Today was legit.
Continue reading “Today Was Legit!”
Today Was Legit!
Today was legit.
Therapy.
You want to talk so bad right now, that you think you might choke due to the lack of words being able to escape your throat.
There is just so much to say; but nobody wants to hear it, and nobody really cares anyway.
So you stash it deep down in your gut and let it simmer.. Let it burn.. Let is suck the life out of you.. Until the tension slowly builds. It rises up and heats your entire core until it finally hits your brain and your head is pounding.
You need an escape- need to run!
Then the cravings start attacking for trail time, because you know the pounding in your brain won’t stop until you either speak your mind or get to that freakin’ trail.
And since you can’t speak your mind..
You run.
You strike the ground with everything you’ve got in your body because you’re so sick of holding all of it in. You can cry, you can scream, you can yell, you can run faster, and you can run farther. You can speak your mind to the trees, or shout out to God above. Do whatever you want to do because when you run- you’re you.
After a few hours-
The pounding stops.
The pressure is gone.
Nothing is solved, no.
Yet everything feels good
….if only for a millisecond.
And that’s why you do it again, and again:
Running is your therapy.
*ps – Don’t freak out- I don’t really need therapy, I just write when I’m frustrated because I love how it flows.;)
a beth presten kinda night
My in-laws gave me a gift card. The gift card bought me some awesome fleece gear. The fleece gear told me the trails were calling & then my phone actually rang– and no it wasn’t the trails….( I was shocked too).. it was Beth Presten! One of my favorite people on earth! For real!
Beth Presten was calling to see if I’d like to have a little outdoor adventure tonight. “yup. harbins? Holla.” (we tend to act/talk like 15 year old hood chicks when we get together).
this adventure was going to be a bit different for us.
A. Beth is pretty frickn pregnant.
B. I am healing from a fractured hip.
C. Normally when we train together we are hitting 7 minute miles, and pushing each other past our cardiac barriers. Or running from Sasquatch..
Presten and I have trained together for about 2 years. We have had countless adventures, as both of us are pretty ridiculous in our training styles-Aka we thoroughly enjoy running for hours, in dangerous places, like the woods, at 4 in the morning. We both are extremely competitive, and we really just have always had this cool training partner thing going on for quite some time. So with our competitiveness & heavy mileage pushed to the side, I was excited to see how our evening of “aggressive hiking” would go.
We headed out to one of our favorite training routes. We hadn’t seen each other in a couple of months, and we had a ton to talk about, laugh about, vent about.. You know, typical runner bond mixed with bff for life type chick stuff. Time slipped away and before we knew it, we were on a dark trail with no exit in sight.
This always happens to us.
Last time this happened to us, we were freaking out. Beth had watched a documentary on Sasquatch prior to our evening run, and determined that Sasquatch does indeed exist. She pleaded her case to me during that run, and I too, became a believer. Towards the end of that run, we heard a branch snap, and started to get skittish. We got all quiet, and eventually started running like there was no tomorrow back toward the trail head shouting things about Sasquatches and what have you. I think we finished that run with a good 5 minute mile. Yeah, I guess looking back it could have been a squirrel…. Maybe..
Another time we found ourselves trapped in the dark, we were hiding in a ditch en route home during a very long run. Beth and I had been discussing, quite in depth actually, women going missing, kidnappers, molesters, etc. Typical stuff unarmed women talk about when they run together at night. Anyway, there was a dude in the park that night that seemed a little out of place. And we were convinced he was following us home. Every truck we saw for the next few miles resulted in a ditch dive, duck & cover until we felt it safe to run….. I still think that man was out to get us. He just couldn’t find us bc we were too freakin awesome at camouflaging ourselves amongst the roadside shrubs- even in highly reflective running gear.
So back to tonight. We found ourselves on the dark trail, and whadya know, some moron with a headlamp was out on the trails too! Beats me as to why, because I really don’t understand why anyone would tackle Harbins in the dark, but nonetheless, dude was there. Dude was coming towards us. Beth and I immediately assumed it was the Unabomber- a sketchy looking guy we had passed and nicknamed earlier during the hike. Really Unabomber was probably just a man in a sweatshirt trying to get some exercise, but you never know. So we started to get all freaked out- as usual. We thought it would be best if we just stood still and thought of our plan of attack. Then we decided that I should whip out my trusty knife (though I’ve never had to use it :-/) and we would confidently walk towards Unabomber’s light. We needed to show him “we ain’t skurrd”. But then- his light went out! Totally caught us off guard. We started flipping out & ran away fast [yes the pregnant girl and the broken hip girl ran]. I pulled out my phone and called Dan to explain we were “probably being attacked” *again because we are always being attacked* but he was nice enough to play his usual I’ll talk to you guys until the bad guy leaves game.. We put him on speaker and asked him to shout intimidating things about being a trained sniper, and what not, until we made it back to the parking lot. We never saw the Unabomber! So basically, our plan of attack worked- the run, wield weapon, and have Dan talk loudly on speaker phone thing really scared him off, I think. There’s always the possibility that he flipped his lamp off to pee, or something, but I seriously doubt it.
Ahhh… What a night.:)
Good weather. Great friend.
