A Birthday Wish

Today I graduate to the 35-39 age group.

Here's hoping this age group isn't quite as competitive as the last one, and that maybe I can finish just one race this year someplace other than DFL. : )

Dear Santa

Thank you for the best Christmas present ever.

This Is Why We Have Doctors

I think I jumped the gun a bit on the running. The muscles in my pelvis are ... let's call it perturbed.

I promise I won't run anymore until the doctor says it's okay.

The Fog is Clearing

I went on that walk, just like I promised myself. It felt good to lace up my running shoes for something besides a trip to the mailbox, and my cozy technical gear felt like old friends.

The fog rolled in so thick I had water droplets on my eyelashes and Kona's furry ears looked like they'd been dipped in sugar. We walked the first mile at a comfortable clip and when turned around to come home I couldn't resist... I had to run.

Just a little. Just to see how it felt.

So I did, but in deference to the obvious I took it easy. If I went faster than a 14:30 pace I'd be shocked. First I was just trying to see if I could go to the next driveway... then the next... and the next. Before I knew it I'd run half a mile and still felt perfectly fine. But, I decided I should probably stop and walk the rest because the doctor technically hasn't cleared me to run yet.

But talk about crazy - me choosing to stop running instead of my body forcing me to.

Clearly I'm still not used to this whole 'me as Runner' thing (after today I think I officially deserve the capital "R")... but after 11 months off and a little thing like having a baby my body is obviously sending a message: I can do this. I want to do this. This feels good.

I guess it's about time I started listening.

Polishing My Badge

Any fears I might have had about losing my One Of The Crazy People badge after the baby came were well and truly put to rest today.

Coming home from the hospital for Little Geek's latest weight check I noticed the weather... 34 degrees, overcast and a little bit foggy.

Honest to gawd, my first thought was "wow, what a great day for a run."

Since I still have the bra issue to deal with I won't be running, but as soon as Wonderful Husband gets home to watch the baby I am going to strap 'em into the best bra I've got and take the dog for a walk.

I'm on maybe 3 hours of sleep (not all in a row) and perhaps someone without a Crazy People badge might think the time would be better spent taking a nap. But I suspect paying a visit to my cold weather base layers (with thumbholes! we all know how I heart the thumbholes!) and getting my heart rate up a little will do me more good than any amount of sleep.

Regarding the Little Geek...
My little piglet went from being underweight, refusing to eat and not gaining enough to (about a week ago) finding his appetite and, to everyone's relief and delight, gain 18 ounces in 8 days. He's still not quite gotten the hang of nursing, but that's gotten much better too and I can imagine a time when it won't suck any more. He's doing so well we no longer need to make pilgrimages to the hospital for weight checks, which is the best Christmas present I could ask for.

This Is Getting Ridiculous

So, I special ordered the 40G nursing bra.

It's too small.

We just re-measured me. Things seem to have re-arranged themselves since I placed the last order. This is getting expensive - I now have 4 nursing bras that don't fit (one of which cost $50). I've bought and returned several more. I HATE being stuck with mail order for this.

My goal for the day is to locate and order a 38H...

Here's why this matters: they hurt. A lot. I can't hardly walk around the house, let alone get in a solid workout, with the current situation. Even the websites that claim to offer supersized nursing bras often don't have sizes in this range. I'm in too much discomfort to try on my Enelle running bra at this point, but I suspect it will now be too small (it's sized for a DD-DDD). I currently don't know how I'm going to get back to running because I can't find a bra strong enough to control the girls.

Calorie Nazi Status Report

Does it count as a status report if I'm reporting that I've haven't reported in with The Calorie Nazi in nearly a month?

OK, so, confession time.

I've been eating like an unsupervised teenager with a bad case of the munchies. And since that's how Wonderful Husband would eat every day of his life if I didn't usually stand in his way armed with healthy meals, well, we've been quite the pathetic pair since we came home from the hospital.

In the last four weeks we've managed to go through...
- dozens of bagels
- shameful quantities of cream cheese and Nutella
- a gallon of eggnog (ok, that was just me. he can't stand it.)
- ridiculous quantities of frozen pizza
- at least a case of soda
- a couple packages of brats and hot dogs
- 4 packages of Fudge Stripes cookies (and ya know what? after the second one you hardly feel the guilt any more. I think it might be numbed by all the trans fats and high fructose corn syrup.)
- an entire batch of Tollhouse cookies (because apparently all the store bought ones weren't enough)
- an entire tub of pseudo-cheese spread
- several orders of Chicken and Broccoli with fried rice... and don't forget the deep fried crab rangoon!
- fewer ordered pizzas than you'd think (we were too busy filling up on nasty store bought cookies!)
- more Italian Beef than two humans should ever consume. Served, of course, with my personal touch - garlic bread buried under melted mozzarella
- two bags of frozen tater tots
- too many jalapeno poppers to count. drenched, of course, in ranch dressing
- gallons of chocolate milk
- more Big Macs than I care to admit

At least my last organic veggie delivery came with salad stuff, and in the midst of this junk food orgy I have also, for whatever reason, been on a major salad kick. Probably the last vestiges of my inner triathlete screaming for mercy.

But never fear, I managed to drown out the cries for help with a couple of jars of extra chunky blue cheese dressing.

BUT... believe it or not, I have not gained any weight. Yet. I guess the fact that sleeping is still more important than eating and those couple hundred extra calories a day I'm pouring into breast milk production are temporarily saving my flabby ass.

So. Yeah. I know. I mean, I KNOW. This must end. Like, immediately. Because I'm not going to make it through that half marathon next August on Fudge Stripes and egg nog.

I guess I just had to come clean in order to force myself to clean up my act.

What I Wish I Was Doing

Little Geek at 2 weeks old.

(His eating problem isn't completely resolved yet, but it's slowly getting better. I'm down from spending 12-16 hours a day feeding him to more like 10-12. On the plus side, I've had plenty of time to catch up on my back issues of Triathlete magazine.)