after the ballooning

Posted on June 19, 2014 by Cindy

Things I’ve learned about sinus surgery/balloon sinuplasty and other random thoughts from yesterday:

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1. You have no idea just how far back your sinus cavities go until a nurse packs your nose with numbing gauze. Chris and I took one look at the nurse’s supply tray and we were both like, “yeah, that’s not going all the way in there.” (Insert a “that’s what she said” joke here.) But it did. Equal parts fascinating and horrifying.

The doctor’s office was late getting started and we did a lot of sitting and waiting. At one point, Chris threatened to take a picture of me with my nose packed with gauze, IV in my hand, playing Candy Crush on my phone. I think the glare I gave him convinced him otherwise.

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2. I’ve gotten used to people assuming that Chris and I are married. I figure that when you’re of a certain age (like we are), and you’re obviously a couple, people just assume that you’re married. Especially if we’re out with the kids, it looks like we’re a little family unit. And that’s fine, I don’t really care what other people think. Hell, I’ve taken my kids out to do stuff with my brother Chris, and people assume he’s their dad. Until my girls address him as “Uncle Chris,” and they probably put it together. But again: I don’t care, it’s not really on my radar to worry about how other people perceive my marital status.

But I have to say, it’s kind of jarring when people call Chris my husband. It happened a few times yesterday, nurses called him that. Like, “your husband is in the waiting room,” that kind of thing. And my brain goes, “Wait, what? I don’t have a hus- ohhhh right nevermind.” I didn’t bother to correct them, because really, they’re just doing their job, and they don’t care about my relationship status. Still, it throws me a little.

Like a couple of times when we’ve gone out to eat, and Chris paid with his debit card, and the waiter has come back with the check and said, “Thanks for coming out tonight, Mr. and Mrs. [Chris’s last name].” It’s happened in reverse, too, when I paid with my card, and the waiter called him Mr. Wilkinson. It’s just… strange.

Point being: wedding rings, y’all. Check for them.

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3. The anesthesiology nurse warned me that it stings when the sleepy meds start to drip into my hand from the IV. I said, “oh yeah, I see what you mean,” and then I don’t remember anything after that. No counting down from 100, it was just lights out.

[Side note: that same nurse told me afterward that during the last part of the surgery, my heart rate went way up and I started to thrash around. I really wish she hadn’t told me that. I kind of wanted to keep the vision that I was just peacefully asleep for the whole thing. Knowing that my unconscious self was able to register pain and react to it is probably the kind of thing that will give me nightmares.]

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4. The next thing I remember was being in a wheelchair in the recovery room, crying and bleeding all over Chris. I must’ve woken up earlier, because they got me from the bed to the wheelchair after I was awake, but I don’t remember that part. And Chris said he heard me asking for him as he was walking down the hall to the recovery room, so again, I was obviously sort of conscious, but I don’t remember that at all. I just remember that my whole head hurt like hell and I couldn’t breathe. And I hate crying in front of strangers (like the medical staff who were in the room with me), but what can you do? That happened.

The ride home was pretty miserable. I moaned and whimpered the whole way.

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5. Percocet is a wonderful thing. Chris helped me get settled in bed (2 pillows to keep my head elevated, towels on top of the pillowcase in case I bled everywhere, bottle of Gatorade on the nightstand in case I got thirsty), and I slept in a lovely, comfortable, narcotic haze for a few hours.

When I woke up, we had dinner, lay on the couch, and watched TV. I cut the Percocet into one-fourths so I could space them out, keep myself pain-free, and not be completely loopy and stoned. It worked pretty well.

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6. Trying to sleep the first night after sinus surgery is pretty awful. I can’t breathe through my nose (nor am I allowed to blow my nose), so I woke up pretty much hourly. Not fun.

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7. The tools they used in the surgery shaved several layers of skin off the tip of my nose, and it’s now starting to blister. This is decidedly not awesome. I’m keeping Bacitracin ointment on it.

