The Results......Torn Meniscus

I have been waiting till I knew for sure but today I got the call. Yesterdays MRI  confirmed what my doctor and I suspected. I have a torn Left Knee Meniscus. To tell you the truth until my doctor told me what he suspected I didn't  truly know what a Meniscus was.  But boy do I know what one is now!!  Thanks to Google OR not.

The meniscus is a piece of cartilage that provides a cushion between your thighbone (femur) and shinbone (tibia). There are two menisci in each knee joint. They can be damaged or torn during activities that put pressure on or rotate the knee joint.

I have a "medium to severe" tear. I do know that is bad, bad enough to cause the "locking" up of my knee that I have been experiencing when I run or go down the stairs. OR even lying in bed the other night I moved just right and my knee locked up. Luckily it doesn't stay locked long but enough to get my attention. When you have a bigger tear you get the locking issues. The "tear" flaps over inside the knee causing the knee to lock up because that meniscus should be flat all the time so you bones can glide over on another. When they cannot glide, you cannot move your knee = the locking.

See aren't you glad I did some research for you?


So what does this mean? It means surgery to fix. It's a day surgery so not too terrible. I meet with a surgeon on Thursday.

Want to know the crazy thing?  So there are 3 of us in my running group. And my buddy Karen has the EXACT same thing going on with her right knee. She met with her surgeon yesterday and is having surgery next Thursday.

We have been keeping each other positive and sharing our research/doctor knowledge.

The good thing is the surgery recovery time isn't that long & you can start exercising pretty quickly afterwards. In fact it's encouraged so you can get your knee working again. The nice thing about this surgery is once the meniscus is fixed you're good to go. It's not like repairing a muscle or tendon. Where if you exercise to quickly after surgery you can hurt it again. Once the meniscus is fixed, it's fixed.

 It's the Best worst case for a sports injury.

And yes, I am still planning on doing the Tinkerbell in January. The doctor said I could be up and running for it. I wont finish in a stellar time but hey I wasn't planning on a wonderful time. It's my first half so no matter what I will PR, ha!

Inspiration

Do you need inspiration? When you do where do you get it from? Friends, spouse, kids, a book, prayer or better yet Google?

Well I have been in need of inspiration for awhile now. Training for this half marathon makes me have to be up to speed in the inspiration department.

The Tri was completed with the inspiration of my family. Seeing my kids faces as I passed by & hearing them cheer me on. Completing a goal and setting an example for my kids was my inspiration.

But the half marathon is for me. Plain and simple it's for me. For me to be able to say I did that, I ran 13.1 miles. And I am not the most optimistic person in case you didnt know.

I have been having to dig deep for inspiration for this half training. Yes, I have searched for inspirational quotes, browsed training websites & read the begining of some motivational books.(thank you kindle)

So I reach out to you, the blogging community.....

Inspiration - what does it mean to you, where do you get it and what makes you keep going - and it doesn't have to be in running.

"It is still a mile"

The Tri was 3 weeks ago tomorrow. And for the past 3 weeks it's been hard to stay motivated and on track. Before I was exercising every day and being careful with the food I was consuming.
That all fell to the side once the Tri was finished!  Working out has been there but not with the same intensity. And eating well, it's going - everything in site into my mouth!

It's not like I have a half-marathon to train for or anything, oh wait I do!

My knee has been bothering me on and off since the Tri. I messed it up royally again during the Tri and I have been paying for it since. The deep bruising has finally disappeared but the pain/ache/tightness still plagues me almost daily. I am trying to ease back into working out. Ease back into running but it's hard. My runs have been less than stellar. And then I found this post on my Facebook wall from a friend the other day. Let's just say it spoke volumes to me............

 

I have to keep reminding myself that no matter how long it takes me it's okay. I am still out there, I am trying & I am doing more than I did last year at this time. I guess till I am completely healed slow and steady will have to be my mantra.

 

Tomorrow I have my first long run in awhile. We are running 5.5 miles and I am scared to death. This will be the longest I have run in more than 9years, Yikes! I will keep you posted on my timing and how my knee holds up.

Mission Completed!

Yesterday was the day. Yesterday was what 9months of training came down too. The day of reckoning - my first Triathlon. 

The night before we had to go down to the park and pick up our race packets, get marked and of course our swag. Inside our packets were our number (518), swim cap for our heat and other misc things. It was upon this packet pickup that I began to get really, really nervous. I mean like a deer in headlights nervous. And when I get nervous I get a bit pissy, I know me pissy seems a little un-real, Ha!

I had a freak out about a spare tire tub kit that I did not have and so Karyn stopped at a store and we gathered all the things I would need in case of said tire blow out. (didn't need it Thank God!) After I rushed the sitter home, picked up Teriyaki, put kids to bed, laid out all my items for the race and ate the said Teriyaki it was after 9pm. I was tired, stressed and my knee was killing me.

