Completely Blind
I’m lying there in bed, wide awake, I had been tossing and turning for sometime and finally just resolved myself to getting out of bed because there was going to be no further sleeping. I look at my pump, it’s 3:33. I had only gotten 5 and a half hours of sleep. Not quite enough for me to make it through the day and yet I had no clue why I was so wide awake.
I got out of bed, went to the computer surfed around, checked email, and was quickly boreded by the monotonousness of doing such a thing at not quite 4 AM in the morning.
I wondered out to the kitchen, grabbed a diet 7up and decided that I needed to go back to bed, I needed to sleep at least 3 more hours.
It just wasn’t happening…it was 4:15 when I decided that perhaps, just perhaps, I should check my blood, maybe something was wrong. Doing so revealed that I was low. 57 to be exact. I wondered back out to the kitchen for a juice box before I drank it and went back to bed.
I was completely blind to the symptoms of that middle of the night low. Me waking up and being WIDE AWAKE at 3 am didn’t seem like a symptom to me, it didn’t even register on my mind to stop and think about checking my blood. My brain was alert instead of the usual sluggishness that it gets when I wake up low in the middle of the night.
This is a new symptom for me for middle of the night lows. I’m grateful that I woke up because that means I didn’t have a seizure. In the future I just have to remember that if I wake up and I’m wide awake in the middle of the night for a seemingly no good reason, I just need to check my blood.
Happy Reunion
It’s been mentioned a couple times, how I almost killed myself while ignoring my diabetes in 2003. Diabetes had plagued me at that point for 12 years, and for the better part of 12 years, I had not taken care of it. When I turned 21, that was permission to drown it, drown it in alcohol. I spent a year drinking away my diabetes, I wasn’t checking my blood, I wasn’t taking shots or wearing my pump. It landed me in the hospital with the doctors telling my mom “Mrs. Steele, we don’t know if we’re going to be able to bring her out of this, we don’t know what she’s done.”
No one really knew what I had done, I didn’t tell anyone that I wasn’t taking care of myself to any kind of extent, one look could tell you that I was neglecting myself but no one really knew to what extent. Until I was saved from death and on morphine. Then the whole story came out.
After several days in ICU I went home and immediately I started getting the 3rd degree about trying to kill myself. The word “suicide” was used on several occasions. My mom kept telling me that I needed to go back to counseling, I kept refusing because the counselor kept using the word “suicide”. No one could quite understand that I didn’t want to die, I just didn’t want to live with diabetes, so I had ignored it (and I thought I had done a good job up until it tried to kill me). To them, not wanting to take care of my diabetes translated into me wanted to dying.
One day grandma comes over, and we’re sitting at the island and she’s asking me what happened, what I was thinking, why I did what I did, etc. She tells me, “Courtney, if you’re not going to go back to the counselor, you need to start journaling.” She told me that the only option I had was to do one or the other, counselor or journaling, I couldn’t not do either.
Enter Charlene and “The Diarists’ Workshop“. A friend had given me a sheet of journaling workshops when I explained to her what I had to do. I signed up for one at a local bookstore, Bound To Be Read. Charlene Geiss was the instructor.
One class would put me on a trek of dealing with anything and everything that I had ever pushed down and not wanted to deal with. I would fight against all the feelings I was having during these sessions and try to push it all back down. I walked into each session armed with an attitude and stubbornness that was a force to be reckoned with.
I grew into a family of 10ish ladies, I was the youngest of them all and the next youngest of them could’ve been my mother. I think that I can confidently say that they would agree with me when I say I fought with everything that was ever said.
But they saw me grow, they helped me grow. The punk kid that would walk in with my hair in a ponytail, under a ball cap (so they couldn’t see my eyes) with a hoodie on (and the hood on my head half the time as well as my ball cap) let go of that shell after a couple years. It was a physical change as well as a mental/emotional/spiritual change. I started feeling better about myself, taking care of myself, dressing like I cared, my attitude changed, my demeanor changed.