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8. On the upside, I’m 24 hours post-op and I’m not in any real pain at all, just general discomfort (like when you’re congested with a bad cold). I’ve switched to regular Tylenol, so that’s not so bad. I just wish I could breathe normally.

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I guess time will tell if this was all worth it. If it means that I get less frequent headaches, and I stop getting sinus infections that require antibiotics every couple of months, then it definitely will have been worthwhile. Just have to wait and see, I guess.

sticking a balloon up your nose sounds like a really bad idea

Posted on June 16, 2014 by Cindy

A couple of years ago, I started seeing an Ear Nose & Throat doctor for some recurring sinus issues I was having. He recommended that I get sinus surgery, but the recovery time was at least two weeks. And he told me this when Lucy was a baby and I was a full-time single mom of two kids. So I basically balked at the idea.

I saw my doctor again a couple of months ago, and he told me about a new procedure called balloon sinuplasty, which is basically the same concept (taking a Roto Rooter to your nasal passages), but less invasive and the recovery time is minimal. And it turns out my insurance covers it, too.

So I’m having it done later this week. The kids will be with Dave for a couple of nights while I sleep off the anesthesia and recuperate. I’m not anticipating any issues, but you know, when you throw the word “surgery” around, things start to sound kind of scary. Good thoughts welcome.

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The kids spent this past weekend with Dave. It occurred to me that this might have been the first time he got to be with both kids on Father’s Day in Lucy’s lifetime.

Actually, I guess that’s not true, because he was here in 2011 when she was two weeks old. But the vast majority of 2011 is kind of a blur for me. It’s weird when people tell me about something I said or did around the time Lucy was born and I have no recollection of it. (My dad mentioned something about painting Lucy’s nursery pink. I was like, “no, I never painted anything in that house.” Then I remembered that oh yeah, I did. Or maybe Dave painted it and I just decorated it with vinyl wall stickers afterward? I honestly can’t remember.) Everything from that time frame is fuzzy, like something that happened in a dream.

Anyway, the girls got to spend Father’s Day with him this year, and that’s a good thing. Lucy’s daycare class all made some kind of art project for their respective dads, and Catie made him a dragon, since she made me one for Mother’s Day and I guess felt like she needed to be fair.

I know I’m not objective, but I do really like her dragons.

I don’t say much about Dave here, because I generally think it isn’t appropriate. But I will say that it’s been really great having him actively involved in the kids’ lives these past several months. I think it’s been good for all of us.

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I miss blogging. It’s hard because lately I feel so scrutinized. I know a couple of people are reading here, looking for any tiny detail they can use against me or Chris.

What’s the expression, it’s not paranoia if people really are out to get you? That. It seems there are some people whose entire existence is based on trying to suck the happiness out of others’ lives. Joy thieves really suck to have around.

Hopefully, this too shall pass, and eventually I won’t feel quite so censored. But for now, I have to use the “mute” button pretty heavily on a lot of my life, and I hate it.

Lucy’s 3rd birthday recap

Posted on June 2, 2014 by Cindy

When I asked Lucy what kind of birthday cake she wanted, she said, “Princess cake!”

Ask and ye shall receive, baby.

I got some comments on FB that seem to imply people think I made this cake. I did not. I have spectacularly awful baking skills. This is one of those grocery store “fill out the form with the code number for which character-branded cake you want, and what you want it to say.” Boom, done. Princess cake acquired.

I tend to think that 3 is not an age for a big birthday party, since kids that age are too young to remember it. So we kept it small and low-key: Catie and Lucy, plus my cousin’s kids, plus Chris’s kids, added up to 6 kids, and with family visiting (my sister flew in from Texas, and my brother and his girlfriend came over from Charlotte), we had 9 adults.

Since 15 people in my house seemed like an awful lot, we used my neighborhood’s clubhouse, which was perfect, because it’s a nice big space with a lot of seating, and a playground right next to it for the kids to run around.

