I went to yoga last night. It was a Yin class. Yin yoga is more passive and slow-paced and exactly what I needed. I really thought I wouldn’t be able to do much, but really I was able to do almost everything. My body remembers yoga! I want to take a minute to give a shout out to Robyn at Healium Hot Yoga who has been so nice and generous with me. She runs a wonderful yoga studio in Bay View and I highly recommend it to anyone in the area. There are all kinds of different classes and I can’t wait until I have the strength and ability to do more of them. I am in no way being paid or compensated for saying this.
I keep being amazed by what my body remembers and what I am able to do. My body remembers how to run. My body remembers how to bike. The human body is an amazing thing. Mine has been through hell and back in the last year, but it’s finally my body again. I’ve moved up to walk 3 minutes/run 2 minutes and am running under a 10:00 minute pace during those 2 minutes. It feels so good to run again. I’m taking it slow and at some point I’ll be fully running again. I’ve decided to be reasonable and nice to my body and mind and not even try to run a half marathon until spring 2018. I’m running the Race for the Bacon 5k at the end of July and am pretty sure I’m going to sign up for the Milwaukee Marathon 10k in October.
I didn’t get to run Ragnar Chicago this year. It would have been year 7 for me. It got difficult for me when race week hit. I volunteered for my team instead. That was a lot of fun and made me not miss running it as much. Plus at 9:30 I got to go have a beer with my fellow volunteers, then go home and sleep in a bed. It was fun and I’m really glad I volunteered for it. I’m still part of the running community and that never went away.
It’s sometimes baffling to me that almost 5 months ago I was in a hospital room unable to get out of bed. All those little walks down the hallway, that I didn’t want to do while I was stuck in the hospital, were worth it. It wasn’t easy. It wasn’t fun, but I’ve made it this far. If I ever stop running it will be my choice and not because of what I went through this last year. I could lie and say I don’t think about it every day, but I do. I don’t know if I ever will stop, but at least now there are a lot of positive thoughts related to it all.
Cancer is life-altering, but not defining.
Filed under: Cancer, running
