Not all runs feel good + how do you handle your bad? + Jake’s exciting news!!

I was working on edits yesterday morning when this little head popped up under my arm. She must’ve just woken up from a little nap – check out that bed head.

I guess she wasn’t pleased with arm cuddles…she decided she needed to stand on the dang table, which is a no-no. This dog is something else!

Jake had a huge dental procedure with my Dad yesterday morning. I wanted to be home when he got finished so I could see what they did. Jake knocked out his front tooth mountain biking when he was in 3rd grade. He had gotten it fixed, but then had some other stuff happen and it just kept getting worse. Well, my Dad, who is the BEST dentist in Springfield, MO (for real – Ascend Dental Design. Check them out!) fixed him all up yesterday! And let me tell you – it looks incredible! I’ll wait until the swelling has gone down and I’ll post some pictures! Anyway, I wanted to be home when Jake came by before going to work, so I decided not to go run until later. I worked for a little bit before I took a breakfast break – an egg muffin and a rice cake with chocolate PB! Something I’m eating has been really bothering my throat lately. I can’t figure out what it is, but it makes my throat scratchy. I need to get through this week of edits and then I’m going to start eliminating things from my diet to see if I can figure it out. It’s not painful or anything, but it’s annoying.

I worked some more – was able to get my first two chapters completely edited and sent off to my committee chair to read. Fingers crossed she doesn’t hate everything I wrote! Once I sent that email, I took another break for lunch. I had an open-face Greek yogurt chicken salad sandwich and carrots with more peanut butter. I knew better than to have that Sriracha since I needed to run….but I just couldn’t help myself. I regretted it later…

I posted the below stuff on Facebook and Instagram, but if you missed it, I had a rough day getting motivated yesterday. It took every ounce of dedication I had to get me to the gym.

I did NOT want to run. At all. I chugged my BCAAs and headed to the treadmills.

This is what I shared yesterday:Excuses. I used every single one in the book today.

I had too much work to do. 
I had anxiety about my dang dissertation. 
I had terrible acid reflux – cue regret from lunch.
I was sore AF from HealthTracks.
It was cold outside.
The treadmill gets boring.
Skipping one run isn’t a big deal.
I needed to vacuum the house.
I needed to put away laundry.
I could keep going…

I texted Jake, telling him I didn’t want to run. He reminded me how I felt when I COULDN’T run. That was enough to get me out of the house.

I pulled into the Y, still not really feeling it. I could just go back home and do it tomorrow…That’s when I saw my baby sister. She was leaving with one of her clients – she works with mentally disabled adults. She introduced me to her client and he was SO excited to tell me all about the 12 laps he just walked. He’s training for a half marathon. He was ecstatic and it was inspiring. He’s lucky to have you, Pipes; so am I! ❤️ How could I go home and not do what I needed to do after hearing that?

Is every day of running (or anything in life) perfect? Heck no. But those are the things that make us stronger.

I knocked out my run and my striders. Was it fast? No. Did it feel good? Not really. But the next time I’m hurting in a race, I can think back to this (and every other time I have wanted to quit) and KNOW I can push through. Running is 90% mental for me. One of my main goals for this training cycle is to improve my mental toughness. Step 1 is showing up.

I know everyone has hard days, and a lot of people have bigger struggles than not wanting to run or trying to finish a degree. I never want to be fake on here or pretend that every run I do is perfect – most of them aren’t! I do try to focus on the good, but I’m human and have bad days. Heck, I’ve had bad months! But, what matters is what we do in those situations and how we handle the ‘bad’. I’m emotional. I always have been. If I get overwhelmed, stressed, angry, upset, super happy, etc. I usually cry. It’s pretty much the first reaction I have to extreme emotions. Sometimes I need a good two-minute cry, then I take a deep breath, and move on. This is especially true right now with my dissertation. It’s not easy, but it’s not supposed to be. Sometimes it’s going to test me. And when it does, I need to deal with those emotions and then keep moving forward. Because you know what? The only way I’m going to ever finish this thing is by moving FORWARD. Sitting around and feeling stressed/anxious/unsure isn’t getting me anywhere. So I keep moving forward until I figure out what the heck I’m doing – that’s just life! How do you handle your bad? That’s what’s important.

Remember how I said I’d regret that Sriracha on my lunch? Well, I did. One day I’ll learn. One of my readers told me to drink spearmint tea to help with acid reflux – so I drank that yesterday and I really do think it helps!

This is the face of neglect. After me working all weekend and now working all week, I think Lu is feeling pretty neglected. I can’t imagine trying to do this kind of work with human children. Fur babies are hard enough! Mad props to those of you who have kiddos and are rocking all kinds of crazy hard work – you’re amazing!

I always have slippers of some kind on when I’m at home. No matter what!

Mmm. Still sipping on my spearmint tea.

Jake wasn’t feeling all that great last night, his mouth was pretty sore. He had LOTS of work done – he has some pretty gnarly looking stitches. He kept wanting to show me…I’m not good with that kind of stuff! Pictures don’t bother me, but if it’s in person and looks like someone is in pain, I don’t want to see it. I won’t go into a lot of detail, but my Dad did some pretty serious dental surgery on Jake yesterday. We tried to think of things that he could eat for dinner that wouldn’t bother him too badly. I sent him with a smoothie for lunch, but he needed some real food in his belly. We went to Koriya and got a variety of things. Gyoza is hands down one of my favorite things, so we had to get an order of that. Jake was able to eat it in little bites!

Then we these – mine is on the left and was called Japchae (maybe?) and Jake had teriyaki chicken. He ate his whole meal and a little bit of mine. I was glad he was able to eat! He can’t take any pain pills because he’s on call for work. I don’t know how he’s doing it. We both don’t like to take pain medicine, but if I had had the work done that he did, I’d be taking everything I could. I’m also a big baby, so there’s that.

More Skratch bars for dessert!

Poor Jake slept all evening while I worked, but I managed to get about 70% finished with the edits for chapter 3! Eek! I think I have about 5 to 6 more hours of work on that chapter, then I can send it off to my committee chair. After that, I will get started on chapter 5 while I wait to get edits back for chapter 4. Guys, I might just be able to pull this summer graduation thing off – we will see! It’s still too early to tell, but I’m doing everything in my power to make it a possibility! Hmm, get married and graduate with your PhD within months of each other? Sign me up! I won’t walk until December. I refuse to walk until I am 100% finished. I contacted the graduation people at Mizzou, and they may have laughed at me, but they said I can wait and walk in December if that’s what I want to do.

I have HealthTracks later today – I am SO sore, so we will see how that goes, then more editing work before dinner with some girlfriends! It’s almost Katie’s birthday, so we are going to dinner to celebrate tonight! I have a 6-miler Saturday morning and then I’m planning on going to TRX. Other than that, I’d like to spend some more time working on these edits and getting started on chapter 5. Pretty low-key weekend, which I’m excited about!

Happy Friday, friends!