Friday, August 9, 2013

The post about my back in spasm and a date with my boy

My lunch from yesterday.  A chicken burger made from chicken breast, mushrooms
 and green onion.  Super yummy!  Also kale salad and mixed greens.

Yesterday Julien and I spent the day over at my gal Tanya's house.  We had a lovely visit with her and her family, and her hubby's friend and daughter.  The kids played, the adults talked.  It was great.  I had my first kale salad which was completely delicious.  I also incorporated kale from my gf Linda's garden into my ratatouille dish the other day.  I'm beginning to really love kale.

So after I hung at Tanya's house all day, I made my way home to drop off the boy, then went to pick up my newly adjusted orthotics.  They now have a metatarsal lump, a Morton's Neuroma bullet, and a groove where I feel a lump when I run further than 10K.  There are many humps, dips and grooves in my new orthotics.  I'll give them a try tomorrow. I'm not feeling very optimistic.

I had a physio appointment yesterday.  The plan was that I would run to physio and then Graham would go for a run with me so that I would be fatigued and he could assess my running form.  I mapped out my route on the gmap, but failed to switch over miles to kilometers.  So what I thought was a 6K run, turned out to be a 9.3K run.  That wasn't such a big deal though.  What's three extra kilometers?  Absolutely nothing when you're feeling good.  About 1.5K into the run, I had a pain in my middle back.  I went for a massage on Wednesday and was treated for this because the pain has been bugging me for about a week.  It wasn't preventing me from running, but it was there.  I felt fine all day Thursday and figured the massage helped.

By the time I made it to physio (15 minutes late) my back was in full spasm and had been for about 6K. Graham took one look at me and took me to the special room upstairs.  I was a hot mess and in pretty severe pain.  He worked on me for about 30 minutes and hooked up the electrode machine to my back.  By the time I left physio, I couldn't even talk without my breath hitching from the spasms I was having.  Graham told me I'd feel worse before it got better.  I went home, took some muscle relaxants, iced my back, then dragged my sorry ass to bed.  I felt bad for Julien because we had planned to meet friends at Centre Island today and he was scared we wouldn't be able to go.  By morning I felt much better and we did make our way to the island for the day.

I just know that even though I've taken muscle relaxants and am drinking wine while I write this (don't judge), that the same thing will happen during my run tomorrow morning.  If my back goes into spasm again, I'm heading to urgent care for a cortisone shot.  I have a 19K run to complete on Sunday.  Don't mess with my marathon training schedule!  And not to blow my own horn, but despite the fact that my back was in spasm for 2/3 of my run last night, my pace was not too shabby.  7:02 per kilometer.  And I had three pretty large hills to run, a phone call to Graham to make and I forgot to turn my run app off until I was in the bathroom.

So today Jules and I had a mom and son day.  We met a friend and her son at Centre Island, which is an island off of Toronto with an amusement park on it.  It's geared towards younger children and is much less chaotic than Canada's Wonderland.  You have to ferry over and it was an adventure for Julien.  I've taken him in the past (when he was 3), but couldn't go on rides with him due to my size.  Today we hit all the rides several times and had a ball.  I didn't bring my lunch, but still ate on plan.  There was a concession place that sold chicken Greek salad and I omitted the feta.  It was fine.  I brought snacks for both Jules and I and we drank water all day.  If there was nothing for me to eat, I was just going to eat the snacks for lunch.  Instead I returned home with a bunch of snacks and still got my protein in.  Remember, if you fail to plan, you plan to fail!

I had a compliment paid to me today.  Well it was actually something I wasn't supposed to hear, but I knew they were talking about me.  One of the ferry guys who was talking to a buddy within my earshot mentioned that he liked curvy women with a bit of muscle on them.  Then he said, "like that woman in the pink floral shirt. See her legs"?  I have never had men discuss my body before...EVER.  Unless of course it was negative.  The kicker was that they were twenty somethings...AGAIN!  What is it with younger men and MUCH older women?  He even gave me a very special farewell when I stepped off the ferry with the boy. Wedding rings and children do not deter young men.  I wonder if anything does.

This has been in Centreville since I was a kid!

Having fun on the ferris wheel.

Almost to the top of the log ride.

Inside Julien's favorite ride, the scrambler...in the dark!

The Toronto skyline from the ferry.