4. Pizza. The pizza shop at the end of my road opened a few years ago, and I never set foot through its door until December. That was a big, big, mistake. I discovered that their pizzas are very nice indeed, and lost sight of the fact that even pizza with virtuous sounding aubergine, rocket and sun-dried tomatoes is still pizza. It should not be something I eat every week. Ahem. Now I have more time to shop and cook for myself I will not allow myself to stop in there on my way home from work on a regular basis.

It's not rocket science, and certainly it's not the sort of calorie controlled, points counting hell that half the office seem to have thrown themselves into for the New Year. I'll still finish off my christmas treats, just take a bit more care about doing it slowly. It's just exercising a bit of common sense, and realising that while real life was suspended for a while as more important things took over, there's no reason for that to become my way of life on a permanent basis.

It's also the start of my focus on serious training for London. I know from past experience that it helps during marathon training if I'm eating the right stuff, and not feeling sluggish from eating rubbish. I know that if I drink too much and eat rubbish the night before a run, I'll get to three or four miles and have a sudden, desperate and uncontrollable urge to go to the loo. Which isn't nice. My body complains like hell, and yet I still do it. No more, it's time to take my training seriously. If I want to achieve my goals, I need a nutrition plan as well as a running training plan. It's not just about the miles I run, it's about how I feed my body, and what I've been doing recently doesn't cut it for marathon training.

I'm not going to set myself any targets, any deadlines for losing a certain amount of weight. I don't want that. All I want to do is to start feeling good about what I'm eating again. I hate that feeling when I look at the empty flajack wrapper, or pizza box, or wine bottle, and try to work out what possessed me to eat it. I hate the feeling of being out of control, of not being able to take charge of what my hands are reaching for and what my mouth is ordering. I hate looking at my cooking blog and realising that I haven't tried a new recipe worth posting for months (recipe for mashed potato, quorn sausages, peas and gravy, anyone?).

I want my old clean eating life back. I miss it.

Happy New Year

2008-01-01T20:09:00.000Z

So, as usually happens when I'm not in Spain, I stayed in with the tv remote and some wine, but that was fine by me. I'm out for a friend's birthday on Friday, so thought I'd save the hardcore partying for that.

New year is a bit of a non-event to me. It's a date, that's all. I'm not into making big life changing decisions just because it's January. When it came for me, it was July, and because it was right, not because the date changed.

I sometimes make vague resolutions, and witter on about what I want to do in the year ahead. This year, I've narrowed it down to one. I've learned a lot about myself, what makes me tick, what training I need, what food I need, what my goals are, and what I need to work on over the past year. Not just from the high points, like maintaining my weight for another year, running two sub-4 marathons, winning two 5k time trials, but also from the lows. Realising what family and friends do mean to me, even when I don't let them know it. Realising what my priorities in life are - which things stay when time gets short and which can be sacrificed for something more important.

So in 2008, my only aim is to trust my instinct. I know what's best for me now, but there are times when I still struggle to listen to myself. I know that the extra glass of wine won't make me happy, but I drink it anyway. I know what I should do, but I'm too proud or stubborn to do it.

Although, if you want something more concrete, I'm also going to train my arse off to go under 3:45 at FLM...

Christmas

2007-12-28T20:07:00.000Z

It probably won't come as a great surprise when I say that Christmas this year wasn't particularly Christmassy. What with all the illness and death that went on in early December, and spending Christmas in the sun without my sister and her fiancee, it just wasn't Christmas. That's not to say that it wasn't exactly what I needed, a nice break from work, good food, good wine, sunshine and all that. I came back ready to face the world again, and feeling more positive and in control than I have done for about three months, but I didn't come back feeling like it was Christmas.

It's not exactly the traditional way to spend Christmas. I got up, went for a quick run, then got changed and headed off with mum and dad down to one of the resorts to get onto a boat for a spot of dolphin hunting. Not hunting in the sense of capturing and killing, of course, but hunting in the sense of getting a good view of them, and finding where they were playing. The main object of the trip was achieved, and we saw a group of striped dolphins, including some babies, but it was rather surreal.

Sitting on a boat under clear blue skies, looking out to sea, and then over at the island, while White Christmas played over the speakers. My christmas was anything but white. Not only in a literal sense, but it was also far from the "ones I used to know". I suppose it never will be again now, I'll never be 10 again, waiting anxiously for 5am, when we were allowed to start jumping on beds and dragging reluctant adults into the lounge for the great present opening, and grandma will never be there again. That's not to say that Christmas can't be good, and a bit more christmassy, in the future, it just won't be the same.

After the boat we had a light-ish picnic lunch by the port, then went to a bar that my dad does the website for, and had a bit of a chat with the owner, and a couple of drinks with him. Then back home, where we started preparing the meal. The advantage of both my parents being over in England for the funeral was that we had far better stocks of English christmas food than normal - parsnips, mince pies, cranberry sauce, cheese, christmas pudding and what sometimes seemed like half the stock of Marks and Spencers. At one point they were discussing the logistics of smuggling a turkey over in their case, but thankfully they decided they'd be able to find one over there - and luckily for them they were rights.

And then, only after all that, did we get round to opening presents. None of us had really had any time to shop this year, or even to think about what we wanted and drop suitably unsubtle hints, so it was a bit of a low key present opening. Not to say that I didn't appreciate what I was given, but for me, the most valuable thing I came back home with wasn't a christmas present at all. It was my share of grandma's jewellery box.

I've never been a jewellery person at all. Sometimes I just don't care that much about what I look like, and other times it's more of a practicality thing - if I can't run in it, wearing it at other times involves taking it on and off, and the times when I remember to put it on are few and far between. I also had a deeper seated dislike of rings. Rightly or wrongly I kind of saw them as a sign of ownership, that someone gives you a ring, and when you wear it it's a warning sign that you're taken by that someone. Or maybe it was just bitterness that no-one has ever bought me much that's worth wearing.

But she had worked out who she wanted to have her various bits of jewellery, and my name was on a diamond and sapphire eternity ring. I wore it to the funeral (the advantage of losing weight - it actually fit me without alteration!) and it started growing on me. I started to love how it looked on my finger, and I liked wearing it. The only problem was that I worried about how it would stand up to the rigours of sweat and, on holiday, sand. So I decided to take it off in Spain, at which point mum offered me an alternative.

She had been left two almost identical rings. One was grandma's wedding ring, the other was my grandad's mother's (grandma's mother in law - but having no daughters, the ring worked it s way down to her). Mum said that she couldn't wear three wedding rings at once, and offered me the older one. I was less worried about its fragility, as it didn't have the stones, and started wearing it, and falling in love again.

So now I have the two rings, and a renewed relationship with jewellery. I realise that it's not a sign of ownership, imposed on someone unwilling, but a sign that you want to remember or respect that other person the ring came from. And wearing those rings means more to me than any christmas present could.

Not least for an unintended effect. While I was in Spain I ran almost every morning, and by the end of the holiday I was quite a familiar sight to the early morning dog owners and power walkers. I'd get a nod, or a buenos dias. Because I spent quite a few days walking up and down the seafront in town anyway, I'd see some of them again later in the day when I was properly clothed.

The day before I came home, someone who would see me in the morning and then run himself later in the day came up behind me while I was walking along and unleashed a torrent of Spanish. As he ran past he realised I was wearing an ipod, and that I hadn't taken it in, but carried on running. A bit later he ran past again on a second lap, but this time he stopped and sat down on the bench I was sitting on.

Yup, full chat up situation. Sadly, I couldn't use my no habla espanol line, as he then switched into English that was undoubtedly better than my Spanish (although we ended up in a vague Spanglish mix after a while). Apparently my eyes are like lighthouses. That bit was in English, and to give him credit that's far better than I could have come up with in Spanish...

He was quite sweet, but he was rather older than me, and not exactly my cup of tea. I was trying to shake him off gently and politely, making the most of the fact that I was flying home the next day and therefore needed to pack instead of going out for a drink with him. And then he spotted it. A wedding ring on the ring finger of my right hand. Oh joy, the Spanish wear their rings on the opposite hand to the English, and there are certain situations where you don't want to correct the misunderstanding that may arise.

Thanks, grandma, and the great-grandmother I never knew...

Drained

2007-12-12T20:50:00.000Z

Just as I got some news that should have perked me up (well, it did, but not for too long, but more of that later), I seem to have hit a slump.

For the last week or so I've tended to pull on my trainers and head out for a run to try to clear my head a bit. I did something stupid like 40+ miles last week. Then over the past couple of days I've been driving all over the place, picking my dad up from the airport, driving people round for the funeral etc, driving back to Leeds (I ended up doing 350 miles in little over 24 hours, which for me is a lot). And I've just run out of energy.

I just feel like I'm dragging myself through to the end of the week. I struggle to get interested in anything, to motivate myself to do anything. I couldn't even motivate myself to change my shoes, put my coat on and leave work earlier, and just ended up sitting there trying to get the energy to move.

I got into work to find a christmas present and card, and a sympathy type card on my chair. It took me until 4pm to actually open them. I didn't run this evening, needless to say. But neither did I make an attempt to start packing to go to Spain on Saturday morning.

The trip seems to have snuck up on me. For a while I was trying to ignore it because I really didn't know whether I'd be able to go, or whether christmas would be spent in hospices in Blackpool. And it's hard to find too much pleasure in the fact that I am going, other than the fact that it might give me the opportunity to clear my head and find some spark again.

Because I need spark. I'm counting down to the start of my next round of marathon training because....

I GOT A PLACE FOR LONDON!!!

I've had the occasional moment of excitement when I filled in my form, or tried to work out travel arrangements, but I'm still strugging a bit to look forward to next year. Hopefully when I get back I'll be ready to throw myself back into training, and part of my thinking behind skipping the run tonight was that I need to make the most of the opportunity to rest before I start training again. But for now, I think I'm back in the place where 26 miles seems like a very long way, and putting myself through all that training again seems like a very stupid idea.

Fingers crossed that when I get some energy back I'll feel a lot more enthusiastic about training for it!

Santa Dash

2007-12-09T14:58:00.000Z

There's nothing like making a fool of yourself to take your mind off things for a while, and this morning I had the perfect excuse with the Santa Dash.

I didn't know when I entered it whether I'd actually be around today, but I thought it was worth signing up for and making a decision closer to the day. As things turned out I was around, so thought I'd turn up and see what happened.

It was only a mile, and I needed to pick my santa suit up when I got there, so I decided to do a longer run into town first. That led to me dragging myself out of bed at 7.30 after another wine and dvd fuelled night in, and waking myself up with a bracing 12 mile run in the rain.

By the time I got to town the rain was stopping, so I picked up my suit and met up with a load of people from running club, which is where the fun started. Seeing a large group of santa-suit clad people, we got accosted by all sorts of press photographers, and did silly runs up and down Briggate for them. Apparently normal running didn't look as good in the photos as exaggerated long strides. Or that's what they claimed anyway, maybe they just wanted us to look stupid...

After that, it was the warm up. 120 santas doing star jumps and the like. Not to mention the dogs who had turned up in full costume (with their owners), and the truly bizarre "dance" by the sponsors. And then the dash. We decided that we'd run together as a club, rather than anyone racing it (which would have been hard in trousers that seemed to be sized for a sumo wrestler, and beards that gave you a mouth full of fluff whenever you attempted breathing). I have no idea whether it actually was a mile, it felt a bit short (or maybe it was that a mile just does feel short these days?!).

And then, having run in, I had to look on jealously as everyone else changed into normal clothes to go to the pub, while I had a choice of santa suit or running tights. mmm. And after the pub all the other santas had dispersed from town, meaning I got more than a few funny looks on my way to the bus stop, and then on the bus home.

But I don't care, it was a good laugh, it got me out of the house, it got me a bit of a chat with friends over a pint or two, and it got me the fear of being spotted in the papers looking like a bit of an idiot...

PS - can you guess which santa I am?!

The Alternative Christmas Party

2007-12-06T19:12:00.000Z

It is generally agreed by everyone at work that the office christmas party tomorrow night is going to be shit. The venue is too small, and has recently changed hands. The new owners are refurbishing it, and it is closed until February. They wanted to cancel our booking, but we had nowhere else to go so they agreed to open for one night only. The planned sit down meal has turned into a buffet, and it's not looking promising. I haven't been inspired to find something to wear (other than the new shoes), and I didn't fancy the annual battle to get home at the end.

I sometimes like socialising with work people. I went to the ballet with some of them at the weekend, and when I'm in the mood I can have a good time. There are also some who it's painful to spend time with, but when you're in the mood you can put up with that.

I'm not in the mood. Quite possibly the last thing I want to do at the moment is stand around in a rubbish venue, nibbling on rubbish food, drinking cheap alcohol, and pretending I'm having a good time. Grandma died on Monday night, and although it wasn't exactly unexpected, it still hasn't put me in the mood for faking festive spirit. The only spirits I'd be interested in would be neat, in a futile attempt to make myself more sociable.

At one point earlier this month I wanted christmas to be cancelled altogether. There are various christmassy things that set me off (I was glad it was dark at the ballet, as the opening scenes of the Nutcracker reminded me of family christmases when I was little, and when she was the best grandma in the world), and the sight of other people being happy, or at least pretending to be, irritated me. I'm coming round a little. There are some parts of christmas that will be more important than ever this year, like spending time with family and letting them know how much I love them. It's just the commercialisation and forced socialising and merriment I'm struggling with a bit. Christmas isn't about how much money you spend on a present, how much you drink, or whether your coffee comes in a red cup.

There are people I would happily go for a night out with, I'd enjoy myself, and it would be fun. I went to running club last night and was glad of the opportunity for a bit of fresh air and a chat (I might be a comfort eater, but I've also now discovered comfort running to balance it out. After I do a santa dash for a local hospice on Sunday I'm planning a run along the canal, partly because the canal is somewhere I feel close to her). I would happily go to the christmas lights run if it didn't clash with the funeral (and I might go to the drinks afterwards if I get back to Leeds in time). But the people I want to spend time with aren't the people I work with, and I have better uses of my time than going to the party.

It might sound a bit sad of me, but I'm planning the ultimate weepy night in instead. This morning I bought myself a stack of dvds, which include some guaranteed tear jerkers. I'm going to get the lounge set up complete with duvet, chocolate, candles, tissues, mulled wine, takeaway menus and warm socks. I might even get the wood burning stove ready to light. I'm going to sit, watch dvds, relax and get everything out of my system. I was considering inviting some of the running girls round to keep me company, then decided that I'd be better off just being on my own so I don't need to apologise if I want a good cry, or feel like I should be keeping their drinks topped up if I don't want to move.

I've been rushing around so much for the past three or four months that I want to have a night that's just about doing nothing. Not heading into town to try to find something to wear, dashing home to get changed, then trudging back into town for something I won't enjoy. Not thinking about the chores which have gone undone. Not even cooking (although I'm sure that whatever I order, I'll end up whingeing that I could have made something cheaper, better and healthier). Yes, there may be blatant comfort eating, but for one night only anything goes (and in any event, I'm scaling back my plans realising that I probably wouldn't actually be able to get through everything I planned to buy! Even if I do, compared to what I'd probably eat and drink at the party, it's probably not a huge amount worse).

And I'm re-naming it. Instead of thinking that I'm missing the christmas party, and feeling a teeny bit guilty for it, I'm starting to think of my night in as my alternative christmas (pity) party. Of all the things I could do on Friday, it is probably the one that will give me most pleasure, or at least comfort, so it's my night, my party. Who cares if no-one else is invited?

The Fast People

2007-12-01T13:42:00.000Z

This morning I had a bit of a dilemma. Recently a 5k time trial has been set up in Leeds. It runs every Saturday morning, and it's free.

5k isn't really my distance, but I know that there's nothing like doing short, fast efforts to put a bit of speed in the legs, from where it seems to have gone missing a bit since New York. Or maybe it's just that the people I normally run with have got faster.

One of those people ran the TT last week, and was first woman. I know that every time we've been in the same race I've beaten her (2 10ks and a marathon). I improved my marathon time in my autumn marathon, whereas she slowed down a bit, but since then she's definitely had a bit of speed on me as my legs go through the recovery process. We get on really well, but there's definitely a bit of healthy rivalry in this friendship.

She said that last week there weren't as many of the fastest runners, because of the Abbey Dash the day after. A quick check of the results shows that although her winning time of 22:something is decent enough, it's nowhere near the times that had won it in other weeks. But a win is a win. It did mean, though, that I didn't expect that I would be able to repeat the feat on a weekend without the Abbey Dash.

I also had the dilemma that Saturday is my long run day. Even though I'm not marathon training at the moment, I know that I will be again relatively soon, and I don't want my long run to get too short. 10 - 13 miles is the target. Not 5k.

Anyway, I came up with a plan. I would run the 4 or 5 miles to the time trial very gently (there isn't a direct bus so it was that or cycling anyway), run it, and then run home again. I was confident I could still get a new PB on the basis that I haven't run a 5k for 18 months or so, and my 5k PB was run at a slower pace than my 10k PB. And then if I liked it, I might take it more seriously next time. I'd get my long run done on the basis I had somewhere definite I needed to get to, so couldn't cut it short, and would do a bit of a speed session in the middle.

First problem, it started ridiculously early, and adding on a45 minute or so run to get there meant that I had to leave at about 8. So when I woke up at 7.20 it didn't give me long to digest my breakfast before setting out! But it was a nice morning, so I decided that wasn't a good enough excuse to skive off, and set out as planned.

I got to the start and met up with a couple of people from running club. I do like the fact that I can turn up at a race and almost always bump into someone I know. Or at least the local races. Someone who had done it before described the course, and I sized up the opposition. One girl was running around warming up (I always used to be wary of people who took these things seriously enough to warm up properly - until I started being the sort of person who does a 4.5 mile warm up for a 5k...), and someone said that they thought she'd done it before and gone under 20 minutes. I made a mental note not to try to keep up, my target was to do a similar time to Eleanor's, rather than aiming for a particular placing.

When it was time to set off, a couple of girls hared off, but I didn't really keep count. Because the start was slightly downhill people set off fast, but I overtook a couple of them soon enough. The course was one small lap of the park and then two bigger ones, and as I got to the end of the first lap one of the marshalls said that I was 3rd woman. I was quite pleased with that, as I hadn't kept count of how many were ahead of me. I was even more pleased when I realised that I could see the two other women, and they weren't far ahead at all. It might have been a case of mistaken identity or a case of tired legs, but the woman I'd seen warming up didn't look like she was going to go sub-20.

On the second lap I overtook the other woman, to move into second place. I was checking my watch and thought that I could probably dip under 23 minutes, which was my target. I still wasn't chasing the woman in front as such. I could see her, but was concentrating on my own run. Because it's a time trial rather than a proper race, the important thing is to improve your own time, rather than winning. There are no prizes other than a mention on the website.

But after going past the finish for the second time, heading into the last lap, I realised that I was gaining ground. This was my chance for glory, which suddenly started to matter to me. At the 4k marker I was sitting on her shoulder considering my options. I've never had to really think up race tactics before, but I knew that I don't have a sprint finish. Whichever race I'm doing I'm always overtaken by a whole bunch of people right at the end as I plod to the line at my normal speed, while they find that last burst of energy. I knew that if I was still on her shoulder, or she on mine, at the end, she'd win it. So I needed to overtake and make a break to give me enough of a gap to hold her off. I knew that she was slowing from her earlier pace, but maybe she was just coasting a bit while she was in the lead and would pick it up once she realised where I was? I've seen that often enough - as you try to overtake someone they speed up. Although that's mainly men who don't like being beaten by women...

I saw a slight hill. Not a big one, but enough to use a bit of power. I hate hills, but I've started to notice that they're where I tend to be able to open up gaps on people. This was my chance. I gritted my teeth, attacked the hill, and went past. I was in the lead! From there I had half, maybe a bit more, of a kilometre to go, and I knew that I needed to hold her off. This is where I started getting serious, I wasn't going to let that lead go, and I dragged myself towards that line as fast as I could. I surprised myself by lapping not only walkers, but people who were actually running it and I started to smile.

I've never won a race before, and even though it wasn't a proper pay to enter, win prizes type of race, and even though my winning time was 10 or 15 seconds slower than Eleanor's (although still under 23 minutes), I'm still walking around with a beaming smile. I took on everyone who turned up this week, and I beat them all. Or at least the women. I was 22nd overall, and 1st woman. I don't know how many there were in total, last week it was about 60, the week before nearer 100. But all the women were behind me. Fingers crossed I'll get credited with it - even though I registered, they couldn't find me on the computer at the end so had to write my details down.

And then I ran a slightly longer route home, to cool down...