About 2 years ago that group scattered into the wind. Since the split, I haven’t journaled at all, the closest thing I’ve come to journaling is blogging, but blogging doesn’t offer all that journaling does. I can’t put down my full feelings on my blog because people read it and get their feelings hurt or they get pissed off or something gets blown out of proportion. That doesn’t happen with journaling, because nobody but me reads it and I don’t have to share it. With blogging, sharing is implied, and that’s what I like about it, but it’s not always the right place to write everything that’s going on and everything that I’m struggling with.
Since the group split, I’ve seen Charlene exactly twice. Once last year after I graduated and tonight.
A few months ago I emailed Charlene, and I told her, I need to come back to class, I need to be journaling, I’ll even go to Santa Fe to do so if it means that I get to journal under your lead. She sent me a class schedule for this spring and on April 3rd, I’ll return to journaling class.
Today I got to see her though, because she had an open house for where we’ll be meeting. There’s a special place in my heart for her and everytime I see her or talk to her it puts a smile on my face. Here is a woman that was able to take me as a demon child, deal with my stubborness, the anger that I’d throw at her, the opposition that I’d put out there with every move she made, the unsurmountable amounts of energy that I possess, and help me take all my life experiences up to that time, all my hurts and wounds, and through writing, completely change me.
Ok, she didn’t change me, but by being the instructor/facilitator/mentor and working with me as I was, she helped me deal with issues I can’t even begin to verbalize here on my blog, and that changed me.
Charlene, helped make me the writer that I am today. If I hadn’t met her for journaling group, there’s no telling what my blogs would be like in this day and age or if I’d even have a blog.
Everytime we talk, she asks me if I’m journaling, and everytime, I tell her, the closest I get to journaling anymore is blogging.
I’ll continue to blog, but let me tell you, I’m happy to be returning to journaling.
500 Mile Challenge
Ok, so let’s review real quick what’s going on
1) Last week with a push from a friend, I found a reason to compete in a Triathlon, the big Triathlon will be an Ironman 70.3 but there will be small ones along the way.
2) I went and bought running shoes that I wasn’t completely confident in so that I can begin running, because you can’t very well do a Triathlon without running.
A day after I bought the shoes, I decided that I needed the cool Nike + iPod aka NikePlus thingamajig so that I could track my progress, because in reality, I’m too lazy to figure out how far I’ve run if I’m not on a treadmill, and keeping track of my progress is important to me.
But for the NikePlus thingamajig, I had to have an iPod Nano, my iPod touch wasn’t good enough, so I bought one of them too. Now before you go thinking that I’m crazy, I’m not crazy, this is normal behavior, I never slip into anything easily, I always go head first, if I’m going to do it, I’M GOING TO DO IT GOSH DARNIT!!!
So, this evening, I decide that I’m going to calibrate the Nike+ iPod Sports kit and so I put on my shoes, put the sensor beneath my laces (which isn’t the best alternative to not having Nike+ shoes, but I didn’t feel like concocting a good alternative), put leashes on the dogs and off we go.
I calibrated the walk of 400m then the run of the same distance and then I had to go back home. But by this time, Loki, one of the dogs, was in no mood for running, or walking for that matter, so he pretty much made me drag him home. When I got the dogs home, I put them in the yard and ran so that I could have a whole mile and not just eight tenths of a mile.
So I mostly walked, sprint a little at the end run, but at this point, it’s better than nothing. I’m thanking the gods above that I didn’t no take the dogs and just ran by myself because the shoes tore up my heels. I’ve never had a pair of running shoes tear up my heals, but alas, there’s a first time for everything.
After examining the damage to my feet and uploading my stats from my walk/run to Nike+, I decided I need to join the 500 Mile Challenge.
Jamie, The Diabetic Runner started it.
