The calm before the storm

First off, we received some news about one of our honored teammates, Gabbi. She's a smart and vivacious 13-year old who was diagnosed with Leukemia when she was just two years old. Needless to say, she kicked that cancer to the curb and went on to excel in school, including competing in scholastic competitions in Washington DC!

Well, last week, her neck was in some serious pain so they took her to the doctor and she ended up having to go to Phoenix for more specialized care. Turns out she had a compression fracture in one of her cervical vertebrae (ouch!) and was given a neck brace to wear for two weeks. Doctors think that this might have been caused by osteoporosis, which is a nasty side effect of her prior chemotherapy. Of course, she had to have a bunch of blood panels done to make sure the cancer hadn't returned, and they were all clear (thank God). But the stress of going through that? AGAIN?

Now hold the phone.

Seriously? This little baby fought the battle of her life before she was three years old, and now, ten years later, she is still battling because of this cancer? Now how is THAT fair?

Just another thing to let us know that these diseases wreak havoc and they aren't done yet. They're still out there, threatening and taking lives. I'm not okay with that, not at all.

Gabbi was on all of our minds as we warmed up for our run in the dark at 5 am. Having missed last week's 16 miler, I was very anxious to make it up this week. I'd been gearing myself up mentally for it and was rearin' and ready to go.

16 miles was a really big mistake.

Without getting into all of the nitty gritty, I'm nursing a sore IT band (same thing that dropped me on my 18 miler last season ). Again, THIS WASN'T SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN. I keep running (no pun intended, ha ha) over in my head what happened, what I did wrong. I bought a new pair of shoes the week before but I didn't wear them since they were a re-design of the old pair and I didn't want to "test" them on a long run, so did dead shoes do this to me (again?). Did I have poor form and weak abs? Had I been overcompensating on the right side because I was favoring the left (where my biopsy was done?).

I came back, shed a few tears into a cool washcloth, then I put on my big girl panties and sucked it up. I really let pride get in the way this time, and this 16 miler was a very humbling way of bringing me back to earth, let me tell you. I should have just followed the schedule and let the 16 miler be history, but instead I insisted on doing it and have now put myself out of even considering 18 miles next week. BAD IDEA.

So, here's the bottom line. It happened, there's nothing I can do to take it back. All I can do now is take care of myself, and focus on the 20-miler and race day. That's it. I refuse to ruminate and think about "coulda shoulda woulda".....It is interesting, though- three of the mentors all got injured on the 16 miler. We're dropping like flies. These next few weeks are going to be recover and nurse-it weeks.

We got news this morning that Gabbi is doing better, although a neck brace isn't easy to deal with when you're in middle school. She is such a strong young woman that has been through so much, and if I could have just a FRACTION of her courage and strength, I know I'd be ok. In fact, I KNOW I'll be ok.