When I got back I texted Eleanor to tell her the news. She was away this weekend so didn't run it. Last week she said that all the fast ones must have been resting for the Abbey Dash, so this week I said that they must all still have been recovering. And then she texted back.

"If "we" (people our speed) have won 2 weeks in a row, maybe we ARE the fast people?!?!"

Maybe, indeed...

Fuck Me Shoes

2007-11-29T21:20:00.000Z

Oops.

There was a work networking event. At LK Bennett.

I thought I was safe. I thought their shoes didn't fit. I thought that if I stayed near the shoes I would be OK. I thought that even though it was pay day I would be safe.

And then I tried shoes on. Bad idea. When I first lost weight I was gutted that my feet hadn't got any smaller. I still hated shoe shopping because no normal shops stocked shoes in my size. But although that was annoying, it was safe. I couldn't be tempted by expensive, impractical but utterly buyable shoes.

Except, now my feet are conspiring against me. I saw shoes. I tried shoes on. I thought "mmm... these feel nice. These look nice. I got paid today".

That is a bad thing to think. Particularly when they are plying you with fizzy wine.

"You do realise that sale shoes are non-refundable?". I nod my head, too far gone with lust for the shoes to argue. I hand over a card (it being pay day, I justify it to myself by using a debit card rather than a credit card). I spend far more on a pair of shoes than I 've ever considered spending on shoes before.

But they're lovely. I'm nearly 30. I'm an associate. I'm grown up. I deserve a pair of bow down and worship shoes.

I might not want to be fucked as such, but I want the shoes. Oh god, I want the shoes. And now, wrapped up in tissue paper, and in a posh bag, I have them.

I don't know when I'll dare to wear them without worrying about stepping in a puddle, but I have them. They're mine. And I'll stop stroking them in a few weeks time.

Not so bad

2007-11-25T17:48:00.000Z

This weekend actually turned out not to be as bad as I'd feared. The situation in Blackpool isn't great, but at least everything seems to be calmer now, and in reality we might not have to go through this for too long. You can see her slipping from being someone with a terminal illness, to someone who is actually dying from it. That's not a nice thing, but maybe it's better than this sort of limbo.

I raced today too. I signed up for a 10k to give me something to aim for after the marathons, but my legs have felt lethargic since I got back. I've put on a few pounds, and my legs are still recovering, so I was half thinking of pulling out. The thought of getting up early on a Sunday when I have so few opportunities for a lie in wasn't too tempting. But some people from running club were forming a cheering squad (complete with banners with my name on them!) so I didn't feel I could disappoint my public. I actually did a lot better than I was expecting, my PB is 47:09, and I was expecting to struggle to get under 50 but actually finished in 48:12, so a lot closer to my fastest than I thought I was.

I went to Hansa's for a veggie lunch, to get some fresh veg into me after the nutritional black hole that is Blackpool. Yesterday I ate (white) toast for breakfast, half a pizza, chips and apple strudel with custard for lunch, and crumpets with cheese, and a little bakewell tart for tea. That's not exactly 5 a day... I can't believe that I'm now so hooked on getting my fruit and veg fix that I stopped at the services on the way home and raided M&S for a salad! I used to stop at the services for chocolate and now I hunt out lettuce. Is this a change for the better?

My eating does seem to be getting a bit better. My weight is jumping around all over the place at the moment, but I'm feeling like I'm getting into more of a routine and getting a handle on this thing.

Bad week

2007-11-22T19:27:00.001Z

It seems to have been one of those weeks that is as grey as the weather.

My mood wasn't great on Monday after the Sunday bus not a train fiasco, and then went downhill when I heard that Mike Gregory had died. Although I only met him fairly briefly, running the Great North Run with his wife Erica to raise money for him left me with a great deal of respect and sympathy for the whole family. You could tell that Erica would have done anything for him to get him back how he used to be, and that they still believed that there was a chance of a cure. Some of the details she told us about their daily life were heartbreaking, and you knew that Mike's brain and personality were still there, but trapped inside a body which was shutting itself off bit by bit. The news shook me up more than I expected.

Then on Tuesday I made an ill advised attempt to escape for an hour or two by means of alcohol. We had arranged a cocktail making experience with some clients at work, and I drank rather more than I was intending. Which also led me to eat more than I was intending, which was not good on a number of levels. Why do I still try to deal with stuff by trying to drink myself into oblivion? And because I was spending my time behind the bar shaking cocktails I'd dumped my bag, with my phone in it, in a corner. Which was also a bad idea.

It's probably the thing I hate most about modern technology, the fact that people can reach you whenever they feel like it. There are times when I want to be contactable (and I got a new phone so I could be contacted in New York), but also times when you would prefer to be able to switch off. I had made a big mistake. I hadn't told my mother I was going out, and what time I would be back. You would have thought, given that my mother lives in Spain, that she doesn't need that degree of information every time I step out of the house, but yes, she does at the moment. She tried to phone me at home, then on my mobile. Which I didn't answer. She then sent increasingly frantic text messages, and managed to convince herself I was lying in a ditch somewhere. When I could have just switched it off because I'd gone to the cinema, or might have been stuck at work.

To be fair to her, she was rather flustered, and possibly not thinking straight, but I am 29 and more than capable of going out without getting permission from her in advance. So I got into a taxi and called her back on the way home to see what was so urgent. A clearer head would have helped, but I got the gist of it. They'd let my grandmother out of hospital. In other circumstances I suppose that would be really good news, but as things are at the moment, it's the last thing that anyone, apart from her, wanted to happen. She didn't like it there and wanted to come home, but without support structures in place there is no way my grandfather can look after her.

My mother was furious about how it had been handled. The nurses had told her she could go home, and she was dressed and packed by the time my grandfather arrived, leaving him in the position of accepting a fait accompli, or trying to reason with her and explain why she couldn't have what she wanted. They hadn't carried out any proper assessment of what help they needed once she got home, or given him the chance to have any real input into the decision.

They left him to struggle with getting her home, working out how to get her to and from bed and the toilet (the first time they attempted she couldn't get off it, decided to crawl back to the front room and then couldn't get up again - they were considering calling the fire brigade at one point). Although he had been promised help for half an hour twice a day, no-one came yesterday because she had been discharged in such a rush. And today when one person did come, she decided it was a two person job. So it takes two people to help her get out of bed when they're trained in it, and spend their working life doing just that, but a 79 year old man who uses a walking stick is expected to do it on his own when they're not there? Is he meant to just leave her lying in her own shit until they come to clean her up?

She probably doesn't need medical treatment as such, and she's not strong enough any more to try to escape from the house (at the moment she's barely strong enough to get out of bed), but doesn't she deserve a bit of dignity, and to be looked after by people who are capable of dealing with her? It feels like the system is trying to wash its hands of her, with no consideration of her, or my grandfather's needs.

Trying to deal with the flurry of emails and phone calls from my family about all this wouldn't have been easy at the best of times, but with a hangover, Wednesday wasn't fun either. And I can't even count down to the weekend because I'm going over to St Annes and I dread to think what horrors will await me. I feel utterly unqualified and unsuitable to deal with this sort of stuff, but then I realise that none of us exactly have a choice, so what right do I have to try to shirk my share of it?

RIP, Mike

2007-11-20T22:13:00.000Z

That's about all I can say at the moment. Thoughts go out to Erica and the boys, and I keep wondering why life is so unfair.

Sinking In

2007-11-18T19:21:00.000Z

Because of my unexpected day in, I've finally got round to watching my recording of the BBC's coverage of New York. They don't mention us, but I've still found myself getting quite emotional watching it. Remembering the various spots round the course where things happened (where the batteries were changed, where we overtook Larry the Lighthouse for the third time), remembering the crowds, hearing the commentators say what a huge event it is, it's finally started to sink in what a fantastic thing it was to do. Don't get me wrong, I thought it was a wonderful thing at the time, but it's one of those things that doesn't diminish when you re-live it two weeks later.

I do feel hugely privileged to have had the opportunity to do this. It's something that I could never have imagined when I started trying to run. I had vague ideas back then that running would be a good thing, but I didn't have any idea what sort of running that might be. From my house to the next lamppost felt like a long way, and even walking 26.2 miles would have been very, very daunting.

And now, I don't just run marathons, I help other people run marathons, and I run tolerably fast marathons. I've got to the stage where I've had to separate out my medals. Call me sad, but I hang all my medals over a corner of the mirror in my bedroom. The mirror was tilting slightly, so I ended up putting marathon medals on one side and anything less on the other, which balances it out a bit. I never thought that the marathon side of the mirror would exist, let alone have four medals draped proudly over it.

As far as I can tell, I've not got a place in FLM through the ballot. Or at least my cheque hadn't been cashed last time I looked, and it would have been by now by the time I got in. But I do think I have a good chance of a club place. The way the rules work, you have the best chance in your first or second full year of membership (ie where I am now). If you haven't been a member for long enough you don't qualify, but equally once you've run FLM you drop down the pecking order. This year I meet all three of the main criteria, and last year everyone who fell into that category got a place, with the ballot only being needed to decide who from the next group down (who met two criteria) would be reserve. This year it's slightly different in that there are only two places decided like that, and one at the discretion of the committee, but even so, if I was on the committee I would say that I'm deserving of a place. Maybe I'm biased, but I do deserve it, I do.

I do have back up plans though, if I don't get a FLM place I'll do Blackpool which is a couple of weeks later and means I don't need to worry about accommodation, or transport, or food, or even support from my family for the first time in a marathon. That leaves Stockholm. I'm still tempted, but not sure. I quite like the idea of a birthday mara, but if I do Blackpool there's not much time to recover (it's not so bad if I do FLM as I have those extra two weeks). If I run with Matt and the NY gang that's fine, because I'll run at their pace, but if they're not doing it, should I still do it or should I go with my original plan, which was to find an activity holiday where I'd be thrown in with a group and would hopefully make more new friends. Decisions, decisions.

This is a bit of a stream of consciousness, sorry. Red wine is involved.

Gah

2007-11-18T13:25:00.000Z

Today was meant to be my first attempt to do a more adventurous journey on my bike, and spread my wings a bit in an attempt to prove that when I'm using public transport I'm not reliant on someone picking me up at the other end.

I've been going over to Blackpool on the train quite a bit, but have usually ended up getting a lift to and from the station or the hospital. Actually, it is easily walkable to either my sister's or my grandparents' house from St Annes station, but we then tend to go to the hospital too. On Sundays there don't seem to be trains on the St Annes line, so instead I decided to be more adventurous. I would cycle to Leeds station, put the bike and myself on the train, go to Blackpool and cycle from there to the hospital for afternoon visiting, before heading back. I'd get a bit of exercise, opportunity to read the paper on the train, and I could be smuggly green.

First flaw in the plan, the weather forecast wasn't looking great. But I've exercised outside enough over the past few years to be able to repeat the mantra to myself "the weather isn't the problem, it's unsuitable kit". And if there's one thing I have lots of, particularly after my buying spree in America, it's exercise kit. So I layered up, put some dry clothes in my bag if necessary, and headed out.

I got to the station at 9am, soaked and a bit chilly but in plenty of time to get a ticket and some coffee before the 9.35 departure. I checked the boards. What 9.35 departure? Ah, slight problem. There's the 9.35 to Hebden Bridge, but that's quite a long way from Blackpool, or it was last time I checked my map. I checked at the ticket office. No trains. A bus from Hebden Bridge to Blackpool. And last time I checked, although bikes are free and not a huge problem on trains, they don't go down well on rail replacement buses.

So I could leave my bike in Leeds, struggle over the pennines on train, bus, train, and then beg for a lift from Blackpool station to the hospital, or I could turn round and cycle 5 miles back home, getting even colder and wetter than I already was. With the hectic schedule I'd had recently, part of the attraction of the route I'd wanted to take was that it was a direct train, where I could just sit, read the paper, and chill. I wouldn't have that option if I had to change to and from the bus, so I made a quick call to my mum, turned round and cycled home.

At least I tried, I suppose, but I should have known better than to trust a train timetable.

Seniority

2007-11-16T20:01:00.000Z

Ah, there's something nice about being an associate at work. It makes walking through the office in lycra (as I tend to do when I get changed then realise I've left my cycle helmet on my desk) so much easier.

First of all, the trainees and secretaries are now worried that I have more authority. I don't, obviously, but it doesn't harm to let them think that if it means they don't make fun of my arse.

Secondly, everyone knows I'm entitled to free parking. Before when I cycled, maybe they just thought that I was being tight and didn't want to pay for parking in town. Now they know it's a deliberate decision to commute using my own muscle power rather than taking the easy option.

I never thought I'd see the day when I'd willingly walk round the office in running tights, but now I'm almost proud of it. As long as they don't look at the wobbly bits too closely, until I get rid of them again!

Bits and pieces

2007-11-14T21:11:00.000Z

You know when everything suddenly falls into place? This week I've been considering various options of things to do for my 30th next year. I wanted to go on some sort of activity holiday, as I'm now more confident of joining up with a group of other, likeminded, people, sharing a room with a stranger etc. I've been rummaging around in cyberspace and had come up with various options.

Meanwhile, emails have been flying backwards and forwards about Stockholm, which might be Matt's next marathon if he decides to do another one. I'd said that I'd do it without checking the date. Today I looked on the internet, and bingo. 2pm on my birthday. What could be a better way to spend it than running a marathon with Matt and the (majority of the) New York team?

The worrying thing is that, having got the idea into my head that running a marathon would be a nice way to spend the day, I'm now tempted to sign up for the race anyway, even if Matt and the team don't want to do it. Those voices in my head are starting again, and they usually win.

Stockholm is a lovely city, after all...

------------------------------

Meanwhile, it seems that fate has dealt my grandmother a cruel hand at the moment. It turns out that the confusion and madness is essentially an age related, degenerative thing, and that it would have happened anyway regardless of the cancer. It just happens to have manifested itself now, which is extraordinarily bad timing.

The question is where do we go from here? My mother and sister feel strongly that my granddad can't cope with having her at home, but she is desperate to get out of hospital. Would a care home be any better, or would it be even worse? Does it depend on how long the cancer is likely to give her (which is a question that the doctor treating her at the moment just can't answer)?

You can see my grandfather's heart slowly breaking into little pieces. He spent the weekend in tears, and showed far more affection and emotion in public in the course of a short visit to the hospital than I've ever seen him display. I don't know how he will live without her, but I'm not sure he's strong enough to live with her either.

-------------------------------

And finally, as this started off as a weight loss blog, I have a confession. My clothes are tight, and I'm about half a stone (7lb) up on where I was a couple of months ago. That's no surprise really, my exercise has gone down during a month of tapering and recovering, I've been comfort eating, and I indulged quite a bit in New York and Amsterdam. I haven't been able to get into a routine, I have been away at weekends when I would usually cook up batches of healthy stuff, and my ability to get to the supermarket to get fresh fruit and veg seems to have been very restricted.

I've done better than I might have done in the circumstances. I've been eating rubbish by my standards, but it's a long way from takeaway pizzas and McDonalds. I haven't dived into 200g bars of chocolate washed down with a bottle of wine. Tinned fruit in syrup isn't as good as fresh fruit, but it's better than a slice of cheesecake. But even so, my diet could be a lot better than it has been, and it's time to take control of the situation.

Equally, I'm still a size 12 and a stone below the top of my healthy BMI range. But that doesn't mean that I feel good at this weight. It's funny, a couple of months ago I was worrying that I was getting too thin, but now I've put a bit of weight on, I'm feeling that I want to take it off again. I suppose it's all part of the process of finding a comfortable weight - I haven't really had any regain before so haven't been through that process of working out where I start to feel too heavy.

It's not exactly rocket science. On mara training mileage I could have multiple treats in one day. Now I need to remember that just because my brain is used to eating them, it doesn't mean that I need them, and I have to *gasp* choose between them depending on my hunger rather than eating them all. If I bring food into work and I'm not hungry I need to remind myself that there's no obligation on me to eat all of it.

I will get control of this before it gets out of hand.

Team

2007-11-12T21:49:00.000Z

Shortly after posting my race report I disappeared over to St Annes again. The situation with my grandmother isn't good. By the time I saw her on Friday, she was weaker than she had been, and very very confused. She's back in hospital. What I missed, and what my family didn't tell me until I got back, is that she went through a phase where it was more than a bit of docile confusion, but involved her running up and down the street half dressed, ranting and raving, and needing the police and ambulance crews to come and calm her down. My mother is almost relieved that she doesn't have the strength to do that at the moment.

I had hints that something was wrong when I was in America, but Mum said that it could wait til I got home, and didn't give me the gory details. What surprised me, though, was that instead of worrying on my own, and withdrawing into myself, I actually talked to other people about it - even though they were people I'd barely known a week earlier. I made sure my mum called me with the update before we went our separate ways from Heathrow, so I had someone to talk to if the news was bad. I always tend to keep my worries to myself, so to feel so comfortable with comparative strangers really was unusual for me.

I don't tend to be hugely sociable, and the thought of spending a week on holiday with strangers was a bit daunting, but somehow we became a team, and a close one at that. We went round New York together, we shared jokes, we looked out for one another, and I had a better time than I can remember having for ages. I actually managed to switch off from all the stress of home and work, and just lived in the moment, young and free in New York.

I've never really been part of a team like that before. All utterly focussed on the same thing, getting Matt round safely, and all helping each other to do it. We became more than a group of individuals, and bonded like never before.

Well, all of us except one. For all the talk that we were a team, and that we would stick together, there was a rift the size of the Grand Canyon in the camp. None of us would dare deny that the guy organising the trip had done a fantastic job to pull it off and make it all happen, but that does not give him the right to behave like an arse to the rest of us. For large portions of the trip, his main concern seemed to be making sure that he was in shot when the BBC were filming, and making sure that he was surgically attached to Matt. The rest of us were little more than bodies and a source of funds for the trip, without individual personalities or concerns. Our offers of help were turned down, and we were given the minimum of information about where we were meant to be, when, and how we were meant to get there. On the morning of the race he sorted out transport for Matt to get him to the buses (and he naturally travelled with Matt), and gave us no clue how to get there - which turned out to be walking as the subway and buses weren't running so early.

Maybe it was built up into more than it actually was, because we were stressed about the marathon, and I was worried about the situation at home. It was only after the race that we started to relax, be ourselves, and have some fun. Maybe if he'd been around then, he'd have loosened up a bit too. But that didn't happen, and that's the thing I can't forgive him for.

At the end of the race, Laura, Gina and Paul (who had been helping her) had just about caught us up at the 26 mile mark, and moved slightly ahead. Chris wanted us all in a line behind Matt as we crossed the finish, but by that stage Laura only had one speed, and to stop or slow down would have led to her legs seizing up. There was time for Matt to overtake her slightly to get in the right position. Chris had a go at Laura, which led to a memorable shout of "fuck off Hawkins". We didn't know how seriously he'd take it.

I didn't go out with them on the Sunday night. I'd had one drink in the hotel bar, but when we got to the restaurant and were waiting for a table I realised I didn't fancy anything on the menu, shortly before the room started spinning and I fainted. After that I rested in my room for a bit before nipping to Starbucks for hot chocolate and a cake. On the Monday morning most of us went for breakfast together, and on the way back we walked past Chris, who looked the other way and pretended not to have seen us. That was the last we saw of him.

On Monday evening we texted him to see if he wanted to come for a meal with us, and he said he had other plans. We asked what they were and when they'd be finished, so we could meet up later. No response.

On Tuesday morning we were getting quite worried because no-one had seen him for 24 hours, he wasn't answering his mobile, and he wasn't in his hotel room. A few hours later we finally tracked him down - in England. He hadn't bothered to tell anyone he was leaving, and it took a while to work out where our flight tickets were. I'd say that sitting at JFK waiting for a flight home is a bit more than "other plans", when we texted him on Monday evening. Even worse, it turned out that he'd made these plans on Saturday night, so the whole time he was lecturing us out on the course about sticking together as a team (which we were doing, but for Matt, not him), and shouting at us because we were "running in the wrong place" and meaning people couldn't see Matt, he was actually planning to leave the rest of us, but wasn't planning to tell us. Some team spirit, that.

I can forgive him for going home if he wasn't enjoying himself. I can't forgive him for going home without giving us an explanation, and worse than that, not telling us when asked directly what he was doing on Monday night. And spending 7 hours running a bloody marathon without thinking to tell us that all his talk about team spirit was a load of hot air.

Although at the end of the day though, it's him who missed out, so tough.

