Learning Patience

I have been learning the art of patience this week. I'm not there yet. I was excited to get back into the swing of things after my disappointing experience at Porter Ranch. I was pleased to get my new inhaler, and get right back to running on Tuesday and Thursday. Thursday, in particular, was a really fantastic workout for me. I ran for 30 minutes, and then did five "hill repeats" where I ran uphill for 2.5 minutes, and recovered for 4. Because I was running on a treadmill, in order to make the drill more challenging, I increased my incline and my speed on each repeat. After the hills, I cooled down by running a final mile. I had been feeling a little stuffy earlier that day, but the adrenaline and joy of the running helped me ignore it.
But then Friday came and I couldn't ignore it anymore. I could barely take in a whole breath. I was tired, stuffy, my lungs were tight, my coughs sounded like barks, and I started to get a fever. I went home early from work to get a good night's sleep so that I could be refreshed for my 16 miler on Saturday. But when I awoke on Saturday, as much as I wanted to run, I actually felt worse. My fever continued, and I couldn't get a handle on my breathing. I was dizzy and tired and my skin ached.
These symptoms continued through the weekend, and on Monday morning, I went to see my doctor. He was able to rule out pneumonia and bacterial infections. I'm still not sure what I caught, but in order to get my breathing back to normal (so that I can resume my workouts), he prescribed a regimen of Prednisone and two other inhalers, one emergency and one for regular maintenance. I slept almost all of Monday afternoon, but even though that helped, I still could not breathe well enough to run, much less walk.
Seriously. Walking down the street was a real effort. And then of course, it did not help that all I could focus on was the time I was losing that I should be training. The logical side of my brain knows that taking time off to heal is smart and that my running, if I had been able to even start, would have just exacerbated the asthma issues. But still....
So when did this happen? When did I become someone who truly dislikes not being able to run?
I am feeling much better today as far as everything except my asthma. I still have a barking cough and wheeze a bit when I take deep breaths. But I feel that I am getting progressively stronger, and I am determined to do something active with my TNT group tomorrow morning. We are scheduled to do an 8 mile run at the top of Reseda Blvd, which should involve some trails and hills. I'm not sure that this will be the best way to resume my running, but I just hate the idea of sitting it out completely. I plan to get the advice of my coaches, and take it from there. Of course I don't want to make anything worse, but I also want to make sure that I don't lose my conditioning from the past two plus months.
So the lesson I've learned this week...some things are just out of my control. But that is all the more of a reason why I need to take advantage of all of the opportunities where I CAN do something. Sitting on my couch, waiting to heal, I thought of how wonderful it feels when I am running (or more accurately, how great it feels when I've just completed a run). So the next time that I'm not sick or hurt, but I start to feel lazy and sluggish, I plan to remember this past week....and harness my appreciation for what my body can do...and get off the couch, go out and run!