My Marathon Experience

On May 7th I completed the Provo City Marathon. It was my first marathon and I was so excited to get there. Writing down my thoughts on the day has taken me 6 weeks. I have been overwhelmed with competing emotions, thoughts and feelings about the day that I have not been able to form complete sentences.

Two weeks before my race I started to hurt during my last long run. It felt like my left leg was shorter than my right & took longer to strike the ground than the right side. I had swelling, tenderness & a deep ache in my groin. I was worried that I pulled a muscle and was out of alignment. I also occasionally give myself vit b & magnesium shots, prescribed by my dr to help with overall health. With the pain in my hip I decided to inject the vitamins a bit lower and boost my system for the race. Mistake! I hit a nerve. So on top of the hip pain a nerve, felt like sciatic, was numb with pins & needles feeling. Oops! I later found out that magnesium is caustic to nerves & damages them. Amazingly in all the years previous I never hit a nerve, not until my race was just a short 2 weeks away. I had several appointments with chiropractors and physical therapist, had a massage and some A.R.T.(active release technique) work done to get everything working smoothly so that I could do the marathon. I took it easy for the last two weeks (when I ran my groin would start to ache and I would start limping more & more so I backed off to save it for the marathon day) I was reassured by the professionals that I saw that I would be able to run through the pain & then work on stretching everything well after.

Marathon morning. I was so excited! Josh got up with me and drove me to the bus pick up in Provo. I had a brief moment in the car when I was thinking about the day ahead that I felt like I was going to throw up. I calmed myself down and felt fine the rest of the ride. I rode the bus up the canyon with a handful of other athletes. It was the 367th marathon for one runner & he was giving advice and telling his thoughts about the course along the way. (He did say that a hilly course is better because it uses different muscles groups. Our race was to be very steep for the first half some of it being a 7% grade coming down the canyon and then flat for the second half making it a harder course.) We got up to the starting line and waited for the start time.

At the starting area it was pretty relaxed. The group was much smaller than I had imagined it would be. I don't know how many people started the race but only 137 finished. It wasn't too big of a group. The mountain morning air was a bit chilly so I put a small hand warmer in my sports bra to keep warm while I stretched and warmed up. They announced it was go time & off we went.

Starting down the mountain was great. It felt good to finally be moving instead of anticipating. My left hip was a little achy but not too bad. The down hill grade made the first 7 miles fast as I worked to keep a comfortable pace and just keep my feet underneath me. I love the mountains and the trees so the first half was wonderful. We ran along the Provo River, which was full of rushing water right up to the edge of the trail at points. The greenery, waterfalls & fresh mountain smells made the run great. I had planned to do Jeff Galloway's run/walk method and it was hard to force myself to briefly walk every 10 minutes for a minute when it felt good to keep going and I was making great time. Around mile 7 I stopped for a minute to stretch my hip flexors. They didn't feel too tight but my hip still had that ache so I wanted to be sure they weren't going to get too tight. At mile 8 my left leg started to buckle but it only did it once and then felt okay again so I kept going. I could feel blisters forming on the bottom of my feet from the steep grade and the timing chip strapped to my shoe lace was biting my little toe.

I came past the half way point in just under 2 hours! My time was 12 minutes faster than my half last year. I was excited. My muscles felt strong, I felt good & I was half way through. I was pacing myself well. I was going to reach my goal! With the blistered feet I asked Josh to bring my other shoes to give my feet a change. Josh ran back to the car while I continued on to get my shoes and ran them back to me. I stopped to quickly change and got going again. I continued on and went over the viaduct on University Avenue.

As I turned to go around the mall around mile 14 things quickly went downhill. The ache I had been feeling in my left hip/groin was no longer an ache. Every step felt like I had a dagger at the end of my leg jabbing into my hip. It was horrible. I stopped & stretched and walked for a few minutes hoping it would subside. I would jog a few steps and then have to return to a limping walk because the pain was too great. I considered trying to run through it but knew if I continued with that pain level I wouldn't be going much farther and would not be able to finish. I wanted to finish this race so bad. I set a goal & I was determined to attain it. I took some ibuprofen and keep moving.