I crawled into bed with my ice packs and ibuprofen to try to get some sleep. At 10:00 I may have been still awake and a friend messaged me on facebook saying "go to bed". I fell asleep shortly after that and slept until 4am. I had set my alarm for 4:45 to get up, get ready & eat a hearty breakfast before my Tri buddies arrived to pick me up.  Getting up so early gave me this time to relax, eat, have coffee, drink my water, Gatorade and mentally prep. And I felt good when they arrived. Relaxed and ready to tackle this Tri.

With my knee taped like I was going into battle I kissed my hubby and kids goodbye heading to check in. Promising to see them along the way. Bill, the kids and our friend Melinda were coming down to cheer us on along the race route.  A few of our other friends came down to cheer us on. They made great signs and screamed, yelled and offered so much support to each of us as we swam, biked and ran by them. At one moment on my 2nd lap of the bike as I was riding past them I got all teared up.

The Swim was great and I finished better than I have during trainings. I am not going to lie looking out at the bouies and seeing the actual swim course was a little intimidating but I knew I could do it. Luckily my pre-swim jitters and nervous pee didn't stop me from swimming a good race. I was out and to the transition area. We wont mention that before I pulled my bike off the rack I put my helmet on the wrong way, ha!  Got it on and was on the road for the bike.

As I have gone over the race in my mind and in discussions with Bill I have come to realize the bike was my downfall. I honestly wasn't ready for the bike. My issues with the bike started weeks ago when I tore my hamstring by using a bike that wasn't suited for my body. (too tall for it's frame) I quickly found another bike to borrow. And although this bike fit my frame I wasn't familiar with it and learning to ride an unfamiliar bike in a few days is harder than you'd think. I just never got the hang of how to use the gears on that bike correctly and make the ride more fluid. It may seem like riding a bike is easy why would this be a problem. However, in a bike race knowing when to shift down/up or go into a high gear/low gear is very important - especially for hills!  Don't even get me started on hills.

The bike route was 4.5miles long with 1 big hill and several smaller "mounds" and we had to complete the course 2x.  More than half the course was on a newly paved and flat road so that wouldn't be the hard part of the course for me. And lets not forget our awesome cheer sections positioned along this route that helped give us our motivation. Now only if they could've been on the hills, ha!  On the first lap my bike chain fell off midway up the hill thanks to my awesome shifting abilities. A race bike "fairy" drove by and saw me trying to mess with it. After about 5mins he had me up and ready to go. At this point I may have said "I'm just going to walk the rest of the way up this hill " and he said "Yep, probably not a bad idea now"  And I was on my way again. Passing by the cheer squads I may have been heard saying "This sucks" and someone said "Not as much as we do, you're doing this, we aren't".  The chain issue plagued me again on the second lap but at least it was at the top of the hill this time. I was able to get it on myself and thankfully so because there was no bike "fairy" to help me.

I cruised into the transition area glad to be off that bike and ever so grateful to not be biking anymore. I got my footing and immediately felt my knee pop and the hamstring pulling. Yep, the run was going to be difficult for sure. I paced myself and walked/ran the first 1/4 mile or so. I passed Briana on her final 400 yards of the run and cheered her on. Excited to see her almost done, but also knowing that meant Karyn was already done. I was officially the last of our Tri Trio on the course. But sorrow did not set in. I looked at my watch and said "You can do this and you can finish before 10am" and the self motivation talk started:

You can do this
You are strong
You are a fighter
This injury will not define you
You only get one shot, do not miss your chance to blow
This opportunity comes once in a lifetime
I picked up some speed, got some high fives from a few elites who were on their 2nd lap of the run (they completed the entire course 2x) and finished before 10am. In fact I finished the run in like 18mins with a torn hamstring! 

My final race time was 1:41 03 - and my Family and friends were on the other side cheering me on. I found Bill and embraced him with tears coming down my face. I had completed the race. I had set a goal and I had finished it. I had overcome a torn hamstring & bike issues to complete my first Tri and I was alive!! 

I had said all along it wasn't about a time it was about finishing the race. Setting a goal and completing it. But who was I kidding, in my head I had made my own little competition and time. However, on the bike that 2nd loop I began to face the reality that I wasn't going to make that time and  now more than ever it was about finishing.  I am happy with my time. I am happy that I overcame everything to still finish.  Plus, I can now say ........

I am a Tri-athlete!  I finished a Triathlon. 
Bring on next Tri season - bring it on.

Yep, you heard that right, this off season while I am training for the Tinkerbell I will be also eyeing down that 1:41 - I will squash that time next year, just after I get my own road bike!

And let's not forget about my girls. The ones who saw me through till the end. Who were there through all the tears and sweat. Who never said "No" and who completed this Tri with me. Karyn and Briana - You are both Amazing & Strong women who I am proud to have trained and raced alongside. Thanks for joining me on this wild & crazy ride. I love you both!

The Final countdown

This is it, this is the "Final countdown" to the Tri on Saturday. All the training, blood, sweat and sore/torn muscles are for this. This is what 9months of prep and training has lead to. This week started out with a Bang! I drove my first tractor and shot my first gun. I will finish the week off with the Tri. Guess it cannot get much bigger than that right?