I got veggies, chips/dip, fruit, stuff to make sandwiches, and a couple of pizzas, and all of the grown-ups ate and talked while the kids were in and out. It was really nice.

I wasn’t really paying attention to the time, and it had been over 2 hours before I realized we should do cake and presents. By that time, Lucy was already kind of tired and not at all sure about this whole “singing happy birthday” thing.

That’s her “what is all this shenanigans?” face.

We started to open presents, but by that point, she was doing the thousand yard stare, and it was pretty rapidly apparent that girlfriend needed a nap. So my parents took her with them to their house, where she promptly crashed, while the big kids continued to play outside, and the grown-ups cleaned up the clubhouse.

One random moment from that – Chris’s daughter accidentally let go of her balloon in the clubhouse, which has ridiculously tall vaulted ceilings. Since we were supposed to leave it clean, we didn’t want to leave a stray balloon behind. It became very Walter White and the fly in trying to figure out how we were going to get the balloon down.

My cousin’s husband and Chris together somehow devised a Swiffer tied to a broom with an extension cord to try to catch it, but that didn’t work. Finally, we got out the vacuum, Chris stood on a barstool while Tony held the vacuum up in the air, and it was juuuuust tall enough to reach.

Balloon rescue success!

After we finished cleaning up, my cousin and her family took off, Chris and his kids took off, and my sister and I took Catie over to my parents’ house. We found Lucy still asleep.

When she woke up, she opened the rest of her presents, which was much more enthusiastic since she was more perky after her nap.

She got a set of Frozen action figures, which she loved.

My mom, because she knows my girls, had the foresight to get Catie her own set, so they wouldn’t fight over them.

(They’re these, for those of you who are curious. They cost less than half the current amount when my mom bought them, but it took forever because they shipped them from China, and they had a really horrible chemical smell when they arrived. My mom soaked them in vinegar and let them air out in the garage for weeks before they were ok. So, not really recommended, but if you have Frozen-crazy children and are desperate, there you go.)

My sister gave Lucy Barbie-sized Anna and Kristoff dolls, which she immediately stripped naked, because that’s what she does with all of her dolls don’t ask me why I don’t know.

And she got to be a “butterfly fairy.”

Really, what more could a 3 year-old ask for?

So, yeah, third birthday is now in the books. Can’t wait to see what the coming year brings.

to my almost-3 year-old Lucy

Posted on May 30, 2014 by Cindy

My sweet Lucy Goose,

Tomorrow, you turn 3 years old.

I know, I’m surprised we survived the past year too.

This past year has been pretty rough. You still don’t sleep through the night – you come into my room every two to three hours all night long, every night. When Chris is here, you’ll run around to his side of the bed to get him, because he’s a lot nicer about being woken up than I am.

Every night, you come in, one of us puts you back in bed, turns on your Baby Einstein lullaby CD, and lather-rinse-repeat, all night long.

So, when you’re a teenager and want to sleep until noon and I come into your room with an air horn and wake you up at 5 a.m.? Read that above paragraph to understand why. Three years of this, baby girl. Your mama is TIRED.

But oh, you are so funny. You never stop talking. Your internal monologue is not internal at all, you narrate everything as it happens around you. And you ask a million questions about the world. Little things that don’t cross my mind – the other night, we were reading a little board book called Quiet Loud, and for whatever reason, the baby who’s the main character in the book only wears a diaper. You kept asking, “Why is the baby nekkid? He don’t have any clothes??” I tried to say that maybe the baby felt like only wearing a diaper, but you kept asking about it over and over until I got the giggles and couldn’t stop laughing.

And you’ll randomly say things that are completely innocent and unintentionally hilarious, like a couple of weeks ago when out of the blue, you said, “This is how you make a baby!”

I froze, and said, “Wait, what?”

You curled yourself up into the fetal position and said, “See? I a baby!”

Ohhh, right. Whew.

You waffle back and forth between being my baby and being a big girl. A lot of times, you’ll shoo me away from trying to help you with something, because you want to do it yourself. Other times, you tell me, “I can’t do that, I only little.”