The Marathon

2007-11-08T20:10:00.001Z

Right, instalment 1 of the New York tales. First up, I have to say that it was the most amazing experience of my life, on so many levels. Not just for the race day experience, although that was the best marathon I've ever run in terms of enjoyment and the sense of achievement, but for what I learned about myself, how I interact with other people, how teams work, what matters to me, and where I want to be. And also, because of the sheer amount of fun I had. I managed to leave my current troubles at home surprisingly well, and it was lovely to have a chance to let my hair down for a while.

But first up, it's time to talk running. Or the marathon part of the running, a couple of us also ran the International Friendship Run on the Saturday, and we went out for a team jog round Central Park on the Thursday we arrived (or five out of six of us did, but that's a different subject), but the marathon was the big one.

The first thing we had to deal with was how early the start was. The clocks changing did give us a welcome extra hour in bed, but having to meet in the hotel reception at 5am for a race that started over 5 hours later was excessively early. But to get over the bridge to the start that's the time we had to leave to get the buses, so that's the time we met. Matt's parents cycled to the buses, Matt, some carers and Chris got a lift from one of the guys at Team Reeve (or at least his driver), and the rest of us walked. We were on the AWD (Athletes with Disabilities) buses, and had to clamber over wheelchairs to get to some seats. Most of the people on the bus were in racing chairs, and going off in the early starts, but because the bus was accessible we were put on it too, even though we were on the main start. The bikes made it on too, as I don't think Chris and Glenda fancied cycling to the start as well as the 26.2 miles back!

At the start there was then a fair amount of hanging around. It was pretty cold, and I'd bought some cheap tracksuit bottoms to wear over my running kit, as well as my Achilles Guide t-shirt and a space blanket. I wasn't officially running in the marathon, and if you look in the official results you won't find my name. I was registered as a guide, rather than as a runner. Of the seven of us, Matt was registered as a runner, three of the other runners were registered under their names, and three of us were registered as Matt's guides. We still got all the goodies at the expo - the finishers t-shirt, and the medal at the end as long as we finished with the person who we were meant to be guiding, but it was made clear that we were running for the disabled athlete, not for ourselves, and the way we were registered reinforced that. If we were caught running without our athlete, or finishing without him, we could be removed from the course and denied our medal. We had no right to be there without him, and we had to look after him if we wanted that medal!

The start area was huge, although we didn't do that much exploring, both to save energy and also because Matt couldn't get onto the grassed areas anyway. I probably ate a bit more than I sometimes do before a mara, because I knew that I would be on my feet for longer, and I wouldn't be pushing myself as hard to mess my stomach up if I ate too much. Plus the bagels at the start were free...

There was another reason for the lack of exploration at the start. It quickly became clear that the battery in the chair was running down far quicker than expected. Matt had been up even earlier than us to get ready for the race, and before the start he was worried about how little power he had left. The original plan had been to change batteries at 13 miles, and we had Matt the wheelchair guy waiting there with batteries for us, but Matt was worried that he wouldn't make it. There were a couple of frantic calls before the start, and at one point I was worried that Matt wouldn't want to start at all, it took a bit of persuasion for him to take it one mile at a time, and to see what happened.

Unlike the Great North Run where we were right at the front, although we let the faster runners go past before filtering out, this time the race director wanted us to start right at the back. The main reason for this was the bikes, they were very worried about letting the bikes onto the course at all, and they wanted us at the back so we didn't get in the way. But we still seemed to get over the start faster than I expected, and certainly faster than if you're at the back of FLM or the GNR. The start really was spectacular. I'd seen the Verrazano Narrows Bridge from the Staten Island Ferry a couple of days earlier, but I hadn't been expecting the weather on the day to be so perfect, and the views back towards Manhattan to be so spectacular. That really gave us a sense of where we were, and where we were going, and sent a tingle down the spine.

At first we were OK, and were overtaking runners quite nicely. But the situation with the battery was never far from our minds and we tried to get in touch with the wheelchair guy and get him somewhere earlier on the course. There were constant frantic phone calls, as he tried to work out how he could get closer to us when all the roads were closed, and a surge of runners was coming up it. We kept on going, but Matt was getting more and more worried. We started to give the chair a helping hand. Gently at first, more as reassurance than as a significant form of propulsion, but more strenuously as time went on. As one of the stronger, more experienced runners I felt like I should take on a large part of the burden and let other people concentrate on running, so I tended to stick behind the chair, pushing it, with the help of one other person, with the others switching responsibility between them.

Matt was getting worried about it. He knew that we were slowing, and asked us to stop at the side of the road. The wheelchair guy wasn't in sight, and he knew that the chair wouldn't make it to him. This isn't a lightweight, racing wheelchair, by the way. I think when it was being loaded onto the plane they said that it was about 160kg, and that's without Matt's weight and the weight of the ventilator. It's a chunky piece of kit. Matt told us to go on without him because we were slowing him down. At this point there was a universal chorus of nos. We were a team, and the only reason we were there was for Matt. Matt couldn't simply follow us at his own speed, because he needed people with him. The three guides amongst us couldn't go on ahead anyway because our only right to run was if we ran with him, and none of us had gone into the race intending to race it. We had gone into the race to get Matt to the finish, and we told him that if he pulled out, then so would we. After a nervous few moments, Matt agreed to go on, although he still wasn't happy about the battery situation.

To be honest, I don't remember too many details up to mile 11. I remember frantic phone calls, and I remember pushing the chair. I remember our BBC camera crew catching up with us at about the 5k mark, taking a shot as we ran past, then sprinting down the road to try again. There are occasional snippets, the gospel choir in Brooklyn, the eerily quiet Jewish area, the guy racing on artificial legs who was sitting at the side of the road adjusting them. The Team Reeve runners who ran past us and cheered us, having met us at a lunch event the previous day. The crowds. But mainly I was focussing on reassuring Matt that if the worst came to the worst we would carry on pushing him, and telling him that the new batteries would come before any of us were willing to give up.

Then finally, the call we had been waiting for. In a flash of inspired, but unorthodox thinking, Matt found a way to transport himself and the batteries towards us. Sunday was the first, and very likely the only, time I'll ever be rescued at mile 11 of a marathon by a short cockney wheelchair mechanic in a rickshaw. We found out where he was waiting, which was a mere block or two away, and let out a huge sigh of relief when we saw the rickshaw parked up in a side street. It turns out that Matt had had the ride of his life from his driver, Mo, across football fields, with games in progress, along busy roads, and over bridges. But they'd made it, and in his excitement to get started with the battery change Matt managed to fall out of the rickshaw rather than stepping out gracefully...

But our relief was short lived. As we took the opportunity to take on some food, some of us turned round and saw what had probably not been too far behind us, but which we'd been blissfully unaware of. A police car with the sweeper bus behind it. I hadn't actually read the race booklet before the race - because I wasn't registered to run as such I hadn't been sent a copy of it. But even though the finish line was open until something like 8 hours, the sweep bus was travelling at 6:30 pace. If the roads were re-opened we simply wouldn't have been able to carry on on the pavement, with the constant ups and downs. We needed to be on the road, and we needed the roads to be closed. While Matt worked on the batteries, a party was sent to the police car to beg for time. They succeeded. We got two minutes, and a bit of leeway beyond that when they saw that we were almost done. Disaster averted, we set off again.

Relieved of the responsibility for pushing, it was time to start enjoying the race. We were very much at the back of the race, and maybe the crowds as well as the race itself were thinner than they had been a couple of hours earlier, but the crowds that were there, and the runners around us, went wild when they saw us coming through. We started overtaking people who had gone past us while we'd been pushing the chair, and we got a bit of confidence. We had a few good miles, and got into a rhythm. Being in a thinner crowd there was less need to send people ahead to clear other people out of the way for Matt, so we could just weave a path through, and concentrate on enjoying the atmosphere and keeping everyone's spirits up. The stronger runners concentrated on winding the crowds up, so that the slower ones could take the benefit of it, and concentrate on running. I say running, for me it was a pace that I could power walk or jog, and I switched between the two, but some of the girls did need to run to keep up with us.

We went over the Queensboro Bridge, and knew that we had the BBC waiting at the end for us, to take some more "action" shots, and to do an interview once we'd passed the half way point. We did a bit of GNR inspired singing while we were going through the bridge, but I started to notice that one of the girls was falling back. She'd fractured her elbow and hadn't been able to train as much as she'd have liked, and was starting to struggle. I dropped back to check that she was OK, and made sure that other people knew to keep an eye on her. We got to the end of the bridge, did the interviews, and headed up first avenue.

This was by far my favourite part of the race. I really could concentrate on enjoying the crowds. Past the bars there was a lot of noise anyway, but when they saw Matt coming they went up a notch. Then we cheered back and they got even louder. It really did make us feel like heroes. People were asking what Matt was called, although I felt for the kids who didn't understand why he didn't high five them when they wanted him to. A couple of us went to the side of the road to hug a guy with a sign saying "free hugs here", we did high fives, we got given sweets, and it was fantastic. However, all the girl who was struggling kept on saying was that it stretched out a long, long way in front of us, and that there was a long way to go.

Having recovered from his own "I want to drop out" spell, Matt was in his element, and had started to focus on the rest of us. He was constantly checking how Laura was, adjusting his pace to let her catch up, and making sure that after our determination that we'd finish as a team, we did that. Laura was a star. I've never seen anyone with such a look of determination on her face. You could see the pain by looking at her, but you could also see that there was no way she was going to give up. She was a little behind, but never out of sight, and never left on her own, through the Bronx and then back into Manhattan and down 5th Avenue towards the park. As the pace got more comfortable, there was time for more of a chat with the other runners. There was Larry the Lighthouse, there was a bloke from Bedford, there was a bloke running in military uniform who kept saluting us (you can see him on the video the BBC did). And, on 5th Avenue there was a woman who came up to us to say that she'd seen one of the features on Matt on TV before she came out, and that she was so pleased to have met us.

Meanwhile, I was doing all the atmosphere, enjoyment type things that I don't normally get to do in races. Doing an aeroplane run down 5th Avenue, singing along with the bands, clapping my arms above my head, enjoying the party. Checking on Matt, checking on Laura, and persuading everyone that four miles isn't that far really. It was starting to go dark, and it was getting colder, but the end was in sight and we were going to make it, even if we had to carry or push people.

Having made up some ground on the sweeper bus, it seemed to catch us up as we got into Central Park, but never overtook us. I was aware of the lights, but knew that by this stage, reopening the roads wasn't such a concern, and that we were going to make it.

Or were we. At about mile 24 Matt's ventilator gave a worrying sounding bleep. The main battery had gone, and it had switched to internal power. It was still working, but it made us aware that we were up against time issues. We didn't have the luxury of being able to take as long as we wanted. We weren't running for a time as such, but we needed to finish before the batteries gave out. At this point we needed to make decisions. We'd been keeping the pace slow to make sure that we didn't drop Laura, and Matt was adamant that we wouldn't cross the line without her. But we needed to get Matt there as soon as possible. We couldn't put his life in danger. Our compromise was to pick the pace up a bit, and hope she'd respond. If not, we'd get as close to the finish line as we could, and wait, in the knowledge that at least we were there, with carers waiting for us on the other side, if the situation got tenser.

When you spend time with Matt you look past his disability. He's such a strong personality, and he defies his limitations to such an extent, that you sometimes forget how fragile he is. Running those last two miles with the ventilator beeping was a powerful reminder of why people in his condition don't tend to compete in marathons.

We got to the 26 mile marker, and slowed to wait for Laura and the others who had gone back to help her keep going. She hadn't dropped too far behind, and caught up with us in time for a final push for the line. Her words as we approached the line were memorable, but part of a different story, for another day. As we came up to the line there was a slight incline, and Matt asked me if I'd push him. If you look at the finish photos or the video the BBC did (linked below and well worth a look) you'll see me pushing that chair over the line (probably to the mortification of the wheelchair guy who wanted to use the run as a powerful advert for what the chair could do), and I was honoured to be asked.

Our official time was 6:48:40, closer to 7 hours than our original 6 hour limit, but not too bad considering the situation with the battery. Matt, his parents and the carers embarked on a desperate dash to the hotel to get him sorted out (I had been worried that the course actually went very close to the hotel in the last mile, and that we might have needed to pull out at that point for his health, which would have been heartbreaking having got him all that way), I unpinned Laura's number and got someone to take her back (ironically in a rickshaw, transportation of choice when the roads are closed, clearly!) while I went to collect the bags and made my own way back.

And then, having felt fine all the way round, I had one drink in the hotel on the way for a meal after the race and promptly fainted. I don't know whether it was the length of time on my feet, or not paying as much attention as normal to taking my dextrose tablets with having so many other things to think about, but it wasn't pretty. One of the other runners was a nurse, and took my pulse and sent Matt the wheelchair guy to get something sweet, like Kendal Mint Cake. He came back from the bar with a cocktail. Ah well, it was a very sweet one...

New York

2007-11-08T16:40:00.000Z

I'm back from New York. There will be lots more pictures and stories to come, but for now click on this link and watch the video...

Nomad

2007-10-28T10:10:00.000Z

It's coming to something when one of the many reasons I'm looking forward to New York is because I'll get a whole seven consecutive nights in the same bed. Seven! That's a luxury I haven't enjoyed for quite some time.

I'm spending my time travelling from place to place. Committed to races I signed up for months ago, squeezing in trips over to St Annes, staying away for work from time to time, and generally forgetting what my house looks like. My house is turning into a collection of piles of suitcase explosions, from when it's hastily emptied but not packed away so that I have room in the case to start packing for the next trip.

I feel like I'm being stretched in all sorts of ways I'm not elastic enough to deal with. This weekend I came home from St Annes on Saturday because I needed to go into work to finish some stuff off before New York on Sunday, and because I needed to wash, and pack, ready to leave again first thing on Tuesday morning (and I'll probably be out Monday night too). You could tell that my grandparents were disappointed, and thought that I was staying for the whole weekend (not sure why my mother didn't tell them what my plan was, though), but I just can't live without at least a tiny bit of breathing space. Last weekend I left for Amsterdam straight from work, then got home at 10.30pm on the night before I needed to go back, and I just couldn't do that again this weekend before New York.

I'm actually almost liking travelling on the train though. It might take a bit longer, but it's time when I can sit and read, when I'm not responsible for getting me from A to B, and when I can relax for just a little while.

Meanwhile, my legs have recovered from Amsterdam far more quickly than I expected - I've been running decently this week, up to 8.5 miles, and at a pretty normal training pace, so hopefully the running part of New York won't be too much of an issue.

And I seem to have discovered a work ethic. I'm not sure whether the promotion has settled me a bit, giving me a bit more belief that it's worthwhile sticking on the career path I'm on and trying to make a success of it, but it seems to be coming together quite nicely at the moment. Well, if it wasn't for the sudden rush of work that's come in just before my holidays, and which I don't really want to pass to Joanne for fear of not getting it back.

Anyway, I'm currently sitting here waiting for my washing to finish then it can dry while I go into town to get some last minute New York supplies, check on the availability of a frontrunner for the position of bridesmaid dress at the wedding, go into work, send a couple of emails, then come back and pack the hopefully, by then, dry clothes.

Am I the first person to ever think of going to New York to run a marathon as a chance to relax and slow down a bit?!

--------------

Meanwhile, a couple of notes on wedding preparations. The date has been set, and the venue is chosen, we spent yesterday looking for bridesmaid dresses (after the big reveal of the dress to my mum and grandparents - thankfully they liked it so that's a load off my mind). If I had the time I'd rant about sizing. The woman in the dress shop measured me for bridesmaid dresses and wrote my measurements down next to my sisters. Our hips are the same, my waist is an inch bigger and her bust measurement is an inch bigger. So I'm basically straighter, she's curvier, but there's not much in it. But the sizing for the wedding dresses puts her as a 10, whereas the sizing for the bridesmaid dress she liked put me as a 12-14. That makes no sense whatsoever. (Although if it was me who came up as the 10 I wouldn't have been complaining, obviously...)

The other reason for coming back yesterday was that today my sister was dragging my mother to church to pay the deposit for the ceremony. I wouldn't say that I'm completely irreligious or anything like that, but as a family we've never exactly been churchgoers. I would struggle to tell you what my last church service that wasn't a carol service was (and the last carol service was probably 1998 in New York). I don't necessarily reject the idea of religion, I just don't feel the need to practise it...

Anyway, Annette was going to have a civil ceremony, but my grandmother was all in favour of a church service at a particular church she has always loved, and at the moment what she wants tends to happen (as with the tiara we chose yesterday - she liked one, my mum liked another, when I was given the casting vote I felt obliged to keep her happy...) So it will be a proper church wedding, and apparently my sister wasn't very subtle when she asked whether that meant she'd actually have to go to church in the build up. Actually, this is a whole subject that probably deserves a bit more time to talk about it, but for now let's just say that I'd rather spend that hour or two on a Sunday morning running and doing something good for my body than taking out an insurance policy on my soul.

Amsterdam, the gory details

2007-10-23T19:12:00.000+01:00

Preparation

I've never been so unfocussed before a marathon. Before Berlin I was obsessively writing lists, checking every detail of what I needed to do, following guides of what to do in the week before to the letter ("Tuesday - cut toe nails"). Before Edinburgh the administrative side of it wasn't as obsessive, but I was writing long detailed race plans ("keep HR steady, take first 6 miles gently, speed up when you get to the sea front, aim to get to half way in about 1:52"). I worked out what pace per mile I needed to do for 3:45, 3:50, 3:55 and so on. I had a pile of pace bands so I could decide which combination to wear on the day. Before Amsterdam I chucked my stuff into a case on Thursday night, didn't print off any pace bands, and couldn't tell you what pace I needed to do to hit any particular time.

I've had other things on my mind, and it came up quite quickly. I'd done the training in a more disjointed way than normal, and while I'd got enough long runs in, I'd barely raced since Edinburgh. Before Edinburgh I watched my half marathon time drop, and used that to get a realistic idea of what time I was looking for. My only half marathon since then was the Great North Run (2:58) which wasn't exactly a guide to what I expected to achieve running for myself. I knew that I was in sub-4 form, but didn't think that I was in a position to push for 3:45 this time round (although I wanted to give that pace a go at the start of the race to see how it felt), and my main plan for the race was to just run to how I felt. Stick with the pacers if I felt good, otherwise just concentrate on getting round and leave any ambitions of a good for age time another day. I just wanted to finish in a sub 4 hour time rather than making an effort to beat my PB or get GFA (I've missed this year's deadline anyway, so have another chance to make it before I need to apply for 2009).

Morning

The morning was sunny, and warmer than I expected. After breakfast in the apartment (which had been stocked with my pre-race breakfast foods of choice), we set off for the start at the Olympic Stadium. When I got there I decided that it was warm enough to change from capris to shorts, so did that during one of only two loo visits. I handed my bag in and used a foil blanket to keep myself warm until the start. I was in the 3:30 - 4:00 start, so tried to position myself towards the back of it so I didn't get drawn off too fast. I found the balloons of the 3:45 pacers so decided to start near them. I did wonder what I was doing there, because I haven't really focussed on Amsterdam as such it was a bit of a shock to the system to find myself on the start line of a marathon, and for the first time I managed to summon up some excitement about it.

Start - 5k (26:22)

I started off with the 3:45 pacers, and found it quite crowded at the start. I tried to make sure I didn't go off too fast, and was into a nice rhythm quite early. I nearly tripped over a bollard after 3k, and at this point realised that I hadn't taken any energy tablets (I usually take them every mile, but without mile markers - only kms - I decided to take them every 2k, which was a bit longer between tablets but easier than working out a more complicated plan - particularly given that I only realised about the lack of mile markers the day before the race) so decided to take them on odd kms rather than even ones. At about this time I also decided to get out from behind the pacers because it was too crowded, and I tried to keep up a similar pace but just in front of them. It's nice to have them set the pace, but there's so much jostling and elbowing that it's harder to run, and takes more energy than running a similar pace alone.

5k - 10k (25:44)

My fastest 5k of the race. The end of the last stretch and the start of this one involved running the last few miles of the course, I was feeling pretty good and trying to convince myself that it was nice, easy and flat, because I knew I would be dreading doing it the second time round. I have bad memories of that last stretch from last year's half, which is along the same route at the end. We went past the stadium, and out onto the main loop. I was still sitting in front of the pacers but not killing myself. There were water stations every 5k or so, and they were only giving out cups rather than bottles, so I got into the habit of running 5k at a time, walking through the water station and then setting out to run another 5k. Breaking it down into manageable chunks helped. I stuck to my Edinburgh technique of having dextrose tablets and water rather than sports drinks, as I find I can stomach it easier.

