I know this post is going to sound weird at first and you'll probably say, "What does this have to do with running?" but go with me for a second.
First of all, so sorry for being away for so long. Life with school starting for the boys, county fair and scouts...life is crazy....I write when I can, and the time to write is few and far between.
Ok, so....like I said, go with me here....I've been a stay at home mom most of the years my boys have been home. I may have done some odd jobs here and there, but pretty much always been home. I've had the question posed to me several times while being a stay at home mom asking...."If you could do any job outside the home, what would your dream job be??" And as truly interesting and intriguing that question honestly is...the thing that always popped into my head when asked this particular question is....I would of course choose something I love doing....but then in the same thought there was always that fear of, if I'm doing what I love every single day, would I grow tired and soon learn to hate it??
That being said, so goes my upcoming post....no I haven't been asked to become some elite 40 something runner with tons of sponsorships...though that would be nice...sort of...but...there I do believe comes a time when too much of a good thing does indeed become too much. As many of you know, I came into this love of running by watching an online scrapbooker friend's journey into getting healthy and fit. I watched her journey for several months and after wallowing in my self pity for long enough I finally pulled up my boot straps and said, "if she can do it so can I!" and thus began my slightly over 4 year journey of getting myself fit and healthy. This past week I hit a milestone and since August of 2010 I have logged just over 3,000 running miles. I never would have dreamed that a little thing called "Running" would have taken me so far and put me in touch with so many amazing people!! This year has been a pretty big year with my running 2 half marathons (Capital City and Emerald City), doing our local Indian Mud Run and many 5Ks and 10Ks here and there. I will be running the Hot Chocolate 15K here in a few weeks with my awesome sister, aunt and niece. While training for the 15K these last several weeks I noticed that my runs had been getting slower, not only that...they've been getting harder to do...and I've had this slight knee twinge since Emerald City that though it doesn't hurt per se, it just has felt kind of wonky. So when I started thinking about my running year so far I realized that I have pretty much been in "training mode" since January when I started training for Cap City. Right after Cap City was the Indian Mud Run, after that was training for the Feed the Need 10 K and then Emerald City...I've been pretty much on some sort of training plan for 11 months. After thinking a lot about it, I've decided that after the Hot Chocolate run and the Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving Day that my son and I have decided to do together, I am going to be giving myself a much needed break. So for the month of December and maybe even part of January I will be taking a break...will I go without running for that long?? I don't think I could...lol...but I am going to cut way back...at least that's the plan. Instead of running 4-6 days a week I may cut back to 2-3...and instead of running longer distances I may just cut it back to around 3 miles with an occasional longer run thrown in if I feel like it. As much as I love running, it's starting to get to a point where it's becoming like something I HAVE to do instead of something I WANT to do...and we all know there is a big difference there. Not only that, the last several weeks my runs haven't been all that great...more like a "At least I got that done" than, "OK, that was a great run and I think I'm making progress." Definitely been a more quantity over quality, which is really starting to show...a lot!! Sometimes, even with a good thing, you at times need to scale back, re-group and just let things go a little bit and then go back at it again with fresh eyes....and legs :)
So that is that....while I am on hiatus so to speak...I hope to write though about my running plans for 2015....if things go the way I want it to....2015 is going to be an EPIC year in my running. I got several halves I'm looking at and a couple other cool looking races that will be so incredible...if I can pull them off and get hubby's schedule to work with it...it will be awesome....God willing!!
So until then...happy running!!