You adore your big sister (and man, does she ever love you), but you two are the opposite in so many ways. You constantly tell me how your favorite color is pink, and you only like princesses. Even in last week’s newsletter from daycare, when they asked all of the kids in your class to name their favorite farm animal, your answer was, “Pigs. Because they pink.” You are my Super Girly Girl. I don’t know where it comes from, because your sister hates pink, loves video games, and doesn’t give a hoot about princesses, and I wouldn’t consider myself a “girly-girl” type either, but I love that you found your own thing.

It’s funny, because I have to fight with Catie to get her to wear dresses, and you pretty much only want to wear dresses or skirts. (Although at the moment, all skirts are called “tutus” to you, which is pretty awesome.) And you have very strong ideas about your clothes. This morning, you wanted to wear a “tutu” (skirt) with a dress. Together. Because one skirt just wasn’t girly enough, I guess. You grabbed them both and took off down the hall to go dress yourself in the bathroom (one of your “I do it all by myself” moments), and I said that you couldn’t wear the dress with the skirt, so I was going to grab you some leggings to put under your dress. As you ran down the hall, you called back over your shoulder, “No leggings! Just my tutu!” and kept running. We had a little fight about it, and the leggings won out. (Sorry, baby, but the skirt really did look kind of ridiculous with the dress. You’ll thank me someday.)

You really love the dudes in your life. You love your dad, and Chris (you call him Boy Chris, to differentiate him from your Uncle Chris, who you also adore – there’s a whole backstory there about 2 kids of different genders with the same name at your daycare, so there’s Boy X and Girl X, and that’s how Chris ended up as “Boy Chris”). But most of all, you love your Pop-Pop. And oh, does he ever love you, little girl.

I don’t know if you know this, but my dad has always been kind of a grumpy guy. But once when we said something to you about, “Hey Lucy, is Pop-Pop grumpy?” You said, “Noooo! He not grumpy!” And laughed like it was the biggest joke ever. And it occurred to me that you’ve never seen him grumpy, because he lights up whenever you’re around.

You have that effect on a lot of people, actually. It’s a trait I hope you never outgrow, that ability to make people smile as soon as you walk into a room.

People regularly tell me that you look like me, and on a day-to-day basis, I don’t really see it, but then I’ll see an old photo of myself at your age, like this one from my third birthday:

And… oh. Huh. Yeah, I guess we do look a lot alike. Sorry about that, baby. I promise I’ll do my very best not to project my own body image issues and hang-ups onto you.

With your sister, three was the hardest age for us. It was when I had the most problems with her behavior and didn’t know what to do with her. I always thought “terrible twos” was a misnomer and that it was actually three that was the hardest age. That might be true, I guess it depends on the kid. I’m hoping you’ve already gone through the worst of your toddler behavior issues, because lately, you’ve been pretty hilariously fun. And I really hope it stays that way.

Because you are just awesome.

Happy birthday, Lucy girl. We love you to the moon and back.

Love,
Mama

reunion recap

Posted on May 21, 2014 by Cindy

I got to Mississippi on Friday around lunchtime. Since I had some time to kill, I goofed off for a while – I drove past my old house (that felt weird), went to a consignment shop that one of my sister’s best friends owns (she hooked me up with 2 dresses, a shirt, and a pair of jeans that are a size 8 and actually fit my ass, so I love her for that), grabbed a bite to eat, then went to the liquor store and grocery store to have supplies to bring over to my friend Melanie’s house.

I got to Melanie’s right around the same time that she got there with her kids. Later, our friends Allison and Michele came over, and the husbands watched the kids while we sat around the kitchen drinking, eating, and catching up. It was basically perfect.

The next day, we had a reunion picnic planned. It so happened that very few people showed up, but the weather was lovely, and I got bonus time to hang out with my girls and their families, so that was fine by me.

