Tuesday, November 3, 2015

Taking Care of Business

First, I ran the Chicago Marathon this year. Slowly. In fact, it ended up being my slowest time for a marathon by about 5 minutes. I'm not worried about it. There are several reasons that factored into that, namely the weather and my IT band. If I have more time, I will try to recap it for you! I was never worried about the time for this marathon anyway. But I finished and marathon/ultra #9 is complete!

Next up is the Naperville Half Marathon this Sunday (November 8th). Since my longest mileage since the marathon has been 4 miles, I don't have high hopes for this. Ha! My goal when I signed up was just to get through it however I can, and get the medal...plus the extra medal for the Triple Crown Challenge. The extra medal was because I did the Fox Valley 20 miler, the Chicago Marathon, and then the Naperville Half Marathon. I'm going to do a 5:1 run/walk and do the half nice and easy!

After this half marathon, I'm going to be on the DL (disability list). I'm finally having surgery on my shoulder to fix the chronic shoulder instability I have from all the dislocations. For those that don't know, I was running on a dirt trail in July 2012, tripped over a rock or tree root or something, went flying like superman, and landed directly on my right shoulder dislocating it. Since then (with the majority being between 2/2013 and 6/2014) I've dislocated it about 15 times. The last time was in September of this year while taking a nap on the couch. I've had enough.

My surgery is scheduled for November 12th. They will be tightening up the shoulder joint since the tendons and ligaments are loose. I'm prepared for a painful, hard, and long recovery. I'm just hoping it will be all worth it in the end. If it sounds like I'm not too excited about this, I'm not. It's been a very hard decision to make. There's been a lot of stress and tears. Again, knowing that the likelihood of never dislocating it again after this brings tears of joy to my face. Having chronic shoulder instability and repeated dislocations is exhausting mentally and painful physically. Be careful how you are holding the rail when you go down the stairs. Be careful how you are putting on your sweater. Be careful how you are taking it off. Be careful that you don't slip on ice and throw your shoulder out. Be careful how you .... and the list goes on and on with things I have to think about every day to make sure I don't dislocate my shoulder.

So wish me luck! I'll try to follow up post-surgery and let you know how it goes (although it will be several days!).  I may just make a video as typing with my left (non-dominate) hand will be slow and tedious!  Hope you all have a great day and happy fall running!

5 comments:

  1. Congrats on the Chicago Marathon finish, despite it being your slowest. I think resting up before Naperville is your best bet, and it sound like you are not overdoing things now. Good luck with the surgery. It sounds like it was the best decision for the long term.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Good for you for moving forward on getting the shoulder surgery! I can only imagine how difficult of a decision it must have been, but in the long run it will totally be worth it. Your comments on all the things you have to be careful about really made me realize how important the shoulder is in our everyday functions. I hope things go smoothly with the surgery and that you recover as quickly as possible!!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Emily. I'm really just not looking forward to this even though it will be good in the end. Yes, there are so many things that you do with your arm and shoulder, take one away, and take away the dominate one...it's really difficult to do anything, cut food, eat a messy sandwich with one hand, type, use a mouse and brush your teeth, put your hair up, put on a bra. Yeah...it's hard. lol

      Delete

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.