On Sunday, three short sleeps from today, I will participate in a half marathon. While this is still a laughable proposition to me (me, in a race? A long one? Ha!), I feel ready. Calm. Of course, this is because Bob has proven to be an excellent coach/husband. A couple weeks ago we completed the second of two 3-week cycles, where my long Sunday workout increased over the 3 weeks from 8 miles, to 9 miles, to 10 miles. We did that back to back (so my Sunday workouts for 6 weeks looked like 8, 9, 10, 8, 9, 10), and have spent the weeks since finishing that heavy cycle with active recovery. As Bob has needed to remind me several times, this isn’t a period to push myself or get “better,” instead it’s a period to maintain fitness, stay limber, and keep moving.

Let’s admire two charts from my fitbit. They show my average steps per day (by month) for two years – 2023 and 2024 (so far).

As you can see, I went from sub 5k steps a day in 2023, to more than 10k per day in 2024. I must have not charged my fitbit for a few weeks in November 2023.

You know what? I’m damn proud of myself. At the start of this insane idea (right at the end of November 2023), I remember thinking (and telling everyone) that the reward for participating in a 1/2 marathon was never having to do it again. Now I’m beginning to think there are other, nearly as nice, side effects! Plus, Bob and I have other plans for continuing on.

For one thing, look how my sleep has improved!

This kind of improvement doesn’t just happen overnight (that’s a pun wrapped in another, much less funny joke).

When we first started, it was all so excruciatingly slow. We did like 15-minute increments. So one day of exercise would be “walk 15 minutes on the treadmill at 120 bpm / mobility” or some such. (Mobility is the most relaxing evening workout.) I remember that was hard. Now my shortest workout is 45 minutes, and I’ve been out in all kinds of conditions (snow! Sun! Wind! Flood!), the coldest was “feels like 14” which is not a good feels like. I can do the front and side planks for 20 seconds a piece (I do not enjoy it any more than I did at 10 seconds however). My workout yesterday was “15 min warm up, 8x 1 min run / 1 min walk, 15 min warm down.” My average heart rate for the whole thing was 128 bpm. Which is good because it was not a very difficult workout, but not so long ago just maintaining 120 bpm for 15 minutes was very uncomfortable!

Also, I’m hungry way less. You’d think it would be the opposite, but I think what has happened is that now I will feel genuine hunger at times after workouts (especially the ones I’m not allowed to eat before), and my body knows the difference between hunger and boredom. I am also focusing on eating a ton of protein, which is of course very filling. I remember in the before times when Bob would be training for a marathon, he’d be like “I can eat anything! It doesn’t matter!” Which is infuriating because he has that man metabolism and also the lifetime runner metabolism, and I would be working out as well but having to be very careful about what I ate or I wouldn’t lose any weight whatsoever. Now I eat bread on the daily, happily.

It’s interesting being the one training, because we have never lived this dynamic before. I’ve always been the support person, and Bob has always been in training. Now it’s reversed. We talked about it recently, about how difficult it is for the support person to also prioritize working out. He is getting a little bummed lately that he isn’t running much, and when he does go out for a quick 3 miler, he’s wiped afterwards. Now, he did play hockey all winter, and helped coach Grant’s hockey team, and is currently coaching Grant’s baseball team – so he still isn’t sedentary, but it was validating for him to bring this up, and have it mirror my own experience so well. It’s just hard because the kids still need a lot of attention, or driving around, etc, so if the two of you aren’t prioritizing the same person’s workouts, it becomes impossible. Or, more difficult than two pretty laidback people can make happen.

Going back to sleep for a moment – I was so sure that working out out pretty hard every day meant I would finally sleep well! What the fuck! It’s so unfair! I think the reality is that my sleep cycle is 2am to 10am, but instead my life means it’s 2am to 7am. It’s also been getting worse the past week, and I think it’s because I start work again next week! I’m excited; it’s hard going from being fully immersed in something and working closely with people I love and admire everyday to … Not doing those things. It’s sure great to be financially secure and also just focus on care, but it’s a big, sudden change. So I’m excited to go back (and my second week I have a meetup, so I’m going back and then going back), but it means my brain won’t shut off. I’m back on taking medicine to go to sleep and stay asleep, but it leaves me so tired in the morning – I’ll need to adjust to taking it.

We leave tomorrow for NYC (technically NJ for the first night), and on Sunday morning at like 8 (? I feel I should know these details but my coach is on top of it), I’ll be joining a whole mess of other women to participate in this half marathon! Three (point one) miles further than I’ve gone before at this pace! It feels very doable now. I’m ready. Wish me luck!