10k - 15k (26:48)

A bit slower along this spell. We got onto the banks of the Amstel which made up quite a large portion of the race. As we got onto the river we could see the leading men coming up the other side many, many miles ahead. There was a particularly evil bit where I could see a water station just ahead (the one which was just after the 15k point). I thought to myself that it was a bit early as we'd only just passed the 14k marker - and then noticed that we got taken off the banks of the river and round an extra little loop before rejoining the river and getting to that drinks station. Still, at least I knew that it was there and it gave me something to aim for, with a little walk break when I got there.

15k - 20k (26:11)

I picked up a bit of speed again. Running along the river was quite easy for me, I do a lot of my long training runs alongside rivers, canals and sea fronts, so it felt very familiar, even if it was a different river. I could see people coming the other way ahead of me, then got my own back after the turn at about 19k when I saw everyone who was still behind me. I was still just ahead of the 3:45 pacers, and keeping a fairly consistent speed.

20k - 25k (26:22)

I got past the half marathon point in 1:50:56, and started to relax a bit knowing that I could start counting down the miles instead of up. However, this is the point where my mind starts to play tricks on me. Not having had a clear idea before the race of what time I wanted to achieve, I started to tell myself that I could do the second half in about 2:09 and still break 4 hours. This was a bad thing, because it put 4 hours in my head as the time I wanted to beat rather than, for example, deciding to try to break 3:50 or even 3:45. Should I have been trying to think about doing the second half in 1:55 instead, and focussing on a faster time? I don't know. But I was still going pretty well and keeping the speed fairly consistent.

25k - 30k (27:05)

This is where I started to slow down. Not too much at first, but you can see it starting. 5k took over 27 minutes for the first time. It became more and more of a struggle to get to each km marker. Instead of breaking it down into chunks of 5k, I had to break each chunk of 5k down into smaller stretches, just telling myself to get to the next energy tablet, or even the next km.

30k - 35k (27:57)

More of the same. The critical point came just before 35k. The 3:45 pace group caught up with me at about 34k, and I started getting jostled and elbowed because of the mass of runners. It reminded me why I don't like running with the pacers. I made a decision to fall a little behind them because I couldn't face the elbowing and trying to avoid people's legs which was taking up too much energy, but realised that they would start gaining ground on me, and that I probably wouldn't be able to keep up. At the water station at 35k I stopped for my normal walk and drink, while they carried on ahead. At that point I gave up any thoughts of keeping up with them. I was still focussing on breaking 4 hours, and I started to relax as that meant that I had 55 minutes to cover 7k.

35k - 40k (31:02)

Here comes the crash. Having given myself a 4 hour target I started focussing on New York and adopted a walk run strategy. With hindsight, I could have run more than I did. My legs weren't too sore, and I still had energy - my issues were more mental. Because I'd given myself loads of time in my head to finish, I started finding that I was taking advantage of it. I was thinking "I can walk for a while here and keep my legs a bit fresher for New York" rather than "if I carry on running I can break 3:50". I wasn't actually aiming for a PB at this point, just to get to the end comfortably and within 4 hours. I just didn't have the willpower to force myself to carry on running. I struggled through the Vondelpark (where my half marathon last year came off the rails), and was very relieved when I got to 40k, because that was near the end of the park and I'd told myself that whatever happened between 35 and 40, I'd make myself from the end of the park to the finish. I couldn't face any more dextrose tablets after 37k, and my problem wasn't energy anyway, so I stopped taking them in an attempt not to feel ill.

40k - 42.195k (13:04)

I ran most of it. I definitely ran the last 1k, and a bit before that, but might have had a bit of a walk break between 40k and the end of Vondelpark. Because I'd been walking when I probably didn't need to I actually found the energy for a bit of a burst of speed once I got onto the track in the stadium and overtook a few people. Well, when I say speed it's all relative. Coming into the stadium I was a bit disappointed to be so close to going sub 3:50 and missing out. I realised that with a bit more commitment through Vondelpark I could have done it, but I was still pleased to finish in 3:50:35 and take 90 seconds or so off my PB, which I hadn't really expected to do until very close to the end.

Post race

I got my medal, took my chip off and got my bag back. I cooled down very quickly, and was ravenous (it's always a good sign in my experience when you finish a marathon still able to stomach solid food) so dived into the goodies I'd packed in my bag and the stuff from the goodie bag. Sometimes I find there are only certain foods I can face after a long run, this time round I just wanted food and wasn't at all fussy! I gave the gatorade a miss though, I'd been avoiding the sports drinks all the way round after my experiences of them in Berlin, and didn't want to mess my stomach up at this point. I considered waiting for Jen to finish, but started feeling too cold so decided to head back into town, stopping for a sandwich and a hot chocolate on the way before braving the stairs up to the apartment (for those who have visited Amsterdam, the very steep stairs might be familiar, for those who haven't, imagine something not much more sloped than a ladder...). I had a shower and a bit of a nap before Jen got back, complete with finishers medal (but I'll let her write about the rest of her day). A bit more of a nap followed before heading out to get takeaway pizza because no-one particularly fancied leaving the apartment, but I was still hungry and needed feeding! I slapped some freebie samples of muscle rubs onto my hamstrings, and felt my legs feeling happier and happier by the minute.

Post Mortem

I think that if it hadn't been for New York I might have been able to manage about 3:48ish, as I wouldn't have had that thought in the back of my mind that I needed to keep something in reserve. I also think that next time I need to forget setting myself a fall back target of sub-4 and make that target a bit tougher - maybe aim for 3:40 with a fall back target of 3:50. Had I told myself I wanted to beat 3:50 when I got to about 35k I think that I could have done, but because I didn't focus on it I let it slip way a bit.

On the other hand, a PB is a PB and it gives me something to aim at next time, without making New York more of a challenge than it already is. Given my lack of focus coming into the race, to get a PB at all is an achievement I didn't really expect, so I'm not going to spend too much time thinking of what might have been, other than to the extent that it will help me prepare better next time. I think what I need is mental tricks as much as anything physical to get me through the 35 - 40k section. I always struggle there, and it's increasingly mental rather than physical - because I've never run through it, I don't expect to be able to.

On the other hand, it says something that I think of a 31 minute 5k between 35 and 40k as a "crash". To put that into perspective, in Berlin I think that my fastest 5k might have been about 30 minutes, and my slowest nearer 45, and that was only just over a year ago. Last year in the Amsterdam half, I clocked 2:00:29. I did the second half this year faster than that, and the first half faster still. Back to back.

And if you write a list of all the women at running club who have run a marathon this year, you will find that I have the two fastest times on it, even though I still feel like I could run faster in the future. Not bad at all.

A quick plug...

2007-10-18T07:28:00.000+01:00

...for a XIII Heroes fundraiser if you happen to be in the Manchester area next week.

Ups and Downs

2007-10-16T20:07:00.000+01:00

It didn't take long for the promotion pleasure to wear off. When I got home from running club last night there was a flurry of messages on the answerphone. Looks like the rollercoaster is running again.

It seems that the plan a wedding as fast as you plan approach might not be enough. My grandmother saw the oncologist yesterday, and the general gist of it (filtered through various re-tellings) is that the time periods they're talking about are measured in terms of weeks instead of months. She's having some radiotherapy on Thursday in an attempt to delay things a bit, and there's an outside chance of her making the wedding, but we're not holding our breath.

To be honest, it's come as a bit of a shock. She is looking far better than she has done at any point in the past 10 years. The doctors are amazed by how well she is feeling, and say that quite simply she shouldn't be feeling so well at her stage of the disease. For years while she's been suffering from various ailments she's become more cantankerous, argumentative and difficult, but when I was there over the weekend she'd gone back to the sweet, caring Grandma I remember from when I was little. She was chatty and cheerful, and entirely at ease with everything. It made me realise that I've missed the real her, and I just wish we'd have her back for longer than we will.

The whole thing is giving rise to a huge dilemma in my head though. Do I go to New York. On the one hand I have a once in a lifetime experience I've been looking forward to for months. I have a team who need me, to get Matt round the course safely. I have people who have sponsored me and who I don't want to disappoint.

On the other hand, I have a few more precious moments with someone I love. If we're talking in terms of weeks, do I want to spend one of them on a different continent? What if something happens and I can't get back in time?

If things are as they are today, I'll go. I've spoken to mum, and she agrees with that (she raised it before I did - I'd been thinking about it, but unsure how to raise it) But things can change quickly, and there is a line somewhere beyond which I might want to stay. At the moment I don't know where that is, maybe I'll know when I cross it.

I'm making contingency plans. Today I went and sorted out a new mobile phone - the one I had won't work in America, and if I'm not going to be there in person I at least want to be contactable without having to check emails or pick up messages at a hotel reception desk. So now at least I can be kept up to date with what's happening. I'm wondering whether I could go, and get a last minute flight back on the Monday if necessary. I've warned the organiser about the situation, and emphasised that I'm not trying to back out, and that no-one would be more disappointed than me if I have to, but sometimes life, and death, get in the way.

At the moment I'm definitely planning on going to Amsterdam. Unless something goes badly wrong during the radiotherapy, my thinking is that the trip is short enough, it is close enough, and there are enough flights, that it won't be much harder to get over there than it would be from Leeds. But at the moment it seems like plans can change in an instant, so watch this space. I have to say that I've barely thought about the race, which isn't perhaps the best preparation (what has happened to the obsessive list making? Putting together piles for weeks before the race? Writing long complicated pacing plans so I can ignore them on the day?). I guess I'll just have to wait and see what happens.

Does anyone need a parking space in LS1?

2007-10-15T21:52:00.001+01:00

This was tagged on the end of yesterday's post, but deserves expanding a bit.

I've owned a car since I was 22, and before that I shared with my sister. At one point I had exclusive use of three cars (my own, my sister's which I was trying to sell, and my mother's, because she had a broken leg and couldn't drive it, then moved to Spain). Every morning I'd have to decide which one I felt like driving before I left the house. Eventually I sold my sister's and my own, and kept my mother's, making that pact that I'd probably keep it until my sister came home and then pass it on to her.

Which is what I did at the weekend. I drove it over to Blackpool, handed over the keys and got the train back home. And, surprisingly, I didn't feel any pangs of loss or regret, and I don't feel like my horizons have been limited, I feel free to explore and discover things.

Even though running or cycling through dark, cold streets on the way to work might not be everyone's idea of fun, I love the things you notice when you're doing it, and the feeling that you're somehow closer to the city. You notice when new shops open on your route, you explore parks you'd otherwise speed past, and you find the hidden corners that are off the beaten path. You don't have that insulating shell of car, tinted windows, air conditioning and radio protecting you from the world outside and stopping it getting in, instead you're part of it.

I'm starting to feel a sense of place, and rootedness, like this is my city rather than simply a city I'm living in for the time being. Maybe some of it is running races with my club name on my vest, and getting cheered on with shouts of "come on Kirkstall", and maybe some of it is that I know the city far better now than when I only ever travelled the same route to work every day, and then back home again. Maybe it's just that I've been here so long now.

I don't feel like I need to travel to far flung places to find something new. Sometimes you can have just as much fun exploring what's on your own doorstep. There are plenty of places in Leeds I've never visited, let alone places I can get to on a metrocard. And if I need to go further afield we have trains, and an airport, and I have the money to hire a car if I need one (the car club's good for short journeys, but for longer periods a hire car will probably work out better). I can hire a car that suits the mood I'm in and what I want to do with it.

So far, it's going smoothly. I got the train back from Blackpool, and I've been using the bus today. Normally I'd cycle, but with Amsterdam days away I don't want to either overdo the exercise or, possibly more importantly, get knocked off the bike by a lorry. I don't need the car during the week, and at the weekend I'll get the bus to the airport and the plane to Amsterdam (I'm clearly not doing this out of concern for my carbon footprint...). I need a car next Thursday to go to a New York fundraiser over in Manchester, so I'll book one. Simple.

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But oh, the irony. I got a decision on the promotion/regrading application, and the verdict was good. That's put me in a good mood. After all the indecision about whether it was worth applying, persuading myself to do it at the last minute even if it was just to put a marker down for next year, and then pouncing on every email arriving in my inbox just in case it was a decision, the waiting is over. I'd actually managed to persuade myself that I was good enough to get it (we have some progress on the self-esteem front!), but that I might have jeopardised my chances with my hastily scribbled application, but it turns out that everything was OK after all. It just leaves me wondering what to do with the free parking I'm now entitled to...

(But shh, don't tell anyone, it's only being announced officially later in the month).

2007-10-14T19:41:00.000+01:00

This weekend probably wasn't what I'd have chosen for myself, but I had a surprisingly good time. I spent most of it in Blackpool, doing a combination of wedding preparation stuff and grandparent visiting.

First the wedding. In my defence, I haven't been to a wedding since 1995, I've never been a bridesmaid, and I've never paid much attention to such matters. This kind of led me to underestimate the degree to which I'd be dragged into the planning of the wedding. Annette phoned on Friday saying she wanted to make an appointment at a dress shop, and wanted to know what time I'd be over on Saturday. I asked whether it was so she could make sure she was finished, or so I could go with her. Silly question... But it was quite fun in the end, although I didn't get to play with the big dressing up box. I was amazed that she actually made a decision in the first shop, having tried on a mere three dresses (this is a girl who'd drag us round towns for hours before deciding what she wanted to buy when she was younger), and put a deposit down on the spot. Admittedly it might have been because the timescales involved (as it is, it will only be delivered a month before the wedding and then needs to be altered), but I am feeling the strain - what if the rest of the family don't like it and blame it on me!!! Actually, it's fairly inoffensive and more traditional than I thought she'd go for, so it should be OK.

The second part of wedding preparations was the bridal fair visit this morning. Again, it's pretty much my idea of hell but it was actually lovely to spend some time with her doing girly stuff, and she's clearly so excited about it all that it's rubbing off a bit. For so long I've only really seen her when I've been visiting with my parents, rather than just us, it was surprisingly bearable. Not that I'm planning making it my Sunday morning activity of choice (and I did feel a pang of jealousy for the people running in a race as we drove up to the hotel where the fair was...)

The other part of the weekend was visiting my grandmother. I can't believe how much better she is than before she went into hospital, how cheerful she is, and how matter of fact she is about the whole dying thing. I had more fun visiting her than I have had for a long time, now she actually has the energy to hold a conversation, and isn't constantly complaining about how ill she feels.

And boy can she talk. Recently I've noticed a theme in my visits to both sets of grandparents. I don't know whether it's age, or impending weddings, but everyone seems to be really opening up and trying to pass on long-forgotten family history. We've been going through wedding albums with both sets of grandparents, and other long forgotten photographs, and I've been finding out things I never knew before.

On my dad's side there was a fantastic set of photos from India at around the time of the first world war, there some interesting snippets about people I've never met, and a sense of place from seeing the photos of my grandparents wedding reception in the garden of the house they still live in. On my mum's side, I found out more about her dad's family than I had ever known, and of course there were plenty of stories from grandma about her multitude of brothers and sisters.

But one thing that I hadn't realised is that not only did her mother come from Yorkshire originally, but I actually run past her birthplace from time to time. Apparently she was born in a cottage on the towpath in Shipley, which is somewhere I often run through, along the canal, on my long runs. It's funny that I have run past it without a clue that my great grandmother was born there. I'm sure the cottage is long gone, but next time I run out that way I'll keep an eye out for it.

My grandma's side of the family was very much based round the canal. I knew that her father had a dockyard, and transported coal along the canals. I knew that there had been a falling out about the business when he died, and that one of the boats is in the Boat Museum at Ellesmere Port (which I must get round to visiting soon). I remember when I was little, having the canal to Leeds pointed out to me, connecting the two halves of my family as effectively as the M62. This photograph is one of the family's boats.

But I hadn't realised that her mum must already have been connected to boats and canals before marrying her dad, or presumably so anyway if she was born in a towpath cottage. Maybe something to dig into a bit deeper.

I've never been one for family history, but I suppose you get to a stage where you realise that if you don't do it now, all those stories might be lost forever. So there may well be more visits to find out about the past, while she's in the mood to do it.

It's also given me an idea for something I'd like to do next summer. A while ago at work, some people did a charity bike ride from Liverpool back to Leeds along the canal. Given that the canal seems so ingrained into who I am, from the family heritage to where I do a lot of my running today, I'm getting quite taken with the idea of doing the same, and trying to explore where my family came from in the process.

--------------------

I realise that I haven't written for a while, so by means of a brief update on what I've been up to - my boss is (finally) back at work after a year on maternity leave, and I'm feeling a bit funny about it. I enjoy working with her, it's just I have been working quite happily on my own and find myself getting surprisingly defensive when she asks to look at stuff I've been doing, or suggests arranging a meeting with clients I've come to think of as my own.

I haven't heard anything about the promotion application, but it can't be far off now.

I've got rid of my car and joined Whizzgo. I was always going to get rid of it at the end of the month, but Annette's plans changed so I got rid of it this weekend instead. I've actually bought a bus pass for this week because I'm meant to be tapering for Amsterdam, but I'm hoping that most of my transport round Leeds will be self-propelled, either running or on the bike, and the car club is more for emergencies and when I need to move something bulky, but we'll see how it goes.

I'm running a marathon next week. Eek! With all the family stuff that's been going on it's been hard to fit in decent long runs, and I haven't raced properly for an age so I'm not making any predictions or targets about what's going to happen. I'll turn up and see how I feel on the day, and then I've got two weeks to recover for New York. Double eek!

Fantastic

2007-09-30T20:15:00.001+01:00

Well, I said I wanted a smile putting back on my face, and that just about managed it.

I didn't seem to sleep very well on Friday night, and was pretty tired when I dragged myself out of bed on Saturday morning to have my hair cut and drive to Newcastle. I got there and I wasn't that much more awake, but that soon changed.

I was a bit worried that watching an important Wigan play off match in the company of several ex Wigan players would inhibit me a bit, for fear of making stupid comments in front of them! But the match drew me in, and I was shouting at the screen like a lunatic. For some reason the tv cameras kept focussing on a huge Wigan fan celebrating every time we scored, to the predictable changs that he ate all the pies. Someone I'd never met before and doesn't know the history, said "he must have had your share"!

A good win, perked me up no end, then off to a pasta buffet at the hotel, and bed. Again I didn't sleep too well, and was up bright and early for breakfast, then the bus to the start. It was a novel experience being crammed into a van with Terry O'Connor, Barrie McDermott, Kris Radlinski and Mike's wife Erica (he wasn't well enough to take part, but she still did it because it was one of her dreams, and she was doing it for him).

At the start we flashed our passes and got straight into the VIP area at the start. The highlight, for Erica at least, was when she said, excitedly "Paula used my loo!". We got to spot some of the stars, although we were in the "celebrity walkers" bit rather than the "celebrity runners" bit. Although the elites did set off from our side, so we got a close up view of just how tiny and fat free they are. Very scary!

We got interviewed on the BBC before the race. You might just be able to see me in the background if you look carefully. Apparently (and I'm just watching it back and haven't got there yet, so can't verify this), they had cameras live at Erica and Mike's house to show their kids cheering us on. In most of the build up you can see us wandering around in the background - I never thought I'd be on live tv with a load of former pro rugby players wearing lycra!

There's not too much to say about the details of the race. We formed quite a party - 11 able bodied runners, 2 wheelchairs and 2 bikes ridden by the carers, complete with medical supplies. We had a formation which we (vaguely) managed to stick in all the way round to make sure that the wheelchairs were protected. We didn't go very fast (we did the first 5 miles in an hour, then slowed down), but it was nice to just be able to enjoy the experience. Well, I say enjoy the experience but I was spending so much energy trying to make sure no-one got in the way of the chairs that I didn't take in much of the route itself.

But the atmosphere was great, even if I didn't take in the route. We seemed to get even bigger cheers than most when we went past, and the number of runners who came over to cheer us on was fantastic. I actually managed to see loads of people I knew as they ran past us (one of them with the words "this is fantastic, I never thought I'd manage to beat you!"). The Red Arrows went overhead as we crossed the Tyne Bridge (the bit they always show on tv), and seemed to be going up and down the seafront at South Shields for ages as we approached the finish and ran the last mile.

The time wasn't important, but for the record we just sneaked under 3 hours. I'm pretty sure that won't be beaten as a PW for me for quite some time, but this was a team effort, not about how fast I can run a half marathon. It was about getting Erica and the chairs round, and about raising awareness (helped, apparently, by the fact that one of the BBC producers actually has MND and was quite keen on featuring us). It made me more confident that I can run both Amsterdam and New York - for a quite a lot of the time I was switching between walking and jogging at exactly the same speed, depending which I felt like doing. And the bloke who fell off the back of the group first, at a mere 7 miles, is doing New York, so unless he bucks his training up a lot, I will still be in a far better state than that.

