Week of 07/13/2008 - 07/19/2008 (Base Week 18)

So tired....

So starts or ends one of the most physically painful weeks I can remember. Right now, its day 4 and I can't foresee how I'm going to survive my last day on medication, but... I'm not sure what's worse, this, or potentially more hives. I'm just so freaking scared... both states are completely debilitating, you're either flat on your back with ice packs all over your body unable to leave your room lest you will scare the living daylights out of someone--or you are what I am now, a completely useless and zombified, medicated blob, stuck between a hellish limbo world of eternal drowsiness and artificial wakefulness. There's got to be some mythical level of hell where the torture is to be mortally exhausted without ever being able to sleep again.


Sunday 07/13: 1:14:15, California to RB perimeter and back. Woke up at 5 am like usual, but by now I feel worse than I've ever felt. Thought I was going to throw up, so I laid in bed half awake until about 8 am... when I realized that if I didn't get my shit together and run now, I may never leave this bed. Run was okay until the last 1.5 miles or so when I developed severe abdominal cramping. Given that, ~ 9 minute miles isn't horrible, I was expecting much worse. Since I have had so little to eat these days, I'm going to assume its just the medicine tearing up my stomach. When I got back I felt light headed and nauseous too... barely choked down the third to last dose of Prednisone and then had to lay down for a few hours.

Monday 07/14: Off, shots. While it may not always seem so, I TRY not to be catastrophically negative in my blog... but, sigh, some days, life suck-eth. While the nausea from the drugs is gradually wearing off after my last dose this morning, it's steadily being replaced by a sick dread that I'll see more hives tomorrow morning... the fact that old room mate hasn't decided yet whether he's moving out in September, subletter guy just scraped up our hardwood floors, and boy its so great when everyone in the office has the plague, and you're taking immunosuppressant drugs! Well, whoopie doo.

Tuesday 07/15: 42:01, Monterrey to bridge. 24 hours after my last dose, thankfully the mental haze is starting to lift... basically still felt like my body has been beaten into the ground, but the run wasn't as slow as it could have been. Felt alright, mostly like my legs were going on autopilot and the rest of my weary self was being dragged along. I'll take it though... any state that doesn't have the awful medication or hives, that's all I want.

Wednesday 07/16: 1:07:17, Arroyo running with KB and Justine! Really fun, its so different to run with folks. I was feeling depressed this morning bc there were a small cluster of hives at midnight and then at 6 am this morning... but I decided they were small enough to hide with some baggy clothing so I decided to take an Allegra and meet the group anyways. Felt pretty good, longer than usual but didn't seem hard. An added plus, running seems to make the hives disappear. I'm trying to take the small outbreak in stride, because basically I just want to never, ever have to take Prednisone ever again at all costs. Those 5 days were like the most awful, nauseous and tired I've felt in years.

Thursday 07/17: 46:55, Monterrey to the end of the Arroyo Tempo Loop and back on the other side. Auspiciously ran into both Scott and Mandy. Hamstrings a little bit tight but felt good. I think not having done a tempo run in 2 weeks, I'm starting to feel kind of stir-crazy. Yesterday a bit longer than I'm used to though, so kept it short today.

FYI, something strange is up in the neighborhood today, as there was a helicopter hovering directly above my house between the hours of 3 am and 5 am today. Really didn't appreciate that actually... esp given that I really haven't gotten a lot of sleep in the past 2 weeks as it is...

Friday 07/18: Off, shots. Normalcy returns (?) fingers crossed. Slept for more than 3 consecutive hours for the first time in weeks... They cut back my shot dosage in case the serum was causing the hives, which is sucky bc it prolongs the time between now and when I can only get shots ONCE a week, but that aside, this was like the most normal day in a while.

Saturday 07/19: 55:02, Wildcat Trail in CO with short detour. This was the day of the Mt. Evans Hill Climb, and Peter's performance is definitely more noteworthy than my run. He did really well despite sub-optimal training + sub-optimal breakfast (cream cheese, wtf?) + sub-optimal support from girlfriend (we parked far away from the start, so I ate some cereal and then fell asleep in the car due to 2 hours of sleep from flight delay yesterday). The winning time for the pro-1-2's seems manageable maybe next year--provided you don't get an appearance from someone like Tom Danielson.

Run was non-enjoyable in kind of a nondescript sort of way. It was like 90 degrees and extremely windy. But not windy in the "not as hot" sort of way, windy in the "encounter resistance towards moving forwards" sort of way. Oh, well.

Training this week: 4:45:30, back on the ball. Sort of.

G0als: I just want to stop feeling like I want to die. In one's normal state, a person may wish for or strive for a large number of things, but all I can say is that the only thing I want in this world right now is to be able to live a normal life. (ie, preferably one that is not permanently medicated or physically disfigured).