“I started this challenge for the vast community of blogging runners and diabetics. I’m hoping to inspire many to do great things, to push themselves to extraordinary heights, and to raise awareness of diabetes, and the United Nations’ designated “World Diabetes Day” held every year on November 14th.” [Jamie]
I figured that if I was going to be running in an effort to train for the triathlons that I intend on competing in that I might as well put my training to further work and make it count for something just as big as a triathlon.
Thanks to Nike+ and Mark (who created the Nike+ iPod Stats WordPress plugin to take the Nike+ data and make it available on websites) you can track my progress in meeting this goal by looking in the sidebar each time you visit this site:
If you’re interested in joining the 500 Mile (or 1000 Mile) Challenge, you too can do so, and no, you don’t have to be diabetic to join the challenge. You can sign up at YES.DiabeticRunner.com.
Just One Bite
I’ve written about it before, how I have an eating problem, the problem seems to be exponentially larger when I try to eat healthy and steer away from the “bad” foods. Everything just taunts me, the peanut m&ms on the end table, the box of snacks at work that we can help ourselves to (for only 75 cents), the donuts that coworkers bring in on some mornings and set on the microwave, it all calls out to me.
This week has been one of those rough weeks. I went out on Sunday and went grocery shopping so that I’d have healthy foods to eat throughout the week. Snacks were going to be things like apple sauce or yogurt with a side of turkey; or a piece of teriyaki chicken breast; or a granola bar (the healthy ones). I’ve even laid off of soda. I had a soda Sunday at the movie theatre but I hadn’t had one since the Sunday I drove home from Phoenix and I haven’t had one since, I’d say that all in all I’m doing well.
Monday night though, I couldn’t resist the Key Lime pie, it’s one of my favorites, I had to have a piece, a whole piece, not just my usual “just one bite”.
On Monday nights, I go to bible study, there’s about 13 of us and we all bring a dish, the meals and likewise the desserts vary from week to week. Normally I have my “just one bite” rule. All I need is one bite, I don’t need my own plate or my own serving, I just need a clean fork (or spoon) and someone that’s willing to share just one bite with me (I usually don’t have problems getting someone to let me have the first bite, there was a comment one night about how I was lucky that some of the other peeps let me have the first bite, because the person that was commenting said “i wouldn’t do that”. I just kindof shrugged it off and said that’s ok because xxx let’s me do it.)
So, this week, I ate the whole slice of key lime pie, when that pie was uncovered and I saw what it was, I knew there was no resisting it, even as I cut the slice and very nicely and carefully took it out of the pan so that it’s shape wouldn’t get distorted I thought to myself “I should take this to Barb and just have a bite” but I couldn’t, it was too late, the pie was on the plate in my hand and the fork was in my pocket just waiting for me to go sit down and eat it.
After that this week just kindof went down hill. New snack boxes were delivered, and with new snack boxes, are new snacks, and of the new snacks my favorites are the Famous Amos Chocolate Chip Cookies and the Knott’s Berry Farm Shortbread cookies. I just can’t resist them (well I could if I tried hard, but I don’t).
I made it to Thursday before I broke down and went after the cookies, I stayed near to my granola bars and yogurt and applesauce and chicken for snacks. Until Thursday. And then, not only did I eat the Famous Amos, I ate the Knott’s Berry Farm ones as well. A package at breakfast and one on my ride home. I started and ended my day with cookies. When I sit back and think about it, I know that it was bad, but it’s so hard to resist sometimes.
It’s those hard to resist times that I have to think about what really got the “just one bite” thing started. It was because of Katherine McPhee in an article in People Magazine a couple years ago that discussed her overcoming her eating disorder.
There was a comment made about her eating mini Snickers bars with every meal and that helped her get over her want/craving for them. “She lost her fear of so-called “bad” foods by allowing herself to eat ice cream, peanut butter and mini Snickers bars (four with each meal). Now she doesn’t want Snickers anymore…” (more at MTV news).
