October 3, 2009

So I kept saying this was my last marathon! Well on Saturday I got up early and took the early bus. As a result they entered my name in a drawing for some pretty cool prizes. You'll never guess what I won. Free entry into next year's marathon. Of all the prizes. It couldn't have been the week long stay at the local spa, no. Couldn't have been the cash, no. Had to be the free entry into next year's pain cave. So I guess training will resume in a few weeks. I'll work a little harder this year and see if I can't qualify for Boston. Again. In the cold, wind, & rain. Again. It's just 26.2 miles, right? But this is my LAST ONE!

The ER

Hopefully Star doesn't read this or she'll prolly kill me. She flew out from OK for conference late last week. The morning after her arrival Julie and I met her for breakfast. On her way to breakfast she called and said she wasn't feeling well, had some tingling in her right arm and face. So I talked to her while she drove and when she got to the restaurant she looked fine, but had a REALLY hard time talking. She still had some numbness, mostly on her right, but her face wasn't droopy, but she couldn't talk, and it was getting worse. She had a hard time remembering names of family members, which made her start crying, and that's when I got nervous. I thought maybe it was a blood sugar problem, since she'd flown in late the night before and hadn't eaten dinner or breakfast yet. So she tried to eat, but was so upset she couldn't. She tried to drink and dropped the glass. I thought she might be having a stroke, but she's only 28! Then she was mumbling worse and I asked if I could take her to the hospital. She let me drive her first to the insta care, but they recommended we go to the ER. As we were walking in she was getting dizzy, having a hard time walking without help. I was afraid there'd be a huge wait, but much to my surprise, they rushed her into the CT scan room while I filled out the paperwork. After the CT scan came the EKG, and they were able to rule out stroke, THANK GOODNESS! But, the neurologist had been called in because the CT scan wasn't good. The left side of her head was really hurting her so they gave her some meds for the pain, and to help her sleep. Turns out she had poor blood flow on the left side of her brain. That caused a migraine, and her reaction was not typical, but understandable. She felt dumb for going to the hospital, but it was the right thing to do. We were there for about 7 hours and her brother Jack showed up after noon to keep me company. She's fine now, says she feels a lot better. Star, if you're reading this: Take better care of yourself!! Manage your stress and put yourself first for once... you scare me! She was at the hospital about one hour after she first started feeling sick, which, if it was a stroke, would've made a difference, according to the neurologist. So remember, if someone you know has numbness on one side of their body, their face or mouth is droopy, and they're having a hard time talking, take em to the ER now! I've included an attachment to the American Heart Association's website with info about stroke victims, just click on the title of this post.

SGM

The St. George Marathon was this morning and once again, it was FREEZING!! It was windy, cold, and raining sideways. My feet were saturated before the race even began. There's bonfires in the morning and the wind was blowing so hard people had to stand WAY back. Anyway, this was my first marathon that I didn't cramp up, so that was nice. I ran with a friend from work, Stu Short, 22 years old from Sacramento, and a friend from High School, Dr. Tyler Carlson, 32. Stu ditched us at mile 3 for a 3:02 finish which qualifies him for Boston. I ditched Tyler at mile 7, he then caught me at mile 24, and we ran together til the last 2 tenths of the race. Tyler finished 3:50 and I finished with a personal record of 3:52. I'm really happy with my time, my overall performance, especially considering the conditions, it was MISERABLE! This is the best I've ever felt during a marathon. But I think it'll be my last, triathlons are the way to go. They don't hurt nearly as bad.