Coming up for air

Patterns - life is all about patterns. I've been looking at my history and discovering patterns. Such as...when someone in my life passes away I become ill. I don't know if that is due to the break in routine of my exercise schedule or just my body's response to grief. Either way I've been ill since Friday, getting better both mentally and physically every day.

Sadly, I think I grieve more for the loss of my little buddy than I did my grandparents. It makes sense though, doesn't it? He was a constant in my life. He wasn't in my past memories, he was present, he was life itself. Not to say that my life revolved around my dog, that is absurd, but he was in the here and now. I don't know if dogs grieve for one another, or if they comprehend really what has happened. But it seems that Sydney is grieving...or that I'm just projecting it on to her. :)

The time has come where I need to come up for air and really start living fully again. I need to stop going home after work with the intention of working out and just sitting on the couch instead. Lucky, lucky me though...I have a great support team that seems to understand.

I have a wonderful husband, who is taking the loss hard as well, trying to motivate me and doing little things for me that I really appreciate. Example: I bought a basil bunch a while ago, it had the roots and everything, I put it in water to preserve it and kept meaning to pot it, never got around to it...but lo and behold it was done when I got home last night. I never even asked. I have a coach who reads minds, as I was stressing about missing so many workouts, and writes and tells me that we'll get through this and to do what I can right now. I have friends, both old and new, who seem to know when I need to hear certain words, who are there for me if I choose to call...countless friends. I am so blessed.

So thank you to my support team, all of you, even the ones who don't read my blog...like my husband. :) I couldn't make it through times like this without you all.

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Training - As I stated above it's not really great, however my intentions are there.

Currently I'm training for the Austin 1/2 marathon and the time I'm shooting for is going to be a challenge! My fastest 1/2 marathon was in 2007 at the 3M Half, time was 2:29. The hardest course that I have done is the Nike San Francisco 1/2 and my time for that was 2:36. My goal??? 2:15 Yikes! I can do it, I know I can. I just need to follow my plan, do my workouts and believe in myself.

After that I'm not sure what I'm going to do. Coach C has me riding and swimming as recovery days during the run season so I won't lose those completely. I have no idea what tris I want to do next year. Right now I have no desire to do any, but we'll revisit in a while. I'm going to be very selective next year, volunteer a lot, but just do a 2-3 tris. One, budgeting constraints and two, I enjoy training more than I do racing. :)

Well...time to get going for now. I'll be on more often (sorry about the lapse in blogging the past couple of months!) Peace out kids!!