Sunday was bitter sweet. On one hand, May 18 marked my 29th birthday – the last of my roaring twenties. On the other, it was judgment day for the Colfax half marathon.
I spent last week trying to talk myself out of running. The reasons piled up.
- I didn’t train enough
- It was my birthday
- The weatherman forecasted a beautiful day
- I didn’t train enough
- I’d rather go camping for the weekend
- I’d rather go mountain biking
- It started at 6:00 a.m.
- I didn’t train enough
In an act of self-destruction, my wife and I went drinking on Friday night. We ended up playing drinking games at the Gorilla Room in downtown Littleton until the wee hours of the morning. Saturday was spent recuperating from Guinness overload. One day was not enough recuperation. Add hung over to the excuse list.
In the end, excuses were not enough. I ran 13.1 miles on Sunday – my 29th birthday. It was painful. Adding to the pain, I twisted my ankle 12.5 miles into the run. To hell if I was going to quit that far along. I hobbled to the finish line in 2:31 with grimaces of pain on my face and Guinness seeping from my pores.
Today, I’m still sore. I’m sore partly because of my ankle, but mostly because every major muscle group in my body aches in agony due to overuse and under-training.
Why did I do it? Responsibility.
I felt responsible to run because I spent money in December to register for the event. It seemed like a good idea at the time. More importantly, I felt responsibility to get my life back in order. Over the past year, work and life got in the way of my physical fitness. As a result, I lost control of my type one diabetes.
It’s now time to take responsibility and get my life – and my diabetes – back in order. This means increasing physical activity. This means not hiding from exercise.
With 13.1 miles under my belt, I feel prepared to fight against my diabetes.