(The girls on the far left and far right of this pic were in other grades, and I don’t know them as well. The four of us in the middle – Allison, Melanie, me, and Michele – those are my girls.)

After the picnic, Allison had to go, and Melanie and her husband and kids needed to stick around for some family shindig, so I followed Michele over to our school’s church and dug around through some memorabilia.

I need to back up here and explain something about my school. Where I grew up in Mississippi, the public schools were not very good (not a big shock, since Mississippi usually ranks 50th in the country for public education). So, generally, if your parents could manage to afford it, they sent you to a private school. The school my parents chose was affiliated with a Baptist church (funny, because we’re Methodist). The summer between my first and second grade years, we merged with one of the local council schools. (Only click that link if you want to read some truly horrifying racist shit.) The school – while retaining the name of the Baptist church – moved to the council school’s campus a couple of miles away.

In 2000, the school was foreclosed (the graduating class of 1994 had a whopping total of 29 students, so it’s not really surprising that they were in financial trouble). Before the bank came to seize everything, the administration of the school called the church and was like, “hey, we have all this stuff, can we stash it at the church?” Apparently the church has a little annex building, and they gave up one room, and that’s where all of my school’s memorabilia is now stored.

(In the last 14 years since the school was closed, the campus was taken over as basically a squatter’s den/crack house, and the majority of it has burned down. I think it’s mostly just a big empty field now.)

I’m not usually a nostalgic person, and I wasn’t all gung-ho about going to the church to check out the memorabilia room, but digging around with Michele was fun. Mainly because we found some random crazy stuff, and cracked each other up, like this oh-so-fashionable band uniform:

(I know I look naked, I swear I’m wearing shorts.)
(Also, side note: I was never in the band, I just thought this was funny.)

And a really hideous sweater with the school logo on it. I think my sister had one of these in the 80s. Or maybe these were for faculty, I can’t remember.

As kids, I don’t think that any of us realized that we were privileged white kids in what basically amounted to a segregated school. But that’s more or less what it was. As evidenced by a photo I found in a yearbook from 1982-1983, of that year’s homecoming court. Keep in mind this is not, like, pre-Civil Rights era. This was 30 years ago, the year I was in first grade.

It’s a bad picture because I took it under fluorescent lights, but as you can see, all the girls on the homecoming court wore antebellum hoop skirt dresses that year. And all the boys wore Confederate uniforms.

I just… yeah. I have no words. My jaw dropped.

And it’s funny that a lot of us have grown up and realized just how bizarrely racist some of our school traditions were. At the reunion on Saturday night, one of the guys mentioned something about Slave Day. I had completely forgotten that until he mentioned it.

SO! Slave Day? Was one day a year that all of the juniors were auctioned off to the seniors and lower-classmen, and for that one day, you had to follow around the person who bought you, and do whatever they wanted. They auctioned people, and called it slave day. In Mississippi. And it was a school fundraiser! Endorsed by the faculty and administration! WHAT. THE. HELL.

That is just fucked up, no way around it.

(If memory serves, the year I was a junior and it was my turn, I gave my brother some money to buy me, which he did, and I did all of his homework for him that day.)

Anyway, Saturday night was the big reunion dinner, and we got all decked out.

Melanie and me. This is the best pic I have of my dress and red heels.

We had a private room at a nice restaurant. Considering our class is so small, we had a pretty good turnout. I think it was around 25 people (including spouses). There were only two people there who I actively wanted to avoid, and it turns out that it was pretty easy to just not make eye contact with them at all, and only chat with the people who I wanted to see.

Michele had mentioned going to a bar after the reunion dinner, and initially I thought that sounded fun. But then I had three drinks during dinner (I wasn’t driving, I rode with Melanie and her husband, and he drove), so by the time dinner finished, all I wanted to do was get my Spanx off, put on my yoga pants, and go to sleep. So that’s what we did. Because that’s what happens when you get old, I guess.