It was just one of those days that would have seemed completely impossible if you'd suggested it a few years ago. To run a half marathon with some of my rugby league heroes, and to barely break into a sweat, and to cram into a van with people I've idolised, it was fantastic. Even more so when I realised what a bloody achievement it is for those guys in the chair to get round, and the amount of work it takes to protect them, the respect we got from the other runners, the crown, and the fact that we really did feel like heroes.

The Big C

2007-09-28T19:55:00.000+01:00

It looks like my sister is planning a rush wedding. Originally they were talking about spring 2009, but it now seems that the date is more likely to be January. 2008. As in three or four months away.

She's not pregnant. (I think!) She just wants all our grandparents to be there, and recent events have given the situation a degree of urgency. They've finally done the tests on my grandmother, and she has lung cancer. We don't know how bad yet, how advanced, how agressive, how long, but I think we are all making similar assumptions. Forget the statistics for 5 year survival rates, and think about numbers much smaller than that.

We might be wrong, but she's 79 and she's been suffering from various ailments for months, years even, without getting any medical help. How much of that is the cancer, and how much is other stuff we don't know, but it would be a miracle if it hadn't been there, festering, for some time. They're confident enough to diagnose it without having got all the tests back, so it must be a clear case.

The news didn't come as a shock particularly. She smoked for years, and it was probably a question of when it would catch up with her, rather than if it would. And if it wasn't that, there was clearly some sort of serious problem with her lungs, and would something else necessarily be any better? At least now we know, we can think about treatment or at least alleviating the symptoms rather than just watching her refusing to see a doctor. And we can do everything in our power to try to get her to that wedding.

---------------------------------------------

Speaking of illness, it now looks like Mike's going to be too ill to do the Great North Run on Sunday. That's a shame, because if he's not well enough now, he probably never will be. As far as I know, everyone else is still running for him, and it should still be a fantastic experience, but with a bit more sadness about it. There was an article in the Telegraph yesterday which flagged to me that he was pretty unlikely to make it, but I still lived in hope that he'd be having a good day on Sunday. But I'm sure he'll be with us in spirit, if not in person.

This one's for you, Mike.

--------------------------------------------

What with all this, I'm not the most cheerful person around at the moment. It's trivial by comparison, but the shortening days aren't helping either. I'm finding it harder and harder to drag myself out of bed to get to the gym, finding it depressing to need lights both on the way into work and the way home, and hating getting used to running in the cold again. I'm being a real grumpy misery guts, and I wish I could snap myself out of it. I wish I could take some time out to escape from it all, without feeling like that just leaves me less time to keep on top of everything else, or feeling guilty for putting myself first for a moment. Even if I could just spend some time with someone who could make me laugh for a while to take my mind off things rather than sinking deeper and deeper.

Keep on Going

2007-09-25T19:36:00.000+01:00

If nothing else, this last few weeks must have done wonders for my ability to keep on going when I'm convinced that I have no energy left - which will hopefully help with marathon training. I've been all over the place, trying to fit family, and work, and running, and everything else in. If I look at it all, it can get overwhelmingly daunting, but when I break it down into individual tasks, I persuade myself to get through one more thing, and then another.

This weekend was just about as horrifically tiring as I thought it would be. The rugby on Friday night was fantastic, but not exactly restful. Then I raced on Saturday morning (finishing 4th woman in a 5 mile race! The worrying thing being that I was kicking myself for not trying a bit harder and finishing 3rd - although there weren't any prizes anyway, personal pride was at stake). I drove 315 miles to pick my mother up from Humberside Airport, drop her off in Blackpool, visit my grandmother in hospital and drive home again. I then dragged myself out of bed early on Sunday, travelled down to London, and did a 17 mile run because it was the only time I could fit it in. I then collapsed, ate pizza, and only felt slightly refreshed by yesterday morning when I had to sit through a dull, and long, IT contracts conference. Then the train home, getting back at about 10.15pm. After that, it made a gentle cycle to work and a day in the office seem like a rest.

I seem to be just as busy this week, with a weekend in Newcastle for the Great North Run following on from the annual client party at work. I'd really rather not go to that, but suspect it wouldn't look good if I skived. Which wouldn't be a good idea while my associate application is still going through. In a last ditch attempt to look half decent on tv on Sunday I am managing to squeeze in a hair cut though - watch out for us if you're watching, the BBC are meant to be featuring us, and we've got a tv crew from Granada following us too.

Then it's the taper for Amsterdam, and I've never looked forward to something quite so much. I've been half wondering whether I shouldn't give up on Amsterdam, with being so tired at the moment, but I figured that I only really needed one more long run anyway, so I may as well put my training to some use even if I think I'm unlikely to get GFA unless my stress levels rapidly decrease and my energy levels rapidly increase in the near future!

Anyway, I'm still hanging in there, just about. I'll be glad when all this madness is over though!

Wine and Chocolate Will Not Help

2007-09-20T19:37:00.000+01:00

I can tell when I'm getting stressed, and feeling like I'm sinking under everything that's going on. I go quiet, and I start to think about turning to those old friends, red wine and Dairy Milk. Particularly the red wine. My way of dealing with a situation I don't know how to handle is essentially denial, and anything that can get me into a semi-comatose state, with my senses dulled, is a winner for me. The chocolate isn't such a non-negotiable part of the deal, but old habits die hard (even if, to be fair, I'm more likely to reach for the Green & Blacks now).

I'm trying to retrain my brain at the moment. Running helps far more. I can still clear my brain of everything I am trying not to think about, and I can still dull my senses to everything except the mechanical action of my legs and my arms, and my breathing, and my heart rate. And I don't get a hangover in the morning. But somehow, even though I know that, and I know that it's a better way to deal with the situation, it just doesn't have the same appeal to my brain when I'm sitting at work deciding how to spend the evening. On Monday I got to running club, sat for 10 minutes in the changing room and then decided to go home. I forced myself to run last night, but my heart wasn't really in it when I set out. It got better though, and I'm glad I did it. And maybe if I do it often enough it will become my stress reliever of choice.

I will admit to a little bit of comfort eating, and I will admit that some of my clothes are a little snugger than they were a week or two ago. That doesn't bother me, I'm not bingeing as such, just being a bit less controlled than I could be. Why do I feel like food is going to help though? After all, a bar of chocolate or a slice of toast isn't going to sit there talking to me, hugging me, or doing something practical to make me feel better. It might provide momentary satisfaction, but the taste is gone quickly, but the emotional void is still there waiting to be filled. At the most it will take my mind off things for a moment or two, but it's actually not chocolate or wine that's best at that. What I need is the sort of food that I can stand in the kitchen cooking for an hour or so, busying myself with doing something. One of my favourite comfort foods is risotto, not just for the taste but because standing there stirring the stock in allows me to empty my head of anything else. Spending the time cooking something, or running, is time devoted to my health and wellbeing, rather than worrying about someone else's.

But if that's the argument I need to use to tear myself away from the wine and chocolate, I'm still not sure how to stop the habit I have of retreating into myself, of barely uttering a word, and certainly not letting anyone know what's bugging me. My brain seems to think that it's weak to ask for help, or to admit that I don't know what I'm doing, or that I'm out of my depth. I've simply never been in this position for, and don't seem to have any instinct that kicks in and tells me what to do, other than to try my best to ignore it in the hope it goes away. And I'm not sure that is going to happen.

At the moment, it seems that this could be my plan for the weekend:

Friday night - leaving drinks, then to Bradford for rugby. Home.

Saturday - 5 mile race. Drive to Humberside airport. Drive from Humberside airport to Blackpool. Visit hospital. Drive home.

Sunday - help with registration for 10k race. Get train to London. Do 20 mile run.

Monday - sleep through dull conference. Sleep on train home.

The strange thing is that the runs are probably going to be the times out of all that where I feel most chilled out and relaxed, and the part of the weekend I'm most looking forward to because I'll get some time alone. Further evidence that I'm not entirely sane. Or, if I still am (just about), that my sanity is quickly ebbing away.

Manic

2007-09-16T18:23:00.000+01:00

I often think that one of the keys to my success over the past few years has been planning and routine. I don't need to think to work out how to fit exercise into my life. I don't get to lunchtime wondering what food choices to make. Everything is set in my mind in advance. I know the combination of tubs to pick out of the freezer in the morning to give me the right mix of meals. I know how to plan my commute to and from work to incorporate the right exercise for the day. My mind has some tried and tested back up plans for when things get a bit disrupted, and essentially it's just a case of reading the instructions.

When things are normal, it works well. My routine is demanding, and it keeps me busy, but it has just about enough "sanity time" built in. I'm out at 6am every morning, and two or three nights a week, but there are two or three for me to recover a bit. I sometimes worry that I don't have enough time to myself to relax, to read, to think, to write, to do the things that feel more like living than simply existing, but when I do have a bit of time, I enjoy it for a while then start to get a bit restless, which I take as a sign that I'm ready to head back onto the treadmill again.

But when things aren't normal, that's when I start to worry whether this is good for me. Yes, when things start to get manic my routine helps me fit more in than I have any right to be able to do, because I've got the technique of packing a bag with everything I need for the day in 5 minutes flat, not forgetting anything, not needing to prepare food from scratch later. But what does seem to go missing is the sanity time, and after a while that really starts to show.

I don't have a great relationship with my dad. There's nothing specific there, or if there is it's hidden deep in my subconscious, we're just not particularly close. I had hoped that we might get closer now that I've started being more active. He was always the sportsman, the walker, and I wondered whether we could tap into some shared interests. That hasn't happened yet. Maybe one reason for our continued distance is my dislike of his attitude towards my mother's family, but that's jumping ahead in the story a bit. He also just doesn't understand me, as when he assumed I'd have a menu for the local chinese takeaway, which was a bit ambitious as I (a) don't like chinese much and (b) haven't had takeaway for about 3 years. And as for the scales he bought me, they're going straight in the bin (not least because they weigh me 2 stone heavier than I am - serves him right for buying cheap tat because he wants to weigh his case and then passing them off as a "present").

Anyway, his dad hasn't been too well recently, so he decided to come over from Gran Canaria to see him. Even though he spent every day at their house, he still stayed at mine for some reason. I'm not actually sure why, to be honest. On the basis that they have a spare room, and had to come over to pick him up and drop him off every day, and half the time I wasn't in anyway, I'm not sure what benefit he got from trekking back over here, but that's a side issue. As is the fact that I found out he was coming from my grandparents. He never bothered to tell me himself, or to ask whether I had any plans. But let's move on. While he was here I did feel like I should spend some time over there. I didn't break into my normal routine, but on the nights when I'd normally have been resting, I went over there. So that cut down my evenings in the house to... well... not very many at all.

And then, on thursday evening when I was over there, my grandfather got a weight off his chest. He's pretty seriously disabled after a bout of polio before I was born, and now he's got something wrong with him, but the doctors aren't exactly sure what. He's having regular blood transfusions, has to go to the hospital every week, and although he looks better now than he did a few weeks ago, is no closer to being better. He wanted to take the opportunity of two thirds of his family being there (all four of us, out of six), and him still being of sound mind, as they say to give us firm instructions about what he wants for himself. He doesn't want to be kept alive. He said he's had a good life, he's 81, and he doesn't want to become a burden on anyone. It wasn't an easy conversation.

So at that point, you'd hope that the mood of the evening could only improve. Until my dad got a phone call from my mum who is still in Spain (they rarely come back at the same time, so someone can look after the business and, more importantly, the cat). When he told my grandparents (not me) what she'd called about it took me a while to compute. Apparently Mrs Newton had been so unwell that they'd called the doctor out to see her.

After a second or two, I realised that he was referring to my other grandmother. It would have been nice if he'd directed his comments at me rather than his family, and if he'd referred to her in terms that I recognise. Or in fact anything that would indicate that he was talking about his own mother in law.

A bit of background here. My grandmother is 80. She was in hospital somewhere over 10 years ago, had a bad experience, and has pretty much refused to see a doctor since. They still go for flu jabs etc, but she refuses to see the doctor about the more serious ailments that she's been suffering from. She intends to "go out of this world as she came into it" (rather ironic for someone with a daughter who spent pretty much her whole childhood in hospital), and has a deep distrust of the medical profession. So if she's agreed to see a doctor, things must be bad.

So I said that I might go over there on the Friday night to see how she was and, equally importantly, how my grandfather was. Rather like me, he's too stubborn to admit when he wants help, or support, or even just a hug. He struggles on trying to cope with my grandmother, and you can tell it gets to him a bit. He worries about her, no matter how much they bicker.

When mum's here she visits her parents, and she visits my dad's parents. When I suggested that I'd go over to St Annes to see them, what was my dad's reaction? Absolute silence. Although it's not entirely an unreasonable idea, I know better than to expect him to go over there on his own. But if I was going anyway, would he join me? Clearly not. I suspect that there may be a minor row on this subject when he gets home. I always get the feeling, from how he talks to his family about them, that he looks down on my mum's side of the family a bit. He's the privately-educated dentist's son from the city, while she's the carpenter's daughter from Wigan, coming from a family where she was the first to go to university and where a good night out is still an evening of bingo at the labour club. I just get the feeling that he sees himself as better than them, and when his family talk about my mum's parents it sometimes has a "look at how the working class live" sort of tone. Maybe I'm being unfair, but his lack of interest in a visit hasn't helped.

So instead of looking forward to Friday night as an opportunity to enjoy the rugby, collapse into bed, and enjoy a long, leisurely run on Saturday morning before the inevitable trip over to my dad's parents, I ended up going to the rugby, then trekking from there to St Annes. On Saturday morning I did cling onto the last remnants of routine by squeezing in (as you do) 17 miles up to Blackpool and back, along the sea front, taking advantage of the fact that I'm an early riser, and my grandparents aren't. Also taking advantage of the fact that whenever I go somewhere I eye up potential routes, so even though I'd never run from their house before, I knew where I'd go if I did) It wasn't the run I'd planned, but it was good to finish 17 feeling like I had something in reserve, even if it wasn't the same as completing 20. I then spent a difficult day trying to find out more details about what's actually wrong, trying to give my grandfather some support, trying to find some way to squeeze some fruit and veg into my diet.

Meanwhile, my dad went over to his parents (again), and they were sorting out getting him to the airport for his return flight. Over 5 days I'd managed to see him for one evening and a couple of snatched moments elsewhere (and he'd still managed to wind me up by leaving biscuits lying around and leaving the toilet seat up!)

I left St Annes at about 7pm and, on the way to the motorway, I picked up a bottle of wine. Having got my long run out of the way, I had just one plan for the rest of the weekend. A glass of wine and collapse into bed when I got home, then do some chores (washing, shopping) to make up for the fact that I'd barely been in the house since Tuesday, on Sunday morning, then spend the rest of the day reading the paper, speaking to no-one, and trying to get my sanity back.

I got home, and I unlocked the door. I put my bags down and I opened the wine before doing anything else. As I grabbed a glass my mobile rang.

It was my dad. The stupid idiot (that might not have been the word I used) had managed to go to the airport on the wrong day. He'd got there and realised that his flight wasn't listed. The flight was this evening, not yesterday. He was coming back to Leeds and needed me to pick him up from the station. By this point I was so tired that when I put the phone down I almost burst into tears. I knew that if he came back I (a) wouldn't be able to go to sleep until he got back (b) wouldn't be able to drink wine while waiting for him (c) wouldn't be able to have a quiet day of doing nothing (d) would need to go over to his parents for lunch (AGAIN) today and (e) was on the verge of going insane. I just about managed to get to the station and back without falling asleep or crying, although by this stage I was virtually incapable of speech, and thankfully this morning I was feeling a bit more sane and agreed to go over there for lunch, if not the whole afternoon. But boy was I glad to get back home afterwards, locking the door behind me, grabbing that bottle of wine for a second time and just collapsing onto the sofa. Then falling asleep.

Mike Gregory

2007-09-11T19:05:00.000+01:00

I'm having one of those days where I can't concentrate because of the image that keeps on popping into my head. Last night I watched a news report on Mike Gregory, who we're doing the Great North Run with. I really was speechless. I knew that he was seriously ill, and that he has a nasty nasty disease (Progressive Muscular Atrophy - a form of Motor Neurone Disease), but I really didn't realise how bad it had got, and how quickly. He's been ill for three, maybe four years, and has already reached the stage where he can't move or communicate, other than by operating a computer with a foot pedal which then reads out what he's typed (think Stephen Hawking and you won't be far off).

It really did bring home the enormity of what we're attempting, as well as the fragility of human life, and how lucky I am to be young(ish), healthy and fit. Mike was captaining his country at one of the toughest sports around in the not too dim and distant past, and now he's been reduced to a virtual skeleton, trapped in a body that doesn't work. And even though nobody's said it out loud, you just sense that unless miracles happen, the disease is going to carry on eating away at him until it kills him. I don't know when that will be, but the talk of finding a cure when he was first diagnosed seems a long, long way away now.

Both my mother and I seem to have had exactly the same thought, that it really emphasises the importance of seizing each moment, and living life to the full, because if it can happen to him, it can happen to anyone. When I see things like that I can never think of running as a chore, but more of a celebration of the fact that I can do it. It isn't something to be squeezed grudgingly into my day, carried out reluctantly on a treadmill, it's a chance to get outside and make the most of the fact that my legs, my lungs, my heart all work in graceful unity, as they're intended, and that I can be free, even if it's only for an hour or so.

I wrote last week about Jane Tomlinson (and I've managed to get hold of copies of both her books - "The Luxury of Time" and "You Can't Take It With You" - from the library which I'm devouring at the moment - I've ordered Mike's - "Biting Back" - from Amazon too to get me in the mood for the GNR), and it struck me when I saw Mike that what we're attempting is perhaps in its own way as significant as what she did. The actual sporting events may be different, but the spirit and the magnitude of the challenge is little different. They both have that spirit that says that no matter how grim the diagnosis, you carry on fighting and living for as long as possible, and you refuse to let it beat you.

On the same subject, I had an interesting PM exchange last night. Matt (the disabled guy I'm running New York with and who is also doing the GNR - and who has that same spirit as Mike and Jane) posted an update on his training, and the guy who's organising it all gave a bit of an update on his and said that "no doubt [I'd] be along with some sensational times to put them to shame".

I replied and said that there was no point bragging about my times because what I'm doing is nowhere near as hard as what Matt is doing.

And then got told off for it. Because "you are the best in the team and it's not bragging coming up with the best times, it's a challenge for him, and the rest of us to keep up with you."

In my head I've been seeing my role for both these events as very much in the background. They are events for Mike, and for Matt, and I have no right to be hogging the limelight and detracting from their achievement by bragging about my times and implying that I could run faster if I wasn't sticking with the team. What they are doing is far far harder, and I kind of feel like I've blagged my way onto something that's far bigger and more important than I deserve any credit for.

But I do kind of see the point. Matt wants to just be part of the team in New York regardless of whether he's in a chair or not. He doesn't want to be treated differently. He wants us to look past his disability and see him as just another athlete. And he wants to be challenged by trying to keep up with a faster runner, rather than feeling like everyone is slowing down to make allowances for him. If we were a group of entirely able bodied runners, then maybe I'd be joking with the blokes about them not being able to keep up with me, and Matt and Chris don't want me to behave any differently just because Matt is in a chair (making the valid point that Matt may well not be the slowest of us anyway, and likes joining in with the winding up of slower runners).

Maybe what I've failed to appreciate is that it is about the team, not just about Matt and Mike. Maybe (and we're back to me not giving credit to myself when it's due), what I'm doing is, in its own way, just as noteworthy as what they're doing. It may be less of a physical challenge for me than for them (and can someone tell me when I started thinking of marathons as "not too hard"?) but how many other people do I know who would spend their own time and money training and fundraising for something like this. Have I been playing down in my head how much those guys need us, whether it's for physical things like moving bottles or pushing chairs, or just for mental things like being someone they can chase after to keep them going* or to talk to to keep spirits up. They couldn't do what they're doing if there weren't slightly strange people out there who wanted to help them. And I'm not just doing it once, I'm doing it twice.

The charity name is XIII Heroes, and I've been thinking of the others as the heroes, but maybe I am too.

(Oh, and you didn't think I was going to let the first part of that comment pass did you? Since when have I ever been the best on any sports team? God help them if I'm the best they've got! I just hope that he was talking about New York rather than GNR, because if he meant GNR, that team includes Ellery Hanley, and I wouldn't want to start claiming that I'm better than him at anything...)