To say I am nervous is a HUGE understatement. Yesterday, as we drove home from my husbands Aunt & Uncles Farm I started getting weepy eyed. Reality set in BIG time

I am scared to death!! 

The reality of what is coming at the end of the week hit me hard. I started nervously talking, giving excuses and quite literally freaking out. Why hasn't this come before now? I guess I should be glad right?  My friend Briana said she has been dreaming about the Tri for the last few nights. It's haunting her day and night. For me it's just starting and  I feel like I have to poop all the time (TMI).  And these are no little butterflies in my stomach! 

I know in my heart of hearts I can do this, I know that it's going to be tough and it's going to challenge me like nothing before. I know that I am just nervous because of my torn hamstring (which is getting better) and because it really will be the accomplishment of a HUGE goal. I will run across that finish line into my husband's arms and my smiling children's faces and all the fear will have melted away. And suddenly it will all be worth it. I will feel accomplished and sore.

So here's to a week of Firsts!! And a few pictures of my mad shooting & tractor driving skills.

Success defined

Success does not come to you......You go to it.

With this statement I have found success. I have found the ability to push through even on the hardest of days. Sixteen short days from now I will wake up on a hopefully sunny day, dress in my sexy Tri shorts and head out to complete my first ever Triathlon. This day has been a long time coming and it will be a completion of a goal. A BIG goal!

I have been thinking about goals a lot lately. I have never really completed a goal that I can think of. Besides my goals of getting married and having kids, if you can call those goals. I have set many goals in my life but like many other things they have never been accomplished. Like the nursing degree I never got or all those diet goals that never shed those unwanted pounds.

Why is it that I have never accomplished a goal? I think my own fear has held me back from completing any sort of goal. The fear of my own body, fear of what people would say, fear of getting hurt and the fear of failure. However, something clicked inside my head/heart this year and suddenly I am not afraid of failing. 

On this goal journey I have learned a few things:

1. I want to compete & finish this Tri so bad I can almost taste it
2. Training for this Tri has been hard work & has taken more commitment than I thought
3. You have to mentally be ready to attack your goal
4. There will be good and bad days as you aim for your goal but you cannot let the bad days bring you all the way down

In January I decided to complete this Tri to prove to myself that I could do it and to show my children that you can do anything you set your mind to.  And by golly they have seen my blood, sweat & tears as I have trained the last few months.  With many  "Are we going to the Y again?",  "Mama are you going swimming or biking today?" and "You're sweaty mama" they have seen me working hard on this goal.

The morning of Sept 8th will bring me excitement, nerves and determination. And it will be all 3 that will carry me across that finish line to complete my first goal.

What's your goal? Do you have one? Why not?  What's holding you back from completing your goal?

You will never know your limits 

unless you push yourself

to them 

26 days and counting

The countdown till the Tri Tri Tri Again Triathlon is officially counting down. 26 days till I will swim 1/4 mile, bike 9miles and run 1.6 and finish a HUGE goal.

However, as the clock winds down I am getting nervous....no terrified better sums it up. Until this point I have been fine and constantly cheer leading my Tri buddies Briana and Karyn. But that all changed on Saturday when we went to watch the Lake Tye Triathlon.

As I stood there watching the competitors dolphin dive into the water, then run to their bikes & jump off to run I began to feel the butterflies. I began to want to throw up just a bit. The "What the H*#$ was I thinking  began creeping into my mind.

Training has stepped up just a bit and is involving more brick workouts each week. Last week was just a hard week for me training wise and so I barely managed to workout 3 days. Which may have played a role in my freaking out a bit on Saturday.

Yesterday we did a brick workout that consisted of 1/4 mile swim and then a 20min run. With the weather so beautiful and summer finally arrived in the NW I decided to swim without a wetsuit. And I am wrote this post so I survived!  The water felt great and the swim came very easily to me.
BUT then today I completed another brick workout. A 4.5 mile ride followed by a 10min run, where we completed almost 1mile. My newly "revamped" Huffy mountain bike did well. Yep, I am riding a mountain bike in my Tri and not just any mountain bike but a Huffy. "Don't you wish your bike was hot like mine?"   I did get it outfitted with street tires and am going to get some cage pedals hopefully this week. (my pedals are too small for cages so we are ordering new ones or Bill said "you will have cages one way or another, that's why God invented power tools")
A quick update on WW as well needs to be addressed - or rather I feel it should. I haven't weighed in since 6/23 when I had lost - .8. But I made Bill take me to face the scale today. And I was up +.6. And you know what I was actually okay with that! Ha! I have been training & eating what I want, whenever I want. And that may or may not have included a few Magnum bars. So I basically have maintained for almost 2months and that was OK with me. My goal of loosing 50lbs before the Tri wont be met but that's okay, because my body is more in shape & 31 lbs down is fine with me.

Yesterday, while waiting on my bike to get fitted I walked around downtown Snohomish and saw a cute sign that I loved and am going to post in my house......

 It took more than

a day to put it on,

it will take more than

a day to take it off.