When I was reading the article, I thought, I don’t purge, but I do binge, and this is something that I can apply in my own life, I myself can’t have 4 mini Snickers bars at each meal, but what’s wrong with one at lunch time.
Nothing’s wrong with that. My best weeks, food wise, are when I allow myself a little treat daily, the one bite of dessert on Monday nights, a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup with lunch, or some other treat. It doesn’t need to be big, but it does need to be something. By not depriving myself from the so called “bad” foods, I avoid my need to binge on them (like yesterday when I started and ended my work day with cookies). I just need to remember that when I get into my “eat healthy” kick, that I need to put a little piece of something into my lunch efforts.
I think that the “just one bite” or “just one small piece” rule works well for those of us that have eating problems whatever it is that’s causing it. If we deprive ourselves, it’s going to cause problems down the road, either as sneaking or bingeing.
I know that I do it, not to say that every person does, but just one bite can help those of us that can’t seem to get by for very long before we break down and binge on those things we were trying to avoid.
Where Do All The Diseased Mice Come From?
When I was in Denver for the Diabetes Expo, Peter A. Gottlieb, MD was a speaker and something was being said about a cure. I didn’t catch all of what was being said though because a thought popped into my head…big surprise right?
I had meant to write about it at the time, but I forgot about my thought, that was until the news about the study that was until the news about a “cure” that Denise Faustman has been working on is going to human trials, and then my thought returned.
Where do all the diseased mice come from? This is something that I’d really like answered. For some reason, mice are what are used for most every kind of cure you hear about (or at least I hear about, doesn’t matter the disease the cure started in mice). So, where do all the diseased mice come from? For my concern, are they breeding diabetic mice, are they doing something to make them become diabetic. I know we can produce a type 2 mouse, that doesn’t take much more than to over feed it and let it live a sedentary lifestyle (with all due respect to type 2 diabetics and that horrible over generalized stereotype, but it’s all I got.), Type 1 is a different beast though. A Newsweek article, “Diabetes: Of Mice and Men” says that Faustman’s work does not address type-2.
So, once again, where do all the diseased mice come from? What are the doctors that are testing for a cure doing to the mice to make them a Type 1 diabetic? Does it matter that perhaps they weren’t a Type 1 diabetic based on the laws of nature when it comes to the curing the now diseased mouse?
Six Rides Under
With each Tour de Cure that I participate in I know that we’re getting closer to a cure. With each ride, I like to think that the life of diabetes becomes increasingly shortened. One day I know that I will get to bury my diabetes and that at it’s funeral, there will be a joyous celebration. The only tears shed will be tears of happiness.
I’ve shed a lot of tears over the last 16 years where my diabetes is concerned, but last year I said “NO MORE!” (Well, not exactly, but close enough. There’s still been tears, but not as many) Last year, after 15 years of battling diabetes, the disease that had controlled and changed my life, I decided that I was going to control and change it. What began as a goal to ride in one ride to show that I was ready to be in control of my diabetes quickly expanded.
When I was finished with my first Tour de Cure in Long Beach, CA, I knew that one ride wasn’t enough. It wasn’t enough to fulfill my craving of being an athlete, it wasn’t enough just to show once that I could take care of and control my diabetes, it wasn’t enough to bring a cure to the disease. It was only hours after my first ride that I decided that I would be riding in a Tour de Cure in every state.
My sixth ride takes me to Las Vegas, NV. And while I know that my personal goals are secondary to the primary reason I ride - for the cure to diabetes - I consider them an important part of fighting this atrocious disease.
I ride for myself, for my family members with diabetes, for all my friends with diabetes, for those with diabetes that I don’t know, and for those that will be saved from the torment of diabetes when a cure is found. And I will continue to ride until that cure is found, whether it be before I’ve ridden in all 50 states or long afterwards.