With the limp and slowing pace I knew I wouldn't make it in the time goal I wanted but I would still finish. I kept limping a long watching my pace get slower and slower so I kept changing & changing my finish goal. Every 30 minutes I would set a new goal and then keep working for that. I tried multiple times to start jogging again but it just wasn't possible. Around 16 miles I passed a high school kid who was doing his 1st marathon and went out way too hard in the beginning. He had hurt his knee, taken no nutrition, was getting loopy and overall was not doing well. I gave him a gel & he walked with me for a few minutes. He slowed down & I kept going. At the 18 mile point I stopped at an aid station and got some icy hot for my IT bands & a cold pack for my groin and continued on. From here the course took us back onto the Provo River trail running back towards downtown Provo. It was scenic and enjoyable if it weren't for the pain in my leg. I tried to draw energy from nature around me & wished I could run. It was past the time I should have finished and I still had miles to go. Josh was waiting for me at the end of the trail and had a bench set up with everything he could think I might possibly want. When I saw him I let out a small sob and tears filled my eyes. I was overcome with emotion & pain (but I wasn't going to tell him that) I pulled myself together before I reached him. I was so grateful for his love & support. I changed my shoes to the newer more padded ones again and told him I would see him at the finish line~ just much later than I had planned. My 1st 14 miles were at a 9:20 min pace or faster the last 12 were progressively getting slower until I couldn't do much better than a 20 minute pace. Back on the streets of Provo I was offered a ride 5 different times. People would pull up next to me, tell me how bad I looked and ask if they could give me a ride. Very sweet, but not too helpful for the mind over matter to be told you looked too gimpy to finish. I thanked them for the offer but declined because I was going to finish.

Two miles out from the finish line the high school boy caught back up to me. He said he had gotten a 2 mile ride to an aid station had been given more fluids & nutrition and was now ready to finish. He was worried he did not want to be last. (A fear I had had on previous races but at this point was no longer a concern to me, I no longer cared if I was last only that I finished) I told him that if we were last the scooter guy would be following us but that we could go in together so neither of us was last. I gave up my music and chatted with him as we limped along. Just before the 6 hour mark we watched the police traffic control officers leave the intersections on the roads up ahead of us. By this time Josh had jogged back from the finish line to come find me. (They had seen life flight take off a few minutes before and someone had said a blond lady with a pony tail was hemorrhaging on the course, guess my family was getting pretty nervous) I was glad he was with us. Every step was very hard and I was loosing stability in my leg. Josh stopped traffic for us and we kept going. He also carried a poster my friend Cindi had made that told me I was strong & I could do this. The words & hard work from my friend uplifted & motivated me to be strong.

I was having a hard time limping and moving forward & was incapable of quick movements. At this point I was seriously wishing for a morphine shot. Before my race Josh had given me a blessing and I was told I would be able to reach my goal. I knew I was going to finish my race. It never crossed my mind to stop but morphine or some other STRONG pain relief sounded wonderful. I tried playing it out in my mind just how I could get my hands on a syringe of morphine & shoot it into my hip. Totally unrealistic but I enjoyed the fantasy and idea of relieving the pain for a few minutes. As we came back onto University Avenue just less than a mile from the finish line they had street crews picking up the cones protecting us from traffic. I was upset. Just barely 6 hours and they were taking down the race!! From the finish line backwards to the start?! If they really needed to take it down couldn't they start at the other end?! I said a quick prayer to not get run over in the last few minutes of the race and kept going. Poor planning in my opinion and we weren't the last racers. But we kept going. Josh helped us again with traffic to get across the 6 lane road and come into the finish shoot. The boy I had been walking with decided to "run" in, he was happy to beat me by a whopping 20 seconds & I had absolutely no run left (besides his race was 2 miles shorter than mine so what did I care)

I finished my first marathon in 6 hours 11 minutes! Not the 4 & 1/2 hours I had hoped for but I finished it. Josh, my mom, my sister Jessica & her 2 little girls, my brother & sister Eric & Allana & their 3 little girls had all stood there waiting for me for hours! They were there waiting & cheering for me. The support was sweet & appreciated. I sobbed! I hugged Josh and cried. My mom came over and I just kept crying. I sat down to eat an orange wedge and get control over myself and breath. The race area was pretty deserted so we got in the car & went home to see my kiddos, I had Josh leave them home so that he could help me.

I felt okay riding home but when I went to get out of the car I knew I was in trouble. I could not put any weight on my leg at all & the pain was excruciating. When I reached the stairs I crawled in and decided that was easier than trying to stand. I crawled into my bathroom and ran an ice bath. I began to sob again because the scenario brought back a flood of memories of years not too far back when I had to crawl because my joints were too inflamed with Rheumatoid Arthritis. A time when I dreamed of running a marathon but was trying to resign myself to life in a wheelchair. Back then I really couldn't have dared to have gotten so much better & yet I had & I had even completed a marathon! It was overwhelming all the thoughts and feelings going through my head. Mostly at this point I was just so full of gratitude that I had been able to do it and figured a few days rest and I would be okay. I was so overwhelmed with everything I had dealt with, faced & overcame in the past 13 years. So I kept sobbing for most of the day. I stayed in the ice bath for 15 minutes (a record for me) When I got into the tub I realized that I completely forgot about the hot hands pack I had stuck in my shirt. My chest was a bit raw & blistered either from the heat or rubbing, not sure which but I never even felt it. After my bath I crawled to the couch. Josh helped me release some fluid from my blistered feet & then took the kids so that I could rest. The pain was bad so I went for the biggest drugs I had,lortab that I hadn't taken when I had my last baby. It didn't even touch it. So I just held really still (that usually helps).

