sick sucks

I am SOOO sick. Seriously, it’s a bit ridiculous.

Running plan for last week:

Monday – 30 minutes
Tuesday – 35 minutes
Wednesday – Travel to Iowa, no run
Thursday – 35 minutes on treadmill at hotel (i.e. the “not running in sub-freezing temperatures” plan)
Friday – 40 minutes on treadmill
Saturday – Travel back to Houston, miss scheduled long run
Sunday – Make-up 9 mile long run


What actually happened:

Monday – I was still in so much pain from Saturday’s 10 miles that I decided I needed another rest day to let myself heal.
Tuesday – I got home from work feeling a bit sick and still hurting a lot, so I decided on a 15 minute short run to try to stretch everything out. Nothing felt right.
Wednesday – I woke up at 3am incredibly sick, drove to the airport, flew to Denver, then to Omaha, where I met my family for the 3 ½ hour drive to Emmetsburg, Iowa. I arrived in terrible shape.
Thursday and Friday – I struggled through remaining upright through our family visit. I was way too sick to run, and I probably would have considered myself too sick to even get out of bed if there weren’t places I felt I really needed to be (a story for another place).
Saturday – Another really rough travel day – flying is painful if you have sinus issues.
Sunday – I was still too sick to even consider running.


So, yeah, last week was a complete failure.

Monday I went to see an ENT (Ear, Nose, and Throat) specialist. He told me that I am a mess, that it isn’t normal to get sick as often as I do, and that I bled into my eardrum during the flight (which explains some of the pain). He needs to do a CAT scan to determine the source of my troubles, but he wouldn’t be able to see anything useful in my current state. So, I am on yet another regimen of medications. He put me on a stronger antibiotic (I was still on the last course of “strong” stuff when I got sick last week), and a course of steroids. I will be on those for a couple of weeks, then I will wait a couple of days after finishing them before going in for the CAT scan. It looks like that will be scheduled either right before or right after Christmas. Hopefully, a solution to my problem will soon follow.

The drugs are really screwing with me. Antibiotics always mess with my stomach, and the steroids make me jittery and blur my ability to think straight. I don’t like feeling this way at all. Of course, my sinuses do feel MUCH better, but the rest of me feels off now.

The doctor did say I could keep running, though. As you might imagine, feeling the way I do doesn’t make me really excited about the running.

I didn’t run Monday (scheduled run: 30 minutes), because I felt awful after my appointment (the first does of steroids came in a massive shot). Yesterday (Tuesday), I wasn’t feeling so good when I got home from work, but I didn’t want to skip another run, so I decided to shorten the recommended run a bit (scheduled: 40 minutes) and see how my body reacted. I wanted to at least start adjusting to running again, so I set out to do 20 minutes.

Running sick is even less fun than running. I made it through about 7 minutes before my body started to disagree with the running idea. And that annoying side cramp managed to come back. I ended up walking a couple of times for about a minute each in the middle of the run in order to alleviate the pain. I did most of the return run without having to stop, but by the time I got home, I was terribly out of breath and just feeling awful. But, hey, I ran.

Part of me really wants to quit this whole thing right now – I am sick, I am miserable, and I am struggling to keep the rest of my life in order. But I refuse to give up. This cause is important to me, I have put in so much effort, and so many people have donated money and supported me through this mess. I intend to do everything I can to cross that finish line in January. And right now, that means running sick.

Tonight is supposed to be track practice, and tomorrow is supposed to be a 45 minute run. I am going to attempt 30 minutes tonight, and I will probably shorten tomorrow’s run to 35 minutes. We are scheduled for a long run of 10 miles on Saturday. I intend to go out there and attempt it. I might end up walking part of it, since I don’t know how I’ll be feeling by then. I did miss a week and a half of runs (including the last long run), so I don’t know how my body will react. I know I can do 10 miles, though, so at least I have that.

A month and a half left, then I can do whatever I need to fix this sinus problem and be healthy again. I can’t wait for the end of January.