New Shoes, Treadmill and other tidbits...

Man, what a weekend! Friday night we went to Fit Right Northwest and I got my shoes and Tom had his gait analysis done...and he got shoes too!

I managed to pack my running clothes and new shoes for our trip to Seattle (thought I could at least run on the treadmill at the hotel). Treadmill, ugh...not too bad though. I got two miles in, a much needed workout. Although the day before we spent pretty much the WHOLE day walking. Qwest Field is quite a distance away from Pike Place Market! It was a good day though. Anyway, I thought that I would be bored, but the display on the treadmill that thing is FILLED with all sorts of information for my puny little brain, so I spent the half hour just mesmerized with the changing numbers and my BPM. There really was no time to get bored, but it was a little slow going. My goal was to run 30 minutes and hopefully get two slow miles in. I did it so and my shoes were awesome!

Training Plan
Today I printed off a training plan (which is free on the Runner's World website) to get to a 10K distance. I'll have to use a lot of treadmill time to get down my pace for a 14 minute mile and then try to get used to pace so I don't try to do TOO much. I hope to start training after we return from our trip - that's the plan at this point. I have over six months to train for the Duathlon - but my main concern is the running of course. I know that I can ride so that's not a problem, anyone could ride 12 miles pretty quick if they need to. I just see the second 5K being very slow. As long as I finish I'll be happy with that.

WHY DU?
WHY would I do a Duathlon? That question has come up more than once. I had to think about it because I have been having thoughts of doing one for a little while. The main reason is because I think it would be fun. The serious reason...because I can.

The way a person goes thru cancer treatments really says something about that person. My cancer wasn't as devastating as others, but the treatments certainly were not that easy. The radiation even though it was painless, it caused a fair amount of fatigue, which surprised me. I had radiation to my HEAD! I still don't understand that...oh wait, I had 1/2 doses of chemotherapy to go along with that, so that probably didn't help. I was a little tired after six weeks of daily doses of radiation and chemotherapy. The chemo was a regimen of 5 days a week every 4th week - ugh. That was plain harsh on my stomach since my chemo was in pill form. That went on for 12 months...that's a long time! The pills just made me feel sick to my stomach and eating was not a fun activity at that time either. So just getting thru the day was my job. That's not to say that it was like that all the time - I got out and still did fun stuff, but the fun days were limited by how I felt. If I felt crummy I would rest, felt down I would ride to raise my spirits and if I felt good I would do long rides (anything longer than 5 miles). So being a cancer patient taught me to just deal with stuff as it came along and to take care of myself as well as possible. My attitude about my health changed during my treatment days and I decided that I wanted to take better care of myself.

This year was a year the biggest change - my decision to have MRIs done every six months. That was a decision that I made back in January, but only after my appointment with my oncologist at that time. When my quarterly MRI came around again I had already decided to start training for my first 5K. My MRI results came back good, yet again, so it was hard to say "Yeah, I want to keep doing this every 3 months..." The plan was changed and it was the best decision I have ever made!

This summer has been the best summer yet...did a couple of 5K's for fun, rode a bunch of organized rides, did a lot of bike commuting and I started thinking of a new challenge a few weeks ago. This is my goal for 2009 to complete a Duathlon and get some of my friends to suffer along with me.

My new goal is significant because 2009 will be 5 years since my diagnosis and so much has happened in 5 years - no more tumor, treatments etc, less MRIs and doctor appointments, less stress overall - MORE happiness and fun! I will never stop having regular check-ups, but that's something I can live with.

Cancer Free is a phrase we never talk about...I'm a healthy happy survivor!