For the Las Vegas, NV Tour de Cure, I’m going to do another Metric Century, just like I did in Phoenix, AZ two weeks ago. For those of you that aren’t familiar with metrics (that would be most of us that were educated in the US), a metric century is 62.5 miles. I know that the elevation is a little higher in Vegas than it was in Phoenix, and being near lake mead there’s likely to be a lot of hills, but I believe that I can do it.
My goal is to have my ride time come in at no more than the 4 hours 30 minutes and 27 seconds that it took me to complete the Phoenix, AZ Tour de Cure. I would also like to cut my break time down from 10 minutes to 5 minutes if that’s possible. If I can do that, I’ll be completely done with the ride in about 5 hours. That’s my goal.
My other goal is to raise $200 for this ride, I’m already at $150 so I’m fairly close. If you’d like to donate, your donation is welcome.
New Feature: Past Rides
Ok, maybe it isn’t a new feature, but even on the old layout the map stopped working a short while after it came into existence. As such, I’m proud to announce that y’all can once again keep track of my rides in one easy location, the Past Rides page.
Each little marker on the map will take you to the page where I wrote about all that I thought about the ride (or most of what I thought). As an added bonus, you can see pictures of the ride as well, it’s exciting stuff!
I’m very excited myself to have this page back. I’m really liking that new markers are getting added regularly now that we’re back in cycling season. It excites me to see all the places I’ve traveled and ridden.
Running Shoes, Take Me Away
Anytime in my life that I’ve ever needed a pair of running shoes, it was Payless special, except for those once a year we’d get to go to a department store and get shoes for school, but mom always had a price limit, $40 or something like that, not too expensive so I never really got what I’d call sweet shoes, that was until I started working and I could afford my own shoes, and then I became an Adidas fiend. If I wanted a pair of running shoes I was more likely to migrate towards Adidas than I was any other brand, except Nike. Nike and I had a decent relationship for a while, but then I got all snobby and I couldn’t “brand clash”.
Because my shirts were Adidas and my pants were Adidas I couldn’t very well run around in Nike shoes right? And since I didn’t like the Nike pants because they didn’t rip away like the Adidas I had to change shoe brands, not that it killed me by any means.
Today however was different, I couldn’t just go in a buy a pair of shoes because it was the brand I preferred or the colors I liked, no, today, I went and bought running shoes for that in which they were intended, running. I’ve never really been concerned about how shoes worked when I ran. A few years ago when I was running I’d just put on my shoes and go, if my friends wanted to go running and I didn’t have my shoes, I’d put on their shoes (because we were same sized feet) and go.
I went to Fleet Feet because the Boulder store comes highly recommended and the Orlando store is also highly recommended. I do not recommend the Albuquerque store. It looks like the athletics monster went into that store and vomited, it’s a surprise that the store isn’t closed for breaking fire code regulations or something. Another thing was, and what I was really hoping for is that they’d fit me for a pair of shoes put me on a treadmill like they do in the Orlando store and watch me run, they didn’t even have a treadmill that I could see in the Albuquerque store. The guy that was watching me walk so that he could decide what kind of shoe to put me in asked if my left leg had ever been injured, the whole time he was looking at my right leg, so I grabbed my left leg and said, “left leg” and he said what about your right leg, and I said, “no, not my right leg only my left leg” and he said something about over pronation on my right leg whatever that means.
I was a little skeptical in his analysis just because he didn’t know right from left but I walked out with a pair of Saucony Progrid something or other.
I’ve got half a mind to go up to Boulder this weekend and see Kathy because she was who was recommended. I hear that she’s very good when it comes to picking shoes that are the right fit. I’d just hate to be running in a pair of shoes that aren’t quite the right fit and therefore might cause injury. I want to feel comfortable in the pair of shoes that a store representative gives me, I don’t want to have any doubts about the questions they’re asking me or anything else. I don’t want to injury myself before I even get to my half Ironman race in 2009, that will break my heart.