*This thought has got me slightly worried. I have noticed from running forums, and from observation at races that there is a male tendency to pick a fast, shapely female arse to act as a pacemaker for them. It seems to motivate them to keep up far better than split times on a pace band. So now I have the slightly horrifying image in my head of a group of my rugby league idols using my lycra-clad arse as a target to chase after. I'm sure that a few years ago this would have classed as a nightmare. "Right, your job is to dress in lycra and to be chased by a group of Wigan legends for thirteen miles. Don't let them catch you". It's tempting to let them set the pace...

Es Muy Buena Abogada

2007-09-08T14:23:00.000+01:00

The other night I touched on one of my irrational fears. Also pre-occupying me at the moment is one of my more rational ones. I'm terrified of failure, and sometimes I'd rather not try something, than try and fail. That's what stopped me trying to lose weight or play sport for a long time. It's partly because of my perfectionist tendencies I suppose, if I can't be good at something I don't see the point of doing it. I seemed to forget that there can be enjoyment in just losing yourself in a moment. I see that now more easily, I may be the world's slowest cyclist, but that doesn't stop me enjoying the fresh air and the wind in my hair.

But while that works for things that are enjoyable to do badly, it doesn't work for everything. There are things that are no pleasure to do, and which still bring the risk of failure. That's where the problem starts. At work I've been paralysed by indecision for the past month. I've just about got to the stage of my career where I can apply to be "regraded" and given a new job title. There's no pay rise as such (although there is medical insurance, and I'd get some money in lieu of parking - the parking itself being no use as it would take effect from the day after I give my car away), but most lawyers love showing off their status so it's seen as a big thing.

If it were just a case of weighing up the benefits, I wouldn't be that bothered, to be honest. I don't care what my job title is, and the relative lack of extra benefits doesn't give me the incentive to fill in the form and go through the waiting procedure to find out whether I've got it (unlike cycling on a sunny day, waiting to hear the decision of the partners on whether they like you doesn't have any inherent pleasure). I would almost rather live in ignorance than apply and be told I'm not good enough. OK, so it's only not good enough "yet", people seem to either get it at 4 or 5 years PQE, and at 4 years and 5 days I'm only just about sneaking past the minimum PQE requirement, but still I was wondering whether or not it would be leave it for this year, and avoid the pain of rejection.

It got to lunchtime on the day before the deadline, and I still hadn't really done anything about applying, kind of assuming that I wouldn't put myself through it. Then suddenly I gave myself a kick up the backside and read the role description. It describes what I do. I have all the experience it wants you to have, so why shouldn't I go for it? After all, I've pretty much been running the IT side of things here for nearly a year, so it's not as though I don't tick the "autonomous" and "responsible" boxes. How many people at my level get to do that? I've done internal work for internal IT procurement contracts which has got me glowing reviews at management board, and almost without exception the partners who have worked with me have been impressed with the work I've done. I have had meetings with the head of everything non-legal (not his official job title) about IT contracts, and have prepared reports on them for the managing partner who has to sign them off. I've done work on deals which are so confidential that they were meant to be partner input only, but where the partners didn't have the specialist expertise they needed.

Even worse, if I didn't apply for it, would that be seen as a lack of ambition to progress within the firm? (I have to admit here, that maybe if it was seen as that they'd be right, but that doesn't mean I want to show that card just yet). And if I didn't apply but other people who I don't think are as good as me did, and got it, how would that make me feel when the appointments were announced? And what if people thought I'd applied and been rejected, without knowing that I hadn't actually applied? Don't you just love office politics?

Sometimes I still have problems convincing myself that I'm good enough. I've never had anything other than good feedback from people I've done work for, I've survived a year of maternity leave without feeling overwhelmed. When I read the criteria, I know that I can tick almost every one of them off, but still I struggle to convince myself that ticking each of the criteria adds up to being good enough as a whole. I had to sit myself down and go through it to persuade myself that there were no glaring omissions.

So at about 1:45 I realised that my application had to be in the internal post that afternoon. It is possibly the least considered application they've ever received, handwritten onto the form (it was a PDF and I didn't have time to work out how to get typed answers in the right places), and without the input from my boss that it suggests you get - with her being on maternity leave and with the deadline looming, I just bashed something out that said what I wanted to say, rather than what she thinks they want to hear. I didn't do a first draft, amend it, write it out neatly, I just said what I wanted to say and put it straight onto paper. I then put it on my desk and looked at it for a while. I put it in the post tray. I took it out of the post tray. I put it in again, and 10 minutes later I was horrified when I realised that the post tray had been emptied and I couldn't retrieve it for yet more indecision.

I do suspect that to some extent your application form is irrelevant as long as the right people already know your name, and because of the amount of internal work I do, I know a lot of senior people in non-legal departments who lots of people never come across, which will help. The form is fairly short and they don't interview, so it must be very much a case of the impression you've already made on them, rather than anything you do during the application process.

I think it's best that I assume that I'm not going to get it, and to carry on convincing myself that I don't want it, but it's the first time in a while I've put myself forward for something where it's out of my hands whether I succeed or fail, and where I get feedback on how other people see me. I'm quite proud of myself for doing it (I will admit to a moment of panic when I got to work this morning after a day out of the office and saw a voicemail from the partner I had to submit the application to - but he was just just saying it had arrived rather than "how could you be so stupid as to think that application is good enough"). If only there was something positive that could come out of the process even if I don't get it, rather than just a straight yes/no answer, it would help me enjoy the wait while they scrutinise the applications. Even though I'd hate to go through an interview, even that would help me feel like I have some opportunity to influence the process rather than just sitting here helpless.

I don't know, but there's no way of recalling the application now, so I guess I just have to wait and see, while trying not to wonder what on earth I did that for...

Hang on. That all finished a bit negative. Why should I assume I won't get it? Why DON'T I think I'm good enough? Why am I never prepared to trumpet my own achievements? I'm not one for massaging my own ego, or telling people how good I am. I let my achievements speak for themselves most of the time. I don't boast, I just do.

The problem is that, being the eternal singleton, distanced from my family, and without a real team at work, I don't have anyone else who tells me how good I am. So because I don't tell myself, and no-one else does it for me, I start to lose sight of it. On my noticeboard at work I have pinned a page from one of those Spanish phrase a day tear off calendar things - "Es muy buena abogada" - she is a very good lawyer. It's as close as I tend to get to reminding myself that I AM good at this, even if whoever wrote it certainly didn't have me in mind when they put it down for 15 June 2006.

But, when I put my mind to it I can come up with a pretty impressive list of things I've done, any of which would be an achievement on their own. I've done lots of things that most people will never achieve. How many people will ever run a marathon, let alone break 4 hours or help achieve a world first? How many people will ever run a half marathon with Ellery Hanley and Kris Radlinski? How many people will ever maintain an eight stone weight loss? How many people will ever get a first class degree in law, or a distinction in a masters degree? Take temporary control in a specialist area for a year? But I haven't just done one of those things, I've done them all (or at the very least they're on my to do list for the near future).

I think my job for the weekend is to remind myself of that.

Corporate Social Responsibility

2007-09-06T20:39:00.000+01:00

I had a really good day today. We had a Corporate Social Responsibility event, which basically involved going to some moorland near Doncaster and pruning back trees so that the footpaths were cleared. We teamed up with a firm of accountants, and it was surprisingly good fun. It helped that the weather was good, and it was the sort of day where I'd usually sit in my office wishing I could be outside.

I do think that CSR things tend to be more about being seen to do things, and led by marketing departments rather than because the firm really cares about footpaths in South Yorkshire, but it was still something that I enjoyed having the opportunity to do. As I spend more time outside running, cycling and walking, I'm learning to appreciate the value of public open spaces, and the work that goes into keeping them useable, so it was nice to be able to put something back.

My arms are scratched to bits, and I needed a rummage in the first aid box after sawing my leg (don't ask!), but it feels nice to get some fresh air. The question is - will it feel like I've worked out in the morning, as I don't often use my gardening muscles...

Afterwards we went to the pub for food (all that work must have burned off loads of calories ;) ), and drinks, and it was there that one of my irrational fears made an appearance. I am terrified of taxis. There is very little rational basis to it, but I struggle to bring myself to use them (in fact, this is one of the things that worries me about being car free - it would almost certainly be cheaper to get a taxi home from running club than to use a car club car, but I just don't like taxis...). Anyway, I'd come up with a complicated exercise/transport plan for the week (the two are becoming almost synonymous as my commute to work is essentially either a run or a bike ride) which got me to work this morning to change into stuff I'd left at the gym having run to running club last night, and then left me free to get the bus home. I only had about £3 in my wallet, but that was OK because the bus wouldn't cost that much and drinks were free.

But in the pub a colleague who lives near me suggested sharing a taxi home. I'm sure that people don't understand that I'd actually rather get the bus home than get in a taxi. Not to mention that I didn't actually have the cash on me to pay for it, having left the house in the morning with the plan of getting the bus. He probably thought he was doing me a favour by offering to share, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it.

Irrational fears, don't you just love them?

Goodbye and Thank You

2007-09-04T19:35:00.000+01:00

Last night I drove home from running club, a little later than normal. Nothing dramatic or unexpected happened on the journey, and it was entirely uneventful.

Today it was announced that Jane Tomlinson died last night, at roughly the time I drove past the hospice that was caring for her. I'm not saying that my presence in the rough vicinity has any real impact on the story or the event, of course, but it brought home that she's not just an inspirational figure in general, but a true local hero round here.

As far as I've come on my weight loss journey, I still can't even imagine completing some of the events she has done, and to do them while suffering from terminal cancer is absolutely unbelievable. I would be utterly daunted by an Ironman triathlon or cycling across America, but she went out there and she did it.

Although my challenges were entirely different, and of a different magnitude to Jane's, she's always been a huge inspiration to me. If she could run a marathon, then why shouldn't I try? The hurdles I had to overcome to get to that point were nothing compared to what she had to face, so why not go out and do it. She reminded me that seemingly ordinary people could do extraordinary things if they put their mind to it.

In June I ran in the inaugural Leeds 10k (a race she helped found). Even though it was expensive, crowded and not PB material, I wanted to do it to make it a success for her. Most people seemed to understand that it was important to make this year's race a success, because she probably wouldn't see next year's run. I might have complained a little about the slower runners at the start, and the people in fancy dress I had to weave round, but she deserved the city to turn out and run for her, and that's what we did.

So while today's news isn't entirely unexpected, it's still a sad loss. Goodbye Jane, and thanks for the inspiration.

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The other news of the week is that I now have a good motivation for another year and a bit of maintenance. When I was originally losing weight my aim was to keep it off until a trip to Australia I'd had pencilled in for years as a bit of a 30th birthday treat. Sadly, that trip to Australia is almost certainly not now happening (and the money that was saved up is going towards the New York fund - incidentally the website has now been updated, complete with details of how to donate), but I still wanted to make it to my birthday anyway. If I have to reach my 30s, I may as well do it thin and fit.

But I digress. The new maintenance motivation is that my sister is now officially engaged, complete with ring. Everyone's known for a while that they were planning to get married, but now she has the jewellery to prove it. As far as I know, I get to be bridesmaid, and whatever her plans for the day it will be a good opportunity to get some good photos of the family all together, which is something which happens less and less frequently these days. So of course, I want to look my best in them. Not outshining Annette, obviously...

There isn't a firm date yet, early talk was of September next year, then possibly January 2009, although she's giving some thought to making it earlier because of the state of a couple of my grandparents' health. She wants them to be there and, sadly, time may not be on their side.

But still it's exciting, on the basis that on average weddings in my family come around every 15 years, and neither I nor my uncle are likely to do anything in the near future to change that!

Italy

2007-08-30T18:18:00.000+01:00

It's probably a good job I don't go to Italy too often. So many of my favourite foods, so little time. If you don't want to read about it, or you think low carb is a good idea, look away now.

Things started well before we even got there. As I was searching online for pubs near the M11 (we were flying from Stansted), I stumbled across this place. One look at the menu made the decision to go on a detour past Stansted very easy indeed, and what a good decision that was. I don't think I've ever eaten as well in England, or not for a long time. I had aubergine and feta filo parcels with a jacket potato and veg, followed by a shared portion of figgy pudding and it was divine. Mum's veggie tagine was fantastic too. We left the pub trying to think of excuses to head back in that direction sometime soon.

Then early the next morning it was off to Italy. Breakfast was standard airport fare, but we were in Bergamo in time for lunch, and I attempted to be vaguely virtuous with a plate of grilled vegetables and local cheese. There were lots of veg, at least. At this point I realised that (a) a 250ml carafe of red wine was cheaper than the equivalent amount of beer, and (b) you can't sit down for a meal without breadsticks and a huge basket of bread being delivered to the table. I wasn't complaining about either of these things. Mid afternoon was relatively restrained, consisting of juice, before an evening meal of pizza smothered in lovely mediterranean veg, followed by thick, sticky Italian hot chocolate.

The breakfast buffet at the hotel had huge bowls and plates of various fruits every day, which almost made up for following it with muesli and bread and honey. And maybe a bit of cake. And I had to work my way through some important Italian foodgroups of risotto, pasta and ice cream on Monday. I felt that it was my duty. We also tried fried courgette flowers as a starter, which I've heard about before but never actually seen on a menu. I think that mum thought I was mad for suggesting them, but they were pretty good. Remarkably, by Tuesday lunchtime I was actually craving salad, which I duly dispatched with ease. On Tuesday evening, after another mid afternoon ice cream we decided to venture into one of the local bars which did an apperitif plus early evening buffet for 6 euros. We could have made do with that, but melanzane parmiggiana (plus a side salad) was calling my name, so I made room for it.

Remarkably by Wednesday I was still going strong, making the most of the last opportunity to have pizza, and a tiramisu ice cream sundae, before buying some of the local cakes to take to the airport with us. I'm not sure whether they were a bit "paste" like inside, as my bag got searched when they went through the scanner... Sadly, there was one food group missing, but luckily we managed to pick up a bag of fresh gnocci to bring home and eat tonight to try to prolong the gastronomic experience a little more.

Every mouthful of food I had was delicious, freshly made and worth it. I know that I ate more (and exercised less) than I usually do, but I don't care. I don't go to Italy often enough to turn down the opportunity to try all the different things on the menu. Even though the quantities were substantial (and carby) it was good, relatively healthy stuff, and it felt nourishing rather than empty and devoid of nutritional value. The encouraging thing was that I actually turned to salad mid way through the holiday, because I was craving it. I don't think I've ever craved salad before now, but I've actually started to feel like I need something green and leafy in my diet on a regular basis. Strange.

And anyway, I had a way to stop myself getting too far off track. The summer this year has been awful, and as I was packing I realised that, not having had a reason to wear shorts all year, I didn't have any that fit. On Saturday we went to Wembley for a rugby match before flying out on Sunday, and to get there we parked at Brent Cross and got the bus over from there. That involved going near shops, and I decided to look whether there were any shorts left in the sales. It wasn't worth spending a lot of money on them, but if there was something cheap...

We went into Gap. I picked up a pair of shorts. They looked roughly the right size (I'm surprising myself with how well I can judge this). The only problem was the size. The label said they were size 8 (US size 4). I looked at the label and reminded myself that there was no way on earth I'm a size 8. But then I'd look back at the waistband and realise it looked like my size. I crept towards the changing rooms hardly believing what I was about to do. I tried them on, and they were perfect (and only about £10). I remain convinced that they are the biggest size 8s known to man and that size inflation takes place between my shopping trips, but there was still something quite cheering every time I realised that I was wandering round Italy drinking wine and eating pizza and ice cream in a pair of size 8 shorts, and not bulging out of the top of them or being unable to sit down. I knew that the shorts would soon let me know about it if I overindulged too much. In a bizarre way they even made me eat more, because I don't want to be a size 8, and the thought that I might be triggered thoughts like "must do everything in my power to stop getting too thin... more pizza please" I may need to frame those shorts for posterity just in case next time I have a reason to wear shorts they're on the wrong side of too tight, but for now I'm still in shock that I got them on.

The only downside about the holiday was more about what I didn't do than what I did. I feel guilty for thinking it, but I sometimes feel like when I'm on holiday with mum she cramps me, and I can't do what I want to do. I guess I'm too used to independence and being able to flit around doing whatever takes my fancy, whether that's a day of walking or a day in bed. With mum, although she can walk for long distances on the flat, she can't walk up hills, refuses to ride a bike, would die if you suggested climbing or swimming. I constantly feel like I need to make sure she's doing what she wants to do, even if it's not what I want to do. We spent a couple of days round Lake Iseo (beautiful, and far less crowded than some of the Italian lakes), and even in Bergamo could see the southern Alps rising behind the city. My imagination kept being captured by two things. Firstly the thought of heading up into the mountains, and secondly, how bike friendly it was. The road round the lake was pretty flat, and all the ferries which went from town to town had bike racks on them. I didn't want to follow the lycra clad cyclists on their road bikes up into the mountains, but there were plenty of people pottering round more sedately on hybrids with baskets, and I wished that I could find a hire place and spend some time doing just that. Even around town, we always got the funicular up to the "citta alta", whereas I'd have been quite happy walking up - in fact I even ran it one morning, so it can't have been too bad.

Where this leads to a bit of a conflict is that I've started thinking seriously about using a weeks holiday next year not to go to Gran Canaria, but to go on a walking/cycling/vaguely active holiday somewhere mountainous. It might even involve tents. This isn't through some masochistic desire not to take any time off exercise, but because that's what I enjoy doing now. I want that sense of achievement that comes with conquering a peak, or the feeling of slowing down that comes as you potter down the road on a bike rather than in a car. I love feeling closer to a place by being in it, unprotected by metal and glass, hearing it and smelling it as well as seeing it through the window.

I've been considering the Lakes or Scotland, although given the crummyness of our weather the Alps could tempt me. But Mum now also wants to go away for my birthday to somewhere different, and I'm trying to work out a gentle way to tell her that the sort of holiday she's thinking of and the sort of holiday I'm thinking of aren't likely to be the same thing. She seems to think that if I'm going away for a week I want company, and while it's nice to spend time with her, my holidays are a lot more precious to me than hers (on the basis that I get a limited number of carefully counted days, whereas she just takes off from the dive school whenever she feels like it), and even though I'm more than happy to spend a good portion of them with her, I sometimes feel like using them for something completely different, which doesn't necessarily involve her. I guess she looks for company during a holiday because she spends a lot of her "working" day either in the office pretty much on her own or walking up and down the seafront with the phone in case it rings. Whereas I look for escape and my idea of bliss is being somewhere where I can admire the view and do things without needing to make constant conversation. I don't know whether she thinks she's doing me a favour by being company for me, to save me going on holiday alone, but sometimes that's actually precisely what I want to do. I don't think she'd ever dream of trying to tag along with my sister and her boyfriend, but because I'm single it seems to be assumed that I want to go on holiday with my mother all the time. This year I've made a bit of a breakthrough in that she's not coming to New York, but I suspect that might be because of the cost more than anything else.

We'll see. My holiday plans for next year are all a bit dependent on (other people's) weddings and how much money I have left after New York anyway, but I get the feeling that our different views of what to do on holiday are going to have to come up against each other at some point.

Much better

2007-08-23T21:18:00.000+01:00

Last night the weather was gorgeous, so I ran 17 miles. I'm so glad I didn't push myself on a day when I didn't feel like it, and instead waited for a day when the weather and my energy levels felt right. Running on Sunday would have demoralised me, last night went like a dream and gave me a lot more confidence (9 minute miles! The whole way!) So yay for listening to my body.

Anyway, this is just a quickie. Mum's here, and we're off to Italy (via Wembley) at the weekend. I will be listening to my body and seeing whether it wants to eat pizza. And if it does, I will of course be trusting its instincts ;)

(Also, I suspect my mother thinks I'm a freak. She offered to pick me up from work tomorrow. I turned the opportunity down because if she picks me up I can't cycle in because there would be no way to get the bike back home... I suppose I should really have gone for the lift to recoup the £250 I ended up spending on the car today. Once more, the sooner I get rid of that thing, the better).

Sleep

2007-08-19T12:16:00.000+01:00

Yesterday I went down for a day trip to London to watch a rugby match. I didn't actually end up really going into London, other than going under it on the Tube. I didn't fancy bustle and shopping and crowds, so what I actually did was walking leg 6 of the Capital Ring. I got the tube to Wimbledon, wandered over to Richmond and then from there to Twickenham. I'd never been to Wimbledon Common or Richmond Park before and it surprised me how open they were. I guess I've been to London enough times now that I've done loads of the obvious touristy stuff, and fancied seeing a different bit of the city for a change. And I'm down in London again next Saturday, this time at Wembley, so that will be yet another early Saturday morning.

