Bittersweet race...

I thought that today would be the first time I would write a race report. I was wrong. I will just say this. This race was particularly important to me because it is the first race I registered for consciously knowing that I would run through it. I actually registered for the 5k of this event in January. I ended up doing the 10k today and I have ran four 5k's this summer. Today was a celebration of all that I have accomplished since December. I have lost 70 lbs, I am running...a lot, I am swimming...often, I have changed my life in more ways than one and I have conquered a lot of fears. I ran the 10k in 1 hour and 20 minutes which is not too bad considering that it was an accomplishment to just run one minute back in January. So today was about celebrating life with my family.

Today, I was also reminded of how fragile life can be. After I was done with my race and I was going back home walking next to the people who were doing marathons and half-marathons, a guy fell right in front of me and his head hit the ground. He was not breathing...People tried to ressucitate him and the ambulance was called. I later learned on the news that a 32 year old man died at the marathon. It could be him, but it could also be a number of other people because as I was making my way home after that I saw a at least 3 other men who were lying on the sidewalks getting help. I pray that the guy we saw is alright, but even if he is, there is still another young man who died today. This guy died doing something that has given me my life back. This guy pushed his limits and I admire that. This guy also reminds me to make sure that when I go out running or doing any other thing that makes me push my limits, I need to take calculated risks. This guy mostly reminds me that life is fragile and that I need to cherish every minute of it, that I need to keep conquering my fears because that's what life is all about and that I need to keep telling the people I care about that they are important to me because I never know when I won't be able to.

My thoughts are with his family tonight...

Why don't you sit down?

When you’re overweight, you sometimes have to be careful where you sit down. Yesterday, an overweight woman came sitting next to me. I was role-playing a patient while she was coming in to do her exam. She stumbled a bit as she sat down, but everything was OK. The evaluator later told me that she had worried that she wouldn’t fit in the chair or that she would fall or something and I hadn’t thought about it, but I could totally see that happening. I’m so glad it didn’t though, that would probably have made her real nervous starting her exam.

And that made me think back to when I was overweight and I had to worry about where I sat down because it happened at times. I was always careful of seats that didn’t look too solid and sometimes sat very slowly just to see if it was safe to make myself real comfortable.

I was often wondering if I would fit between 2 people in the bus and sometimes I would have to stay up because I knew I wouldn’t. I still wonder sometimes and I’m happily surprised when I do sit and realise that I actually fit in there with some space left on both sides!

It also took me a while to do exercises where I needed to sit on a stability ball because I worried that it would explode right under me.

I remember a few times where I had to sit on Santa and all I could think of was...poor guy...and I was really careful to put all my weight on my feet rather than on my ass to make it a little easier for him.

So yes...I would avoid sitting down sometimes, not because I wasn’t tired, but because...well...you never knew. And some of those seats with the handles on the sides were just very uncomfortable...

Now that I think about it though, I never actually fell...maybe because I was so careful about where I sat, I don’t know. And the people I did see who actually fell in front of me were not overweight. They were either drunk or the chair was probably long overdue to break, but nobody hurt themselves. I'm thinking of one instance in particular where my friend sat on a camping chair on my balcony, and the chair just broke and she just sat there in the broken chair for a bit with her ass on the floor and her legs extending outside the chair. It was hilarious! And let’s be honest! It was just plain funny every single time!