January 7th

Part of me wants to wait to blog until I've had awhile to reflect but I know ill likely become more positive and I figure it'll be good to remember this part too. At this point I'm pretty worn down and upset that I had to walk. I wonder if I could have run more, I think maybe a few minutes more between the 9-10 mile mark. At the end, I was truly messed up. I was as deprived as I'd ever felt. It made me realize that I never deprive my body of nutrients or fluid and have not trained my body in these rough conditions and should have eaten something a few miles earlier. my body was not happy, i felt white like a ghost, and had chills. My hands were so swollen that i couldn't make a fist. When I got home, I couldn't keep water down. I hadn't expected it to be so hard on my knees. When I drove it yesterday it didn't seem so sideways. it wasn't just up and down but the turns had a slant. let me rewind to the point where I felt it started going downhill. I didn't have gps so I hadn't noticed that we'd been going so slow and Nick let me know we'd have to work to catch up at the halfway point. Once we got to a point where nick told me Jp was finishing her marathon at that time, I felt pretty crappy. This wasn't nicks running pace or time but my time and I saw disappointment in his face. He'd be more better running with JP and finishing proudly. And he deserves to run with someone as good as he is. He told me that the time doesn't matter and I knew that if I was faster it would matter but at that point it no longer did. I thought about how many people of all ages and sizes had passed us, I've never run near so many people. but since time didn't matter anymore, I lost the little hope I had that I could make it in an okay time. I no longer had a time goal but just wanted to finish, and even that seemed beyond me. What did I do wrong while training? I relied on nick too much to keep us positive midrun and he'd lost hope in me, and I did too. I thought I may never run in another organized run to save myself this embarrassment and pain again. I was so much happier being naive and content with my measly two miles not knowing how fast or slow i was. but I know better and I will never be content with that again. I'm forever changed. This half marathon and training has pulled things out of me that I'm both proud of and not so proud of. And nick has seen it all and still shows up. He's a good guy.