My leg was hurting badly and it wasn't about to hold any weight so I asked my Grandpa if I could borrow his walker. The 1st week I went back to the chiropractor. My left hip was twisted forward & my right hip was twisted backward making my left leg about 3 inches shorter than the right. I had an xray & he didn't see any breaks so I had him adjust me a few times. I went and had more A.R.T. done to loosen everything else up and continued using the walker for the 1st week and a half. I was getting to where I could kind of limp but movement wasn't very good and still painful. More tears remembering the days when I hurt worse than this for no good reason other than my immune system wanted to attack my body. Remembering the pain, fatigue & depression. Wow how easily those memories fade, much like childbirth. I had more gratitude & appreciation than ever before for the improvement and gift of health that I have been give. I went to a physical therapist, I was offered a wheel chair when I reached the hospital doors~ still very gimpy. She had me doing very basic exercises to strengthen my pelvic floor & stabilize my pelvis. She manipulated my hips & pelvis back into alignment & gave me exercises to hold everything in the correct place. I also had to retrain my muscles & nerves to communicate properly in my low back & legs. She told me that when you push to far on the pain threshold the nerves stop firing. :( With her help I was making progress, squeezing a cheek can be hard work! She sent me home with a crutch to aid my walking & orders to rest. But the ache in my groin wouldn't go away and if I did hardly anything weight bearing then the dagger feeling would return.

After 4 weeks I decided it was time for an mri to get a better idea of what was wrong & how to fix it. Diagnosis: stress fracture in my femur. Biggest strongest bone in the body & I broke it. I beat my old record! I have a high pain tolerance (good with chronic pain but not so good with injuries) and with the RA I often ignore pains because eventually they go away. Years ago I fractured my arm & it took me a month to figure it out. This time from the symptoms I figure I had the stress fracture 2 weeks before the marathon & then ran on it exacerbating it to the max. (Glad it didn't break in half!) So 7 weeks before finding out it is fractured. After 5 1/2 weeks of limited mobility and 1 crutch I was put on 2 crutches today and told no weight bearing on the left leg. Wish I had started that a month ago. I get to see an orthopedic specialist and hopefully he can get me a bone growth stimulator and any other tricky things to get it to heal faster. I am so ready to heal and be healthy. I am grateful for my marvelous body and its abilities.

The last month & a half has been challenging. I have cried a lot of tears & for different reasons. At first out of gratitude, then anger. I have been so angry! I don't even know for sure where it came from but it just swelled up. Josh asked me an innocent question one night and it just weighed on all the emotions I was feeling and I sobbed for three hours (I cry when I am angry, happy or sad, guess it is just an overall good release for me) I haven't cried much in years and it all came out that night. The only saving grace on the anger is that I at least finished the race. Had I been where I am & not finished I know I would be even angrier. Then I go back to gratitude and appreciation for my life. Overall life is wonderful. I hate not being able to move independently, that is probably where the anger comes from, and I have many responsibilities and commitments. But I also know it could be so much worse & I have lived with so much worse so I NEED to stay in gratitude. I am frustrated with the pain. I also discovered that I LOVE to run and not just because I can. I enjoy it for many reasons and it is something I do for me, it challenges me & makes me feel good. I miss it. I miss the endorphins & hormone response that clears the fog in my head & helps me think clearly. The weather is perfect outside right now & I want to be outside enjoying it. For now that means sitting & sewing the trampoline net my kids ripped apart back together and limping around the park on crutches. I can't wait until I can start moving NORMALLY again. I plan to come back & get stronger. In the long run I think this injury & the subsequent set back is going to be a good thing because it has taught me new things about myself & showed me somethings I need to work on to stay healthy in the long run. I do not regret for one moment running my marathon. I am happy I reached my goal. I would really love to do it again in the future & RUN the marathon but I have a lot of work to do before I commit to that goal again. I want to do it, do it well & stay healthy so it will be awhile before I get there. Red Rock Relay is in September. Right now my goal is to be able to go and do that race with my sweet hubby & an awesome group of friends. Wish me good luck that I am healed in time to do it.

* If you are still reading, thanks for listening to my ramblings. I am writing for my own benefit more than anything so you get to read the looong version. ~Hugs~