The next day, my flight didn’t leave until late in the afternoon, so I met up with Michele for brunch. (Allison was packing for a beach trip, and Melanie had gotten roped into helping out with Sunday school at her church.) That was fantastic, and gave me that last little hit of “girl time” that I needed. Then I went to the airport, dropped off the rental car, hopped on a plane, and five-ish hours later, I landed at RDU, and Chris was waiting for me at baggage claim.

Overall, I’m really glad I went, because it made me remember something: there’s a very small group of people, who have known me since I was in first grade, who will always love me and not judge me, no matter what. And it doesn’t matter how many years it’s been since I’ve seen them last. When we’re together, it’s like we didn’t even miss a beat.

I cannot even begin to tell you how awesome that was. There was one of my girls who was missing because she couldn’t get a cheap enough flight (she lives in Colorado), and that bummed me out a lot, but man, getting to spend time with 3 of the 4 girls who I wanted to see was damn therapeutic for my soul.

So it was really good. I miss them already. Guess I’ll have to go back for the 30th reunion in ten years.

on reunions

Posted on May 16, 2014 by Cindy

Today I’m flying to Mississippi for my 20 year high school reunion. I’m actually typing this out on my phone while I’m on the plane, which should be tedious and time consuming, but I text so much that it’s really not. (Just call me Ol’ Lightning Thumbs.)

Random stuff about this trip that I’m going to just make into a list because I only slept 4 hours last night and my brain isn’t in any condition to make this a cohesive narrative.

1. I’m going by myself. The kids are with Dave, and Chris isn’t coming because he has his kids this weekend. I have mixed feelings about it – it’s cheaper for me to go by myself, it’s so much easier to fly without the kids (no stroller! no diaper bag! I feel so unencumbered!), and really, even if Chris did come, he’d be bored out of his mind sitting around while I talk with a bunch of girls I’ve known since I was Catie’s age, talking about stuff that happened 20+ years ago. Still, a lot (most?) people are going to have their significant others and kids with them this weekend, so it’ll feel a little weird to be going solo. And I’ll miss having “my people” with me. But it’s ok.

2. This is a short trip – flying out Friday morning, and I get back on Sunday night. Not even long enough to worry about the cat being alone. (I gave Dave a spare key to my house, in case the kids need something, and so they can check on Beaumont if necessary. Is it weird to give my ex-husband access to my house when I’m not there? Eh, maybe, but I’m not worried about it.)

3. I’m staying with a friend who I haven’t seen since Catie was a baby, and before that, it had been over 10 years. But I’m excited about that, it should be fun.

4. Funny thing about Facebook is that it’s let me stay in touch with the people I want to stay in touch with, and it’s easy to pointedly avoid those I don’t. But the thing is, the people I want to stay in touch with? None of them live in North Carolina, so I never get to see them. That’s kind of what makes this whole trip special. There’s a small group of people I’m super-excited to see, a few people I’m indifferent about, and a few more that, well, I’m pretty much dreading.

5. I think for most people, high school is not always the happiest time in our lives. I was fat in high school, and I was pretty nerdy, and it made me an easy target for getting picked on. I’ll admit there is a part of me that is very much looking forward to putting on a really sexy dress on Saturday night and kind of showing off a little. (And the dress is hot, it’s black and white, and makes me look all hourglass-y, and I’m putting it with a pair of red heels that are pretty amazing.) If it makes me shallow to want to show off in front of the guys who called me fat in high school, so be it.

So! That’s that. Jackson, Mississippi, here I come.

Oh – one last observation. I’ve decided that there are 2 types of women in the world: those who wear high heels through the airport, and the rest of us. I’m firmly on Team Flip-Flops over here, in case there was any doubt.

random thoughts on diets and exercise

Posted on May 13, 2014 by Cindy

A few weeks ago, I’d realized that I’d gained weight. Not a significant amount. Basically, my weight varies a little from day to day, but I have a 5-pound range where I tend to hover. I noticed that the 5-pound range had shifted upward by about 3 or 4 pounds.

