Saturday, July 24, 2010

Sleeping In

I am overdue for a run today, but I decided to sleep in.

Flashing back to earlier this week when I skipped Monday and Tuesday runs, I thought perhaps I'd just squeeze all my runs in the latter half of the week. Which was fine in theory.

Saturdays I teach, but I currently don't have a 9:30 class. I still get to work at 9:30, but that's a half hour later than my regular arrival time, and once I get there I can leisurely take an hour to get ready for class. This is great because Saturday is generally a long run day for me, and I can really enjoy it by not having to wake up incredibly early. I can sleep in.

This week, because I pushed back training a little, my day called for a 5 mile run, which is an easily achieved run, under an hour. So put that with being able to sleep in at least a half hour later, and the beauty of a Saturday when nothing else is on the docket, and I was ecstatic when I went to bed last night. When I set my alarm on my phone it tells me "Your alarm is set from __ hours and __ minutes from now". Which is sometimes really depressing, because more often than not it isn't as much time as I'd like. But last night it said 7 hours and 52 minutes, and I did a little happy dance in my head.

However. I woke up this morning and hit the snooze button. Once. Then twice. Then thrice. (!) And after the third time I thought "You know, this might not be happening today)... So i turned off the alarm and decided to just let my body sleep what it needed to sleep. Considering I haven't had a rest from running in three days, I didn't want to push myself when my body is tired. My biggest fear in training is injury, because I hate being forced to wait when I want to go. And I know most injuries happen when you're tired or your body is overtaxed.

Which leads me to the most interesting development in my project of self realization:

I am listening to my self.

I wrote that purposefully, my self. Because I think this has many levels. I am listening to my self when my body says "I need to sleep more". I am listening to my body again when I say "I need to take a nap". The DBF once said, in a very loving way, "You know, you're kinda like a baby sometimes. If you're hungry or tired you just can't focus on anything else, and if you lose it, you can't get it back". Sometimes when I start getting crabby the first thing he'll ask is "When was the last time you ate?"

I heard once that Type A, over-achiever perfectionists like me tend to forget to do the most basic things. Like eat or sleep. Because everything else is more important than doing the most simple things. And so when I choose to take a nap it's sending a message to my body that says "Hey, don't worry--I got this. You can rest. All is cool. I'm listening." Or when I eat properly at the right times.

So I'm listening to my body. But I'm also listening to my Self. My Me. Who is a voice that has been quiet for a while. Without exposing too much detail, as my two loyal blog readers know, this past year of my life has been really difficult, and I've had a hard time staying above water (on many levels, financially, emotionally, socially...). The DBF, who is the dearest of the DBFs, has stayed by my side through all of this, in spite of what he once said was a year long pattern of a "meltdown a week". And as much as it pained me to hear that, he was right. It didn't take much for me to fall to pieces. Any little crack would make me crumble into a mess of tears, anger, feelings of worthlessness. It didn't effect others in my life as often as it was taken out on the DBF. And he is a saint among men for patiently waiting it out, and doing his best to help me try to get past it.

And in the recent weeks that has changed. In fact I can report that we are almost two weeks without a meltdown. (I feel like I should have a big sign like at big plants that say "14 days since our last injury!") That feels good.

Why this is changing, I'm not 100% sure and I think waiting around to figure it out is kind of a waste of time. If I can venture a guess, it's because I have been listening to my body, as well as listening to my Self. And speaking my mind. Telling people how I feel. Asking for help. Talking to friends more. Writing more. And also forgiving myself more.

This is a big shift, people.

(I hope I'm not jinxing myself by writing in a public place about my near 2 weeks sans meltdown...)

So there's some dust that is clearing and settling and I'm starting to look at this project more clearly. I'm ready for another step, and that means another Negative Tape.

And this one's a doozy.

I am a failure with money.
I am a complete and utter moron and will never be financially secure or intelligent.


How this one is going to work itself out through my running is a good question, especially since I need to replace the special moisture whicking/hot weather tank I ruined in the wash somehow... but $10 at Target does not make a financial failure, me thinks. But what does?

I'm going to ruminate for a while on how to start tackling this NT. I am planning on a 5 mile run/heart rate training on the treadmill this afternoon at the air conditioned gym, and perhaps I'll get some brilliant idea there. Let's see what comes up!

Here's to the next step. Whatever that is.

2 comments:

  1. I like this post :) (also, when you heart rate train, what do you aim for? I'm still not in good enough condition to do it - my heart rate shoots up when I make an effort but then recovers too quickly to maintain a happy medium - but I'd like to in the future...)

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  2. I'll email you about heart rate training... it's kinda complicated... And I don't know if you get a notice that I replied to your comment...?

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