On the train on the way back I fell asleep. Proper, fast asleep sleepiness. I went to sleep at Newark, vaguely noticed Doncaster, went back to sleep again and woke up as we pulled out of Wakefield. I'm kind of glad that Leeds was the last stop. And then this morning I hit the holy grail, my body wanted to sleep, and for me to have a lie in. Sometimes it feels like I get up so early every morning, even at weekends, that my body wouldn't know what to do with the opportunity to sleep even if it had it. This morning it all came together nicely in a dozing few hours of bliss.

The only drawback is that I'd earmarked this morning to do a long run. I half dragged myself out of bed ready to do it, then had second thoughts. I know that I do need to do long runs for marathon training, but my body was finally telling me that it had had enough, that it wanted to sleep, and even though I wasn't injured or unwell, maybe the best thing to do was to just listen to it.

Targets and plans are all very well, but sometimes they make you focus on the wrong things. I shouldn't be going out for a run just because I'm meant to, I should wake up and do what I think will help my running most. A lot of the time that's running, as you can't train on rest alone, but this morning I felt like rest would be better for me in the long term than a run, so I'm not going to feel guilty about taking it.

mmm... duvet.

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In other news, this is a newspaper article about the people I'm doing the Great North run with. what it doesn't say there is who the other former pros are. I had a big smile on my face when I heard the names. Kris Radlinski and Terry O'Connor are two of my biggest rugby heroes, and the fact that I could ever be participating with them on an equal footing in a sporting event is just mindblowing. I used to sit there, vastly overweight and watch them, thinking they were superfit athletes and at a level of physical perfection I could never even imagine. I guess they were. But now a couple of years the wrong side of retirement and with dodgy knees, they're training to do something for the first time that I'm pretty comfortable with, and I'm not at all worried that I'll be shown up or exposed as a fake when I'm running alongside them. Although that's the first time I've seen the word pushing used - I thought he'd be in an electric wheelchair like Matt...

All donations gratefully accepted for this and/or New York (same charity) - go to this website and include a note to say you're sponsoring me (Helen Goldthorpe). Thank you!

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Yesterday's forray to London was yet another reminder that I'm just not a car person. I got the bus into town to get the train down, and the bus back. I have a car sitting outside my house. I have somewhere I can park the car near work which is not only free on a Saturday, but roughly as close to the station as the bus stop I get dropped off at. I didn't touch a drop of alcohol all day (I haven't since the rounders incident, strangely enough...), so was perfectly capable of driving the car at the beginning and end of the day. But driving just didn't even cross my mind. And I've got to take the bloody thing to the garage again on Thursday to get another creaking bit seen to, it's just a money pit and I'll be glad when I'm rid of it!

Photos

2007-08-16T20:40:00.000+01:00

This week I've discovered that photos still have the power to shock, and that maybe memories aren't as long-lasting as I thought.

Someone at work came into my office yesterday. She's been here way longer than I have, and has therefore seen me at a huge range of sizes, knows the story, and in fact constantly badgers me for tips. Which she then ignores. But anyway. On my noticeboard I have a copy of the photo of me and Mike Gregory that I posted on here at the weekend, as motivation for marathon/GNR training.

She looked at it, and asked me "who's that in the photo? Is it your sister?"

She knew me when that photo was taken, and she still didn't recognise me in it. Sometimes I forget that I've been a relatively normal weight for two years now, and that while I'm constantly aware of the change, maybe other people are just starting to think of me as who I am now. They might know that I've lost weight, but they can't picture it in their minds any more.

The other photo that shocked me was in a very different way. After the big Netball v Cricket rounders match on Tuesday night (of which more later), we took team photos of the netball team and the cricket team. That photo really did surprise me.

Not only am I standing bang in the middle of a sports team photo, rather than lurking on the edge, embarassed to be sneaking into shot, it also gave me the chance to compare my size with the other girls. It's one of those guilty habits I have, thinking "am I thinner than her?". Not in a malicious or fiercely competitive way - I wouldn't starve myself just to get thinner than someone, but more in a trying to get a true picture of my size kind of way. Sometimes it's hard to get a realistic view of how thin (or fat) you are (is it on How To Look Good Naked where they make people slot themselves into a lineup of differently sized women where they think they should be, then they usually get told they should have been several places towards the thinner end?).

Let's just say that looking at that photo I'm a lot thinner than I thought. You certainly can't tell from looking at it that I'm the one who used to weigh over 18 and a half stone. And (not that you can see it because of the people in the front row) my legs look surprisingly good in a netball skirt...

I did have to laugh after the rounders game though. I treated it as just a bit of fun, and did my normal exercise as well, rather than treating it as a hard workout (which it wasn't by any stretch of the imagination). The day after, a colleague came into work complaining he was sore. He doesn't know what a proper workout is! I was also speaking to someone else in the pub who has been here two years, and realised that she didn't know about the weight I used to be. I'd kind of assumed that most people at work did, because other people knew and that sort of knowledge spreads itself around. But no, it seems that there are distinct pockets of ignorance out there still. I kind of like it that way.

Did I just mention the pub? That was where the week started to go downhill. The game was quite a way away from my house, and someone had organised a car sharing list to get people home. So I didn't need to worry about it, but it did mean that I needed to stay in the pub until everyone was ready to go. And when you're in the pub, if you're me and the drinks are being paid for by work, there's that horrible temptation to drink them. On an empty stomach, and having played an hour or so of gentle sport. The first glass of wine was probably OK (although it didn't do much to hydrate me). I might have got away with the second. But the glasses I drank after that were definitely a bad idea. Oops. I woke up the next morning still fully clothed in netball kit, and feeling rather less good than I should have done.

That in itself wouldn't have been so bad, and I managed a gentle swim before work to clear my head a bit, but the problem was that we had organised an 11 mile recce run for the Leeds Country Way relay for that evening. I had no way of getting out of it (the route isn't marshalled and is quite complicated, so you need to know where you're going, and I didn't have the mobile numbers of the people I was meeting to do it with), so when all I wanted to do was take my weary body home after work and get into bed to sleep off the tiredness and hangover, what I actually ended up doing was running across fields and golf courses and hills, getting my legs stung by nettles, scratched by brambles and slapped by various crops growing close to the footpath, sliding through mud, getting attacked by bats, and generally wondering whether I was absolutely insane. Having been drinking water like it was going out of fashion all day in an attempt to rehydrate myself, I found it all sloshing around in my stomach during the run, just to add to the misery. The worst bit was that I knew that my discomfort was entirely self-inflicted, and that I had no real justification for complaining because I could have just stopped drinking rather earlier than I did.

Having got home late from that (for the third night in a row), I then collapsed into bed still spattered in mud (although I did get the worst of it off, and managed to take my running kit off this time), woke up the next morning and masochistically cycled the long route into work, getting there feeling almost as bad as I had the morning before. It's not so much that I'm hungover still, more that I'm just tired after three days with little more than 10 minutes at a time awake and in the house, and possibly still a bit dehydrated from the combination of exercise and alcohol. It's a sign of how ingrained my routine is though that every night, even after rounders, I managed to pack my gym bag and lunch for the next morning and remembered to put everything I needed for the day in it despite being rather less than fully on form.

One day I'll learn...

Changes

2007-08-12T19:24:00.001+01:00

How times change

This week seems to be one where I'm looking back at who I used to be and wondering what I'd have said if I'd known what would happen.

Take this picture. It was taken back in 2003, and dates from a spell where I used to have my photo taken with various people connected with rugby. I don't know why, because I hated seeing myself in the photos, maybe the real reason was that the person I shared lifts with to the matches always hung around afterwards to take photos and talk to the players, and joining in was something to do while I waited.

Anyway, one day I had my photo taken with Mike Gregory. He'd taken over as Wigan coach relatively recently at that stage, and had a bright future in the game. The next season he took us to the cup final, which turned out to be his last game in charge as he took long term sick leave, and then didn't have his contract renewed, when he was found to be suffering with Progressive Muscular Atrophy, a form of Motor Neurone Disease.

If you followed the link on my last post you'll know that I'm running the Great North Run with him this year. Looking at that photo would you ever have thought that four years later he'd be the one in the wheelchair and I'd be the experienced runner helping him round the course, using a half marathon as a shorter than normal training run? I'd have laughed at you if you'd suggested it then, but that's how it's turned out.

The second is more of a "has it really been 10 years" moment. I'm having one of my semi-regular but not as frequent as they should be meet up with some uni friends at the weekend. I had a bit of a jolt earlier this year on the 10th anniversary of the 1997 labour general election victory. Not because of any particular reason, but because I remember spending the day cycling round south Manchester trying to sort out a house to live in in the second year at uni, and finally signing up for something with two friends and a freak. We won't go into the freak now, but let's just say that three of us got on and one didn't despite our best efforts in the first few months, so after that we gave up trying to include her.

The three of us still see each other now, and I find it hard to believe that it's been 10 years. And how we've changed. Sometimes you don't notice it so much when changes happen bit by bit, but from those poor students living off pop tarts and supernoodles, buying the cheapest beer we could find and nipping to the pub for last orders after an evening studying, we've somehow all turned into vaguely responsible adults. We all have houses and mortgages and proper grown up jobs. One of us is pregnant, another is getting married next year (hint, neither of those are me). We drink nice wine instead of cheap beer, we sometimes cook for each other (using real ingredients, not processed muck), and we end up talking about carpets, fitted kitchens, gardening and DIY. We go out for a meal in the pub, go back to her house and go to bed at 10.30. We're hardcore party animals really...

I suppose it's just what happens when you get older, but it still comes as something of a shock to the system sometimes when you think back to how we used to live. Ah well, it might be different but at least it's still good fun.

The consequence of going to bed so early last night was that we ended up getting up surprisingly early too. Well, not early for me, and I'd been reading for a while before other people started moving, but early for staying at someone's house after a night out. That gave me most of the day to play with, so I decided to visit the Yorkshire Sculpture Park and have a bit of a walk round the country park. I wouldn't claim to know a great deal about sculpture or art in general, but it was still nice to get outside and have a wander round, stumbling across a sculpture every now and again. Oh, and the scone with jam and cream I treated myself to was very nice too...

Great North Run

2007-08-07T19:29:00.001+01:00

Details have been confirmed - click here to find out what I'm doing!

More info

Car-free

2007-08-05T10:38:00.000+01:00

I've just called the breakdown people to come and look at my car, but the past week or so has been fantastic without it. On Monday morning I was slightly pissed off that it wouldn't start, but since then it's been great being liberated from it.

I've cycled 90 miles this week. I've also used the train to explore places I've been meaning to visit for a while but never got round to going to. It helps that summer finally seems to have arrived, and my longer bike rides have been rewarded by fantastic views, but let's go back a bit.

On Monday not having the car meant that I didn't run, but that was probably sensible given the state of my legs. On Tuesday I cycled to work which is what I always do on a Tuesday, but because of the nice weather I decided to come a slightly longer route home. When I did that I discovered some lovely country lanes much closer to my house than I'd expected, which kind of set the tone for the week.

On Wednesday I cycled to work, from there to running club, I ran, then I cycled home. Doing that is hard work, but it felt a lot easier than the only other time I've attempted to do that. On Thursday I cycled to work again, and on Friday I decided to do a long bike ride on the way in, instead of cycling to the gym and working out there. Oh the bliss. I worked out an 18 mile route, and the first 13 were almost entirely through countryside, I had the roads to myself, I had glorious views, and there wasn't a traffic light or bus in sight. In the evening I walked a mile or so down to the park to watch a free showing of Dirty Dancing, and then back again.

On Saturday I was due to do my long run. I'd planned to do the Keighley run, where I get the train 20 miles out of town and run back. Usually when I do that I drive into town and leave my car with a bag of clean clothes and food, but with not having that option I got the bus, dumped my stuff at the gym and set off from there. Getting the bus into town meant that it was better to buy a day metro card than separate bus and train tickets, and that's where the fun started. Once I'd finished my run, at about 12.30, I had the rest of the day to fill, and a ticket that would take me anywhere in West Yorkshire (for a mere fiver). I decided to head over to Hebden Bridge, as I've been meaning to go for a while. Although it was drizzling up there, and not the bright sunshine in evidence elsewhere in the country, it was nice to get up into the pennines, and remind myself that I don't need to trek into the dales to get some nice countryside. While I was there I found out about a couple of nice walks that I'd like to do some day, when my legs aren't recovering from a 17 mile run!

So, today it's time to get the car started. I'm almost disappointed because I've missed it so little. The main reason I'm doing it today (I could after all have called them on Monday) is that today I've got the opportunity to take it on a long run to recharge the battery, rather than a 3 or 4 miler which would do no good. The irony of all this is that although I was planning to go over to Warrington today anyway, if the car hadn't needed a bit of attention I'd have been going on the train! I did get in a 10 mile bike ride round some more country lanes this morning before calling them, I wanted to make the most of the sunshine so turned my trip to the shop for the newspaper into a bit of a longer exploring expedition - I quite like that I can find new routes on the bike when I can carry a map in my pannier bag, then I know whether they're options for runs in the future.

This has given me a lot more confidence that I can cope without a car over winter. In fact, I'm looking forward to getting rid of it. I'm starting to wonder whether I actually will buy a new one in Spring or whether I'll just find other ways round transport issues. The more time I spend car-free, the more I realise that I don't like sitting in a box, being transported from A to B with little opportunity to enjoy the journey. The distances I travel during the week just aren't long enough to justify the costs of car ownership, and it seems like the only reason I have a car is to get to the rugby. Now, I like the rugby, but do I like it enough to justify paying the sort of money a new car will cost me just to get to those Friday night games that aren't feasible by public transport?

Step Away from the Running Shoes

2007-07-30T19:56:00.001+01:00

Why does walking 14 miles hurt so much more than running 26? It appears that it works different muscles which weren't sufficiently well trained, causing an inability to walk pain free for the past two days. I suppose it means that I haven't been tempted to run, helping with this mini break, but still, not pleasant.

That just reinforced to me the problems of trying to do too many activities at once. I can run decently if pretty much all I do is running, and if I devote myself to running-specific training. But when I try to run and cycle and walk, it seems that I end up struggling through each activity but not feeling like I'm at my peak for any of them. Which then leads to another question, I suppose. Is it better to aim to be a 3:45 marathon runner and to exclude other things apart from as limited cross training, or is it better to just do what I feel like and accept that I might not fulfil my potential? I can't do a long run and a long hill walk or a long bike ride in the same weekend, but if what I really want to do is get out there and walk or cycle, then maybe I should just do that, and not worry too much about the marathon training. I'll do enough training to complete the marathon(s), but I won't do it as fast as I could, and I might enjoy what's left of summer more in the process. In the general scheme of things, is that a bad thing? Just because I probably could run 3:45, it doesn't mean that I have to. I'm meant to be doing this because I enjoy it, not so I can punish myself for failing to meet arbitrary standards.

I think I've bitten off a bit more than I can chew, too soon, and next year I am planning to do one marathon at the most, in spring (I'll do FLM if I get a place, if I don't I'll see if there's anything else I really want to do, but won't hunt out a marathon for the sake of running one). That's a bit soon after New York and Amsterdam, but I'd rather train over winter when there aren't as many competing distractions, let myself enjoy myself over summer doing "fun" rather than focussed running and other active things, then get back into more focussed training over the winter. I can put the rest of my life on hold for a few months once a year to train properly for a marathon, but I'm not sure that I'm prepared to do it twice a year at the moment.

My car seems to be trying to give me the hint to relax a bit too. Despite the fact that my legs don't want to walk, I put my running stuff in my bag and was planning on my normal Monday routine - leave car at running club, pick it up and run on the way home (although today's run was actually an "away day" meaning I'd pick the car up, drive up to the meet up spot and then then run from there). I wasn't sure whether I'd feel like running but I wanted to give myself the option to do it if I felt like it later in the day as it's a nice run. Except I got to the car this morning and it showed no signs of life whatsoever. Even the remote central locking wasn't working, and there wasn't even a flicker when I attempted to start it. Luckily cycling doesn't seem to use the muscles that aren't working too much, so I cycled into work without any major drama, but it did make it harder to get to running club this evening, to reduce the temptation to try to run. I suppose I should be thanking the car rather than cursing it...

(And it provides yet more proof that I'll cope without a car over winter. I use it so infrequently that the battery runs down between uses).

Escape

2007-07-28T19:25:00.000+01:00

Yesterday I had the shittiest run ever, so I decided not to try to push it today. I went with plan B for the day, and decided to go for a day walking in the dales instead.

The run I had planned involved getting the train out of town and running back. I actually ended up on the same train, because once it's got out of industrial West Yorkshire it heads over the Settle-Carlisle line, and that's where I fancied going. I've never been over that line before, and it's something I've been meaning to do for a while.

The logical thing to do is, of course, to get the train to a high point and walk downhill, and where is higher than Dent station. It's the highest mainline station in England (possibly the UK, I can't remember). It's also nowhere near Dent town - when I did the Dentdale run back in March I ran 14 miles up and down Dentdale from Dent and went nowhere near the station. That was the first time I'd ever been to Dentdale and I really liked it, so I decided it was a good starting point to discover a bit more of it.

I managed to resist the temptation to walk towards Dent itself (although my tastebuds still remember the cake at the end of the race and were trying to persuade me to see if I could locate the source), and headed back down the line towards the Ribblehead viaduct. There seem to be quite a few groups round here which organise walks from public transport - from the Dalesbus on sundays and from the train on other days. There were at least two different groups from the train I was on. I was vaguely tempted to tag along, but I had something I wanted to try today.

I bought a compass during the week, and I wanted to learn how to use it and how to map read a bit better. Even though (I hoped) my route was relatively straight forward, I wanted some practice checking against the map to make sure that I was indeed going in the right direction, and I didn't think walking with a group would help that. Also, the age profile of the walkers I saw didn't really fit me, so I preferred to walk alone. I like having space to think anyway.

I headed up the higher reaches of Dentdale where I hadn't ventured before, and it was lovely. Then I headed uphill through a bit of forest, and over Blea Moor, with the train below me. The ventilation shafts from the tunnel stood out against the landscape, but helped keep me heading in the right direction as a check for my compass. And then coming down off the moor, it hits you. The Ribblehead Viaduct. There are other viaducts on the line, but this is the famous one.

Last weekend while we were busy climbing it was opened for people to walk across for the first time ever during engineering work elsewhere on the line. I missed that so could only see it from beneath, but it was still pretty impressive. I even caught a train going over the top, although sadly it was a goods train rather than the significantly more romantic steam trains that run across from time to time in summer.

I stopped and had some lunch staring at the view (and due to my fluorescent yellow rain jacket got approached by random walkers to ask how to get up Whernside - because I looked like some kind of marshall - oops!). Then, as there wasn't too much at Ribblehead other than the viaduct, and I wasn't ready to head back yet, I carried on walking down to Horton in Ribblesdale.

This was the only point where I got marginally lost. Or at least I headed off up the wrong track, realised pretty quickly and managed to get back where I should have been without any drama. Yay for the map and compass! I met up with the Ribble Way, and then the Pennine Way, and made it to Horton a bit after 3pm. I had been having thoughts of cream tea for the last few miles, but got there, realised there was a train fairly soon and that I'd just managed to walk away from the village centre towards the station. I didn't want it enough to walk back to hunt out tea shops, so I just made do with the remnants of what I'd brought with me.

In total I covered about 14 miles. Slowly, and struggling a bit with the bogginess of the terrain in the absence of waterproof shoes, but I had a really good day. I ended up absolutely knackered and nearly fell asleep on the train, but I suppose that's partly because that's just what happens when you wake up at 6am without the help of the alarm at weekends because you're so used to it during the week.

And look at the piccies! No rain! (Well, a few spots while I was waiting for the train home, but nothing significant. Woo hoo!)

Collision!

2007-07-26T18:59:00.000+01:00

Ah well, it had to happen some time. Today I had my first "back on the bike after last time" collision. Last time being some time around the year 2000 and involving a pedestrian walking across a cycle lane without looking.

I was feeling really proud of myself for doing a 15.5 miler on the way to work instead of the direct 5 mile route (complete with daring to take my hands off the bars to indicate), and for filtering up the outside of traffic safely so that I could get into a cycle lane which went straight on because the rest of the traffic would be forced left. The cycle lane goes against the flow of a one way street, and has a solid kerb separating it from the other carriageway.

As I was cycling along it I could see someone crossing the road. I knew that he would step out onto the cycle path without looking in the opposite direction. I rang my bell twice.

And the idiot stepped out into me anyway.