This seems insignificant, I know, but I’ve found that it’s a hell of a lot easier to lose 3-5 pounds than it is to lose, say, 20. So, for a couple of weeks, I cut out all processed foods – restricted myself to veggies, fruit, and meat, nothing else. (Not even any dairy, except for a splash of milk in my coffee in the morning. Because even I have limits.) And I lost the weight pretty easily by doing that. I got back to my usual weight range, and I’m pretty pleased with that.

It got me thinking about diets and exercise programs, and which ones have worked for me over the years, and which ones haven’t. And I have come up with a theory about weight loss that might be complete b.s., but it makes sense to me.

I think that in order to successfully lose weight, you have to find the delicate balance between two factors:
1. A diet that works for your body.
2. A diet that works for your brain.

See, I don’t think every diet works for every person. A couple of years ago, I tried Jenny Craig. It did nothing for me except make me hungry and grumpy and feel like crap. I know some people are very successful on those types of programs, and hey, good for them! I think something about the pre-made processed food just turns my metabolism to sludge. That’s just me and my body.

The brain part is trickier, but I think it’s why I’ve had a lot of “false starts” with diets where I planned to start some new strategy, and then completely failed. Like, I had a doctor who told me to try a liquid diet for 2 weeks. I basically white-knuckled it and barely made it to day 5 before I caved. It was a mental hang-up that I had, I couldn’t cope with it.

I know some people can’t do the diet approach works for me. I know that vigilantly checking your weight every day, and dieting the minute that you start to gain does border on being a little obsessive. I get that it wouldn’t work for everybody’s personality type. And not everyone can do the whole “eliminate all processed foods” super-restricted diet that works for me.

I don’t really know what my point is here, just that you shouldn’t be discouraged if you hit a plateau or need to quit your latest weight-loss endeavor before you hit your goal. It just means you need to keep trying different approaches until you find the one that works for your body and your brain.

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

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While I’m on this whole diet/exercise rant, running has been my “exercise of choice” for a pretty long time now. Over a year, I guess. I started off really slow – I used the Doctor Mama approach of “run so slowly that you would be embarrassed if anyone saw you.” (I tried various interval training programs over the years, couch-to-5K type things, but this “go sloooow” approach is the only thing I’ve found that works for me and doesn’t kill my knees.)

And for a really long time, I only ran on my treadmill in my house, because I was embarrassed about how slow and awful I was at running. All the panting! The needing to stop to blow my nose or get a gulp of water! Mortifying.

And I’ve gotten a lot better. I started running outside when the weather got nice a couple of months ago, and I’m sure I’ll be back on the treadmill when it gets too hot later this summer, but right now I just run in the morning before it gets too unbearable.

I’ve gradually increased both my speed (I’m still slow compared to most runners, I average about a 5 mph pace), and the length of my runs. I’m now running close to 3 miles, 5 days a week. No lie, I’m pretty proud of that.

I like running because I can let my mind wander. It calms my anxiety, and it helps me gather my thoughts and figure myself out. Kind of a zen thing, I guess.

Today, for some reason, I started thinking about pain. On “House of Cards,” at the very beginning of the first episode (the scene with the dog, for those of you who know what I’m talking about), Frank Underwood talks about the two types of pain – how there’s the pain that makes you stronger, and there’s pain that’s useless.

And I thought about how that applies to running. See, I don’t mind it when my legs hurt while I run, because I figure they’re getting stronger. And I’m ok when my heart is pounding and my lungs feel like they’re going to explode out of my chest, because I know I’m building up my endurance.

The one thing I can’t handle? When sweat drips into my eyes. There’s no benefit there. My eyes aren’t going to get stronger because of it. It’s just stupid and it hurts. Useless pain.

So, yeah. Maybe using the treadmill in the air-conditioning isn’t such a bad idea after all.

PooBou.com

Mom. Stepmom. Nerd. Feminist. Pretty good wife. Outstanding ex-wife. I try to keep it light and funny. I'm not always successful.

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