RED Riders
The RED Riders are something that I hold very near and dear to my heart when it comes to participating in the Tour de Cure. If you’ve been reading this blog for any time at all it’s possible that you’ve seen me in my RED Rider Jersey or you’ve heard me talk about the RED Riders. If you’re new to my blog I welcome you. Whether your a new reader or a veteran reader, please walk with me as I regale you with my story of the RED Riders (and share a very cool video).
Me and Mari (the brains behind the RED Riders)
When I went to Denver for the Diabetes EXPO they showed a video that they had put together about the RED Riders and I got a little bit emotional when watching it. (Ok, it made me teary eyed…ok, it made me cry, I get very emotional when I think about what some of us diabetics are out there doing).
Push Play To Begin
In the five Tour de Cure’s that I’ve ridden in, 3 of them have had recognition for the people with diabetes. Longmont, Colorado where the RED Riders started and really just made such an impression on me that the Colorado Tour de Cure is my favorite. I think that it was the “Whoop! for the RED Rider” that really made a difference for me in the Tour de Cure Colorado.
Orlando, Florida had the RED Riders. I myself didn’t get a jersey because I arrived in time to check in for the 22 mile ride, but all the “L” jersey’s had already made it out the door. So I was in my Denver jersey. Not that I was terribly saddened by this because people noticed and asked questions and it was cool to talk to various people. (Ok, I take it back, I was slightly disappointed, but they’re going to send me my size, in the mean time, here’s an XL on me, I was a little distracted in the forward facing picture)
When I took off out of the gate, there were 3 of us, one of the boys was wearing a RED Rider Jersey so I asked how long he had had diabetes. His response was “oh, I’m not the diabetic, but he [the boy next to him] didn’t want to wear his jersey so I am”. And then the other boy chimed in, “I’ve been diabetic for a year”. That was the extent of our conversation because then we went speeding past each other.
Phoenix, Arizona had the RED Riders. We had red bibs, at first I didn’t want to wear mine because I’ve become quite proud of my RED Rider Jersey, but then I thought, people will see and recognize the bib better than the jersey so I covered up my jersey.
In Phoenix I had a little bit of a different experience with the RED Riders. I went out with the earliest group and I think I only saw a handful of RED Riders, I know that I got passed by on and he said “yea! for the red vest” and I responded (because he too had a red vest on) “Whoop! for the red rider”. I know that there were other red riders, I just didn’t get to talk with them. I did meet a young girl, teenage years, that was going to ride in the 35 mile ride and she had diabetes. My experience with the RED Riders in Phoenix was different because, 1) as I said I didn’t get to speak with any of the other RED Riders in depth, and 2) it was me wearing the red vest that opened a conversation with another rider that really didn’t know much about diabetes or what caused it, etc. She was in the ride because she needed the training miles for an upcoming race, and so I got to talk to her for almost 30 miles out of the 62.5.
The conversation between her and I began when she asked if I had to raise a lot of money to get the bib. This is where I launched into what the RED Riders were. I told her that RED Riders are the riders that have diabetes, the RED Rider team celebrates us, it celebrates the courage it takes to live every day with diabetes, it recognizes the the daily grind of diabetes, it’s our day to be a hero.
Mari, the creator of the RED Riders says:
“Being a diabetic athlete means a dedication to trial and error. Every diabetic athlete I have ever met or read about is a meticulous record-keeper and is in his or her own way a scientist, continuously experimenting on his or her body to find the best combination of insulin, food, stress, exercise. The crazy thing is that the combination keeps changing and it is highly personalized, so there has to be a willingness to continuously revamp, re-evaluate, re-organize. Having diabetes and being committed to performance requires a degree of mental flexibility that deserves recognition and celebration. It is symbolic of what all of us as humans have to do to perform at high levels.
One could think I just want special recognition, and maybe I do. Why? Because receiving the recognition on race day gives me and my fellow diabetics the motivation to continue seeing the glass half full on the days when our blood sugar soars to 400 for no explainable reason, or when we have no desire to eat but we must or risk passing out if we don’t.