Thankfully unlike last time I stayed on the bike, and probably gave him a bigger bruise than any damage I did to myself. I tried to keep my torrent of abuse to a minimum, and rode off. I was a bit shaky for a few minutes, but recovered for the rest of the ride home thankfully.

I suppose at least I've got it over with!

And... relax

2007-07-25T19:56:00.001+01:00

When I was at school I was the type of person who would get really worked up about getting 19/20. That meant I'd got one thing wrong. I'd beat myself up about that one mistake. I'd finish an exam more worried about the questions I'd struggled with than happy with the ones I'd answered easily. I'd feel like I'd done really badly because I struggled with that one question.

I've got a first class degree, a masters with distinction and came top of my year at law school, but it still bugs me that I only got a B for A level history. And that I got 58% for public law 2. Admittedly in the 10 years since that course I've never had to use a single thing I learned on it, but that was a 2:2 grade, and it hurt.

I still haven't managed to shake the habit. Whatever I do, however impressive, I keep on feeling like I should be doing more, trying harder, excelling. If I don't think I can do something properly I would rather not try it than be shown to be defective or inadequate. If I'm going to run I want to be a good runner. If I'm going to climb I want to be scaling mountains. If I cycle I want to do the tour de france. Well, not quite but there's always that feeling of inadequacy - how come I can only run 30 or 40 miles a week? I should be running more. I should be running faster. I should be training harder. I should be able to learn Spanish, draft contracts and clean the house all at the same time.

When will I get it through my stupid head that I don't need to be superwoman? I don't need to excel in everything I do. I don't need to constantly push myself and, just occasionally, I could let myself have fun. I don't need to beat myself up because I missed a single training run (stopping training altogether is a different matter, but one measly run? so what?). I don't need to hate myself just because I had an unplanned encounter with a bag of sweets or a scone or a slice of flapjack. I don't need to always wonder whether I can lose just one more pound. I need to get rid of this all or nothing mentality.

I've posted things before that have hinted that I'm on the edge of burn out and although I'm recognising it, it's still hard to pull away because I've got that urge to push myself as close to the edge as I can get. But it's so hard to find that balancing point. If I don't push myself will I go too far the other way, will I slip back to laziness and sloth? I'm still struggling. You need a certain amount of obsession and bloody mindedness for marathon training. But you also need to know when to back off.

Tonight I managed to persuade myself not to run. I was only planning a 2.75 mile leg of a relay race anyway so it's not like the mileage was going to be important, and it wouldn't really help marathon training that much. But it was a struggle to remind myself that not running at all would probably be better than running badly because I was overtired or just not up for it. I went to the park and sat and read, rather than coming home and feeling like I need to glue myself to the computer and the television in a doomed attempt to keep up with everything that's going on. It was nice.

I'm thinking that on Saturday instead of the long run I had planned I might just head back up into the dales and go for a long walk. Up there I don't need to time myself and work out how far I've gone, I can just clear my head a bit and escape from the pressure I put on myself.

Bruises on bruises

2007-07-23T20:18:00.000+01:00

Yup, the bruises are coming up nicely.

Still, they're not quite this bad!

Battered Knees and a Big Smile

2007-07-22T19:15:00.000+01:00

I'm back from climbing. It was fantastic!

Sadly, there are no photos, so you'll just have to imagine the scene. Due to the rain the trains were a bit messed up on Friday night, but we made it up to the (highly recommended) B&B in Austwick for about 11pm on Friday night, in time for biscuits and bed. Oh and choosing breakfast for the morning.

That was a very important decision. And in the morning we duly munched our way through the fantastic spread provided while looking anxiously out at the weather. Unsurprisingly it was raining. It's always f*cking raining. Anyway, we headed down to the centre to meet the instructor.

He was possibly the most scarily fit person I've ever met. Not only was he just clambering over rocks like a goat, and was only really using the ropes to show us what to do, but he runs 50+ mile fell races, goes climbing in the himalayas, dives, does caving and does just about every activity you can think of. If you think I'm an activity junkie these days, you've never met this guy!

(Speaking of first impressions, I was quite impressed that when we walked in one of the organisers said "do you run?". Possibly due to the fact we were attired in running lycra, but after the follow up question "do you race" someone else chipped in "of course they do, look at them!" We look like a proper runners!)

There were three of us on the course - me and Jen, and another woman Julie. She'd done a bit of wall climbing before, and I was a bit worried she'd be far better than us. The back up plan for rain was to go to the wall, but after coffee and hob nobs (Robbie needs 4000 calories a day to survive apparently - and the amount of stuff he does I can believe it!) he decided it wasn't that bad, and we headed to a place called Hutton Roof.

Just the walk up to the crags would have killed me not too long ago. or at least made me have severe doubts about what I was doing. But it was fine, even if it did reinforce my idea that walking up hills is one thing, but running up them in fell races would be another...

Once we got there we got started, and it was surprisingly easy to get started. Unlike something like diving where there's a lot of theory before you can get going, it seemed to be very much learning by experience on the basis that there's always the rope to catch you if you fall, and as long as you're not in charge of putting in things to clip into, and are just following someone else up or following a route he'd prepared, there's not a great deal of knowledge involved. And after the first climb or two you wouldn't have known who had done it before and who hadn't either.

After lunch (and the B&B managed the near impossible feat of packing me a lunch that I couldn't finish!) we went to Barbondale where there was a dry gill. Or at least it was meant to be dry, there were distinct pools of water, even if it hadn't quite converted itself back to a series of waterfalls. This was more like gorge scrambling, with bits of climbing at each waterfall. I really enjoyed this bit, it was actually something that had it been drier I could have done without ropes, and on my own (if I could ever find it again).

We finished a bit early, but I think that was partly because as a small group it took less time for us to get each climb done. And it started to rain a bit more just as we finished, so we weren't complaining. Back to the B&B for cake (we didn't get our "on arrival" cakes on Friday evening so we cheekily asked if we could have them on Saturday instead), a bath, a lie down, and then out to the local pub (next door to the B&B) to eat.

We'd heard that it got busy, and by turning up at 6pm managed to get just about the last table. Following Robbie's fine example of 4000 calories per day we decided to go for the full 3 courses, although we did share a starter. We both stuck to soft drinks too, which considering we had such a short stagger home was most out of character for me. I just didn't feel like drinking to be honest.

We had a relatively early night, and another earlyish (for a Sunday) morning. Another good breakfast, and back to meet Robbie. We went back up to Hutton Roof, this time for the whole day, and did more climbing. It got a bit more technical in that we tried "lead climbing" where you climb up to clips that are already there and attach yourself to them, but don't have anything attached above you until you get there to do it yourself.

After we finished, we drove back, stopping for a cheeky cream tea on the way back. My legs are well and truly bruised, apparently I was getting too close to the rock. But the rock was kind of solid and I liked feeling like I had a good grip on it!

The thing that struck me on the drive home was that at no point during the weekend did my fat identity emerge. I didn't once think "I can't do this, I'm too fat/inflexible/heavy/unfit". I tied knots, attaching myself to the rope, and I trusted them to hold my weight. I didn't ask to be taught a special extra reinforced knot because I thought I was too heavy for the normal ones. I believed that I could do it, that it was well within my ability, and I just went for it.

I loved it. Some of the climbs were harder than others, but I managed them all without any panic or drama. The views from the top were fantastic, even in the rain (photos wouldn't do it justice anyway - it was more the unbroken sweep of green-ness that impressed, which is hard to convey on camera), and I was so proud of myself for getting out and doing it. I'm really loving being outdoors and doing stuff, and now I'm back in the house I'm sitting plotting what I can do next!

So yay for climbing!

Revelations

2007-07-19T18:55:00.001+01:00

Yesterday I found out a few things I didn't know before.

1. My secretary is doing weight watchers. I found her filling in her record card thing at her desk. That shocked me actually, she's quite a thin little thing and you wouldn't think that she needed to lose weight. I guess maybe I don't know the whole story, maybe she has to work hard to maintain that weight. I was just surprised.

2. Someone from running club has her first marathon time tattoed on her foot. Possibly the one sort of tattoo I like the idea of (although it does vaguely look like she's been branded with a series of numbers like some sort of criminal). Imagine, every time you go to put your running socks on it reminds you of how it felt, and every time you go to put your non-running stuff on it pokes you and says "remember, you're a runner, get back into it". I won't be doing it though, firstly I wear sandals too much, and wouldn't necessarily want it showing at work. And anyway, my first marathon time isn't one I'm proud of because I didn't perform to the best of my ability. But putting the time from my second marathon would seem like cheating - and what if I ran faster in the future? Also, there are pain issues and a fear of needles. No, I'll leave it as an interesting idea that will stay as just that.

3. More people are leaving my firm. I'm not sure what that means for me at the moment to be honest, but we're also meant to be recruiting at the moment, so maybe things will work out. Not that I know whether I want to be here long term anyway, I suppose we'll see what happens. I've been thinking a lot recently about what I want out of life (biiiig topic), and things are starting to fall into place. Or at least the "what's important to me" side of things. What I haven't worked out yet is how to get from where I am now to where I want to be. But that's a big subject that I'm not going to go into now.

And people at running club found out something they didn't know too.

We had a club handicap race with a social afterwards, and I took along the Eve article. I'd told one person about it and she'd asked to see it. Of course, it didn't stop at one person, so now I guess it's general knowledge. I'm kind of glad it's out in the open (although they really didn't need to see that before picture), but I'm glad that they got to know me as a fairly fast runner first, rather than as the person who lost lots of weight. They're both part of who I am, but for the first impressions thing I'd rather people know who I am now rather than who I used to be. I think I've been there long enough now that it's time to let the cat out of the bag.

This is a bit of a fly by update today, I'm away again at the weekend, on the big learn to climb/abseil course I've been plotting for months. At the moment even two hours in the house spent doing anything other than sleeping is a bit of a novelty, but hopefully after next week things will start to calm down a bit.

New York

2007-07-07T20:21:00.000+01:00

If you read "Stop", you may agree with me that it's kind of ironic that just as I start to think about scaling things back I sign up to something challenging like back to back marathons. On different continents. Oh well...

I'm fed up of not being able to talk about this, so it's time to get it out there. On 4 November I will be running in the New York Marathon for a charity called XIII Heroes. Even though I'd already signed up for Amsterdam by this point (that is on 21 October*), the opportunity to get involved with this was too good to turn down. Admittedly I was very drunk when I first agreed to do it, but since then I've had time to consider it sober and it still seemed like a good idea.

It's no ordinary charity place. I've always said that I wouldn't do a race through a charity just to get into it. There are other races I can do while waiting to get a place of my own in the big ones, whether it's through ballots or qualifying times or club places. So finding myself signed up to a charity complete with a mandatory fund raising target is a bit of a turnaround. But it's a bit special.

Last year XIII Heroes helped Matt King achieve a world first by completing a half marathon. Matt was very seriously injured a few years ago in a rugby accident, and is now on a ventilator and in a wheelchair. He's the first person to do a half marathon in that condition, and wants to be the first to complete a full one too. For the Great North Run he had a team running with him, for support, fund raising, moving discarded water bottles out of the way and stuff like that, and that's what I'll be doing in New York. I've achieved a dream by running a marathon, and it's time to help someone else do the same thing.

This might actually help me slow down and take the pressure off. We'll be running as a team, at the speed of the slowest runner. The slowest runner won't be me. Because I won't be aiming for a fast time, I can (hopefully) relax and enjoy it. Well, as much as you can enjoy running a marathon on tired legs...

So it's not just "go to New York for a run", it's more "go to New York to do something special and have a once in a lifetime experience", and that's why I'm prepared to put my anti-charity places rants behind me and dive straight into fundraising. However, that means that it's time for a shameless appeal for money.

If you would like to sponsor me, you can do it right now by going to XIII Heroes There's no info on the site yet about the run because it's not being officially announced until the end of the month, but I promise you it's happening. Because it's a general donation link rather than an individual one just for me, if you'd like to help me reach the personal fund raising target I've been set, it's important that you put my name in the notes section when you donate then it can be allocated to me. For those of you who don't know what my name is, cut and paste "I'd like to sponsor Helen Goldthorpe to run the New York Marathon".

There is obviously no obligation on anyone to donate money, or to donate any given amount of money. I'm going into this with my eyes open, and I know that if I fall short of my target I'll have to make up the difference. No matter how much I raise I will be making a sizeable personal donation, (not least because I'd feel guilty about getting other people to pay for me to go to New York for a week without contributing myself) but I'd love that donation to be in addition to the target they've set me rather than part of it. I have to provide the minimum sponsorship in stages by certain dates, so please don't wait until after the race if you're going to sponsor me. The earlier you can contribute, the less you'll have to suffer me begging as 14th September and the deadline for the first installment approaches!

*The status of Amsterdam is unclear. As I've entered and paid for flights etc, I'm going to train as though I'm running both. But if I don't feel right closer to the day, I might drop out of Amsterdam, or at least take it gently, rather than letting the team down in New York.

Stop

2007-07-07T08:08:00.000+01:00

I'm feeling a bit more positive about things today, and have binned the utterly negative post that I was writing on Thursday, but still I'm starting to have a nagging feeling that maybe it's time to take a long hard look at what I'm doing to myself and try to draw a line under it.

Quite simply, I'm not sure if what I'm doing is healthy any more. Maybe I've started to go past the point where it's nice to be fit, and be able to run, and swim, and cycle, to a point where I'm making myself do more than I should be doing, and making myself ill.

I'm constantly tired. But I still try to think of more ways to sneak in exercise, and to increase my mileage. Maybe the real reason for the laziness I alluded to in my last post isn't a natural thing, but a sign that I simply don't have the energy to do anything other than sit motionless on the sofa once I've got all my exercise done. Actually, it's not just a sofa thing. Sometimes I sit motionless at my desk at work too, unable to summon up the energy to pick up a pen or write an email, just trying hard to keep my eyes open so nobody notices how tired I am. on ThursdayI wasn't sure that I had the energy to cycle home at the end of the day. On Wednesday I gave up a run after 3 miles because I didn't feel like I could carry on. On Monday I made it to 11 miles but felt awful for the last 2 or 3. (Yesterday I did 5 without a problem though, so it's not all bad).

Maybe it's just a bug, but I just get this nagging feeling that being active and healthy and eating well is meant to make me feel energised and bouncy, not like I'm constantly trying to recover from one workout before heading straight into the next. The hours I spend exercising are expanding at a rapid rate, and squeezing everything else apart from sleep and work out of my life.

I think the time has come to say stop, and to redress the balance a little. I don't want to get to obsessed by exercise, to the detriment of other things.

It scares me. I know that if I do what I'm doing now I can maintain my weight loss. I'm actually still losing, albeit at a very slow rate - and finally hit 148 yesterday. That should have been a cause of celebration - 8 stone lost - but I actually started wondering whether I actually need to be that thin. I could gain 20lb before being classed as overweight based on my BMI, so why kill myself to stay in the 140s?. But if I allow myself to relax a bit, would I be able to stop myself relaxing too much?

I also find it hard to aim for anything other than longer and faster when I'm training for a race. And I worry that if I train less my performances will slip away. I set myself targets, and I have a tendency to get too caught up in trying to achieve them rather than running according to how I feel. If I cut a run short because I feel rubbish, it's a struggle for me to think of anything other than how to make those lost miles up elsewhere, rather than thinking about what I need to do to feel better next time I run.

How do I stop myself pushing so hard? I'm not sure. Maybe being aware of the problem is the first step, even if it takes me a while to reprogramme my brain to actually act on that awareness.

Making Things Happen

2007-07-04T20:17:00.001+01:00

'm not particularly good at spontaneity. Despite how things might appear if you look at my exercise schedule, I'm actually incredibly lazy and if I don't have something planned and scheduled into my diary I'm more than capable of sitting doing nothing for hours on end and then wondering where the time went.

This isn't necessarily a problem all the time, sometimes it's nice to just switch off and do nothing. But it doesn't help with all those vague plans - days out, and things like that. If I start the weekend thinking "I might do x", I rarely do. I decide that the weather's not nice enough, or the money would be better saved rather than spent on a day out, or that I simply can't overcome my lethargy. Sometimes it's just that I don't have a good enough idea of what I actually want to do, and having too much choice leads me to decide to do nothing.

Recently it's been particularly bad. The incessant rain really hasn't inspired me to do anything spur of the moment, even though a lot of the time it hasn't been bad enough to mean I have to stay inside, just not nice enough to persuade me to venture out. If I arranged to meet someone else and do stuff with them I suppose I'd be more inclined to get out there anyway, but when it's just me I'm not letting anyone but myself down, and I'm quite happy to be left alone on the sofa with the Sunday papers.

To some extent this is a bit inconsistent. I actually enjoy running and cycling in the rain (as long as it's just moderate rain, not the torrential stuff we had last Monday). It makes me feel invigorated and alive, like it's washing my worries away. If it's on my plan to go outside in it, I'll go out and I'll love it. But if it's not scheduled in, I use the weather like a pathetic excuse.

So this weekend there's a new plan. Instead of saying that I might do something, and making tentative plans for what I might do if it's nice, I'm going to make plans and do it anyway. If it's planned in enough detail, I can just take the first step and then the rest of the day will follow from that, rather than having a vague plan and not really having any idea of how I'm going to go about it.

So instead of putting "walking in the Dales?" in my diary, I've looked at bus timetables and routes. I know what time I need to get the bus into town to catch the Dalesbus, I know how long there is between the morning bus up there and the afternoon bus back. I have bought a map so that I can work out a route, and I've started thinking about what I need to put in my bag (food!), and what time I need to set the alarm to catch the buses.

This way if my alarm goes off and it's not raining heavily I'm all set and ready to go, rather than waking up, realising the weather's OK but having missed the bus, not wanting to drive and putting it off until another day.

The same applies to most things, really. Particularly dieting. It's one thing talking constantly, as some of the secretaries at work are, about going on a diet tomorrow, but another thing waking up tomorrow morning with everything already in place to start doing it. Having a training plan has worked wonders for keeping me exercising. I don't just wake up and think whether I feel like exercising (the answer to that question is no far more often than you'd think looking at the consistency with which I exercise), I wake up and get it done because it's planned, and because not feeling like it at the start isn't a good enough reason to skip it (I usually do enjoy it once I get going). Sometimes things seem overwhelming if you just make a goal to lose weight, or run a marathon. But you can commit to writing a healthy menu for the week, then shopping for it, then cooking it, or to going for a single run today. Break it down into steps and it feels a lot easier.

So on Sunday I'm not going for a day out walking in the Dales. I'm going to wake up early and get the bus into town with the bag I'll have packed on Saturday night, then I'm going to take it from there. It seems a bit contrived, putting a plan together to make sure I get out and do something, but I know what I'm like, even (or maybe especially) when it comes to having fun.

Smoke Free

2007-07-01T20:09:00.000+01:00

Today I went out for a celebratory July 1st Sunday lunch, to make the most of the smoking ban. Actually, the place where I went on Friday night was non-smoking then anyway, and I suspect that the place I went to for lunch might have been before, or at least I've never noticed any smoke when I've been in there. But still, I wanted to go out and make the most of the clean air.

Because I was going to a buffet place (healthy food on the buffet - salads and the like, but still with plenty of opportunity for overeating), I dragged myself out of bed for a long run before that. It was actually the first long run I've done since Edinburgh where I've really felt like I could have carried on going, which considering I made it up to 14.5 miles, which was 2.5 miles further than I've done in the past month, I was really pleased with. It was pretty slow (for me) because I ended up going off road quite a bit, and it was still muddy from all the rain we've been having. But apart from where I had to walk to avoid falling, it was a good steady run, and I'm starting to get a bit of confidence back that I can build up for another marathon.

At least the weather held off while I was out for a run. I'm just so fed up of the rain now, I wish that there would be some sign of a proper summer. Mind you, when it arrives I'll probably complain that I'm too hot when I'm out running. It's been an experience commuting in on the bike in the rain. I do think I'm mad when I'm getting absolutely soaked, but there's something very satisfied about being able to get through the city centre when it's gridlocked because of all the flooding.

Friday night I was out with the running club girls. I may have drunk a bit too much red wine, but at least I realised in time, stopped and went home. I dread to think what would have happened if I'd carried on. It's ages since I was out in town on a Friday night. I'm still not convinced about the whole going out drinking thing, crowded expensive bars where you can't hear the conversation anyway, but it's nice once in a while.

This post doesn't really have any unifying theme or insight, but hopefully I'll be able to come up with something a bit more interesting soon.

Secrets

2007-06-26T20:40:00.001+01:00

I hate having news and not being able to tell anyone, but hopefully by the end of the week I should have something very exciting to report.

Sorry for being such a tease and not giving you any hints!