If you are a person surviving diabetes, I implore you to ride this year and do everything you can to declare your status, so others on the course and in the wider community have the opportunity to celebrate and be inspired by you.”
(She says a lot more stuff, and you can read that on the Tour de Cure Colorado site if you like.)
But like her, I’m going to implore you if you’re a diabetic and you cycle to get out there this year and ride in a Tour de Cure in your state. Contact the coordinator and ask them if they’ve got the RED Rider team. I know that this year not all the tours have the RED Riders, it’s kindof the soft opening of the RED Riders this year across the tours, but next year all the Tours will have the RED Rider team.
I hope, that I can be an inspiration to you, but that also you can get out there and be an inspiration to others 
Do you swim or run?
Do you swim or run? Want to learn???? Those were questions Mari asked me last week in an email. We’re working on something and it involves (thus far) Her, Nancy (a new friend), Me (all type 1 diabetics) and an Ironman 70.3 (that’s a 1/2 Ironman: 1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike, 13.1 mile run, which adds up to 70.3 miles) in 2009.
I already have the bike part down, I proved that two weekends ago when I did that metric century in Phoenix, I can ride 62.5 miles. But the question now is, can I ride 56 miles after swimming a mile and a half and then after swimming and biking, run 13.1 miles? I believe that I can.
Doing a triathlon isn’t a new thought to me. It’s something that’s been in my head for a couple years now, last year even I started asking around at the gym, asking the trainers if they had participated in triathlons and how do they suggest training for one, etc.
When I was in Phoenix a few weeks ago, when I was talking to Jerry of Team WHAT? he said something to the effect of Tuscon being a great place to train for triathlons because the weather is fairly even keel and doesn’t change like the weather in Phoenix. He was riding his tri bike and I think that’s how that conversation got started. He told me that for my first triathlon to make sure that the swim portion was in a pool and not in open water because open water can be a little intimidating the first time around. When I told him that I wanted to start with a Sprint he said that a Sprint is a great place to start.
This is just what I needed to turn my want of participating in a triathlon into a reality. Before I didn’t have anything but doubt surrounding whether or not I could do one. It’s not even something I really spoke out loud to anyone that personally knew me, I’d only speak of it to people that I didn’t know because they were the least likely to say “oh, you can’t do that, what about your diabetes? how are you going to train? what about not having insulin in your system while you swim?” (I could go on and on with the questions but I’ll refrain). Despite my general hard headed and stubbornness, too many “you can’ts” and I would begin to think that I couldn’t instead of fighting back and pursuing what I wanted to do. So not many people knew that I wanted to compete in a triathlon. But now it’s a reality. I can fight off any doubt that arises because I won’t be doing this alone. I’ve got Mari and Nancy so far to support me and me to support them, it’s gonna be FUN!
Mari and Nancy both have done several triathlons (different distances). Me, I’m going to start training now and by July/August I should be able to do my first sprint. I’d like to do several sprints and then I’d like to attempt to do an Olympic distance triathlon by December. I don’t think that’s unreasonable. I can cycle already, and I’m not necessarily in it to win the first time around (although my competitive spirit will drive me to keep up with the best) all I need to do is get my swimming technique under wraps and start running again.
When I was talking with one of the trainers at the gym last year, she did tell me that the biggest mistake first time triathletes make is training for the areas they’re not good in, and slacking off where they think they’re good. So like, for instance, that’s be equivalent to me thinking that I don’t need to cycle and that I only need to focus on swimming and running. But I’m not going to make that mistake. I’ve got a plan. (BeginnerTriathlete.com helped me with it.)
If you’re a triathlete and want to give me pointers along the way I’m all for it
And stay tuned because this isn’t the last you’re going to hear of the Ironman 70.3 of 2009 for us women diabetics.