(Nice fleece gear too!)
So regardless of the lack of awesomely insane & legit running skill, it was a typical Beth Presten night. I was happy to find that we can still have a blast together even when we aren’t training [like fierce warrior running beast]. I’m so happy she called me, & that I got to try out my new fleece gear! (Worked pretty good! Thanks in-laws!)
I love my running friends.:) They are so special to me. I love that we can act like little kids, play in the woods, run from bad guys, and just forget about the craziness of real life for a bit. It’s such a sweet thing. I’ll never take it for granted.
Preggers Beth is cute!
Wanna talk toughness?
I’ve quit 3 ultras.
THREE
1.) bethel hill moonlight boogie, my 2nd attempt at running 50 miles. (my first finish was a solo run a couple weeks prior, also in extremely high temps, and on the toughest hilliest roads around. 10 hour self supported finish.) @BHMB, I threw up – nonstop- for 6 miles straight. It was 100 degrees in the middle of summer. I was so dehydrated from puking, and hallucinating badly, that I eventually curled up in a car and fell asleep. I woke up after a couple hours (still feeling like crap) and gutted out another 10 miles before sunrise. I finished 36 miles that day.
2.)FORT CLINCH 100, my 3rd 100 mile attempt. HOTTER THAN HADES in Florida trails with humidity so thick you felt like you were swimming. mid summer. I literally passed out @67 miles and was ambulanced to the ICU/comatose ward and was in a coma for 11 hrs. My Body ate itself- rhabdomyolosis- and started to eat my heart. The cardiac enzymes invaded my blood stream and shut down my kidneys. I woke up the next morning and asked to go back out to finish my run, ha. I wasn’t even allowed to MOVE for 4 weeks- i was supposed to be on bed rest. But 2 weeks later, i got up and started back with a 100 mile week. (read “refined by fire in the fort clinch furnace” for that one.)
3.) Hinson lake 24 hr. I quit at 1:30am after dealing with massive pain in my hip for the entire day. A urinary tract infection forced me to stop every other loop to hit the bathroom, so I had to double up my pace to make up for the stops. I felt great other than both of those incredibly painful things- I eventually stopped running after trying EVERYTHING. Come to find out I WAS RUNNING WITH A FRACTURED HIP. BUT I STILL MANAGED ABOUT 80 miles that day. I would have kept going if my leg would’ve moved.
Those are the only ultra races I have ever quit.
Most all of my ultra training runs were done BY MYSELF. In the middle of the freaking night, on technical trails. I woke up at (or before) 4am almost every single week day to get in my mileage, so it wouldn’t disrupt my family’s flow, or interfere with my ability to be a good mom and wife.
What about you? What ya got? I really want to know.
Because, sure I may have had a few brushes with bad luck. But I guaran-freakin-tee you that I can outlast you on any given day. I actually REALLY enjoy feeling pain. I thirst for it.
NOW TELL ME ONE MORE TIME YOU THINK I NEED TO TOUGHEN UP. I DARE YOU.
-Ashley;)
“Tighten up on your reigns, you’re runnin’ wild..runnin’ wild..it’s true.”
Till I Collapse
A collection of thoughts:
All I want right now is to run until my body can’t take it anymore.
Till I collapse.
It’s how I do it.
ALL OR NOTHING.
Forget political correctness.
Forget what YOU think I should do.
I’m not always concerned with “proper training and tapering”.
Regardless of if I’m training or racing: I simply want to push myself until I can’t push anymore.
I don’t care WHEN that happens, WHERE that happens, or WHY that happens.
I know the consequences of my actions.
I know it’s not smart.
I know it “gets you nowhere”.
Do you think I can’t feel the burning sensation from the break in my hip?
Do you think I don’t cringe every time the strained muscles scream at me when I move?
It is what it is.
I run for a different sort of satisfaction.
I crave the morning after a full day of running, when everything is so tight, I literally can’t move.
Maybe I run to feel pain.
Maybe I run because the pain is too much.
Maybe I run because I’m addicted.
Maybe you have no idea what it feels like to push past your limits..and then some.
I don’t care what it needs to be, or what it should be.
I push harder because I hate the things you say about me.
I will push until I can’t.
I won’t stop unless my body forces me to.
I will always work to push that point farther away.
Whatever it is. Whatever it isn’t.
I will run because I can.
I will run the way I want to.
Till I collapse.
Staying Distracted, Lifting Weights, and a Facebook Rant
Everyone keeps asking me if I’m depressed. Ha. Well….Nah, I wouldn’t say I’m depressed. I’m definitely not my chipper -bouncing off the walls- self. I think I’m just really DISTRACTED. I only get down during times when I feel like I should be running, or when I crave a run. Truth is, I haven’t had time to notice my injury other than the obvious, more in-your-face, times Take grocery shopping for instance, yeah…screw that! Ha! Daniel keeps telling me to use one of those riding carts, and I refuse….they look too weak! So I crutch around all over the stores, and try to carry stuff at the same time. It’s so pathetic.. maybe I should just swallow my pride? (Or NOT.)
I’ve been keeping myself really busy, and I feel just about as tired as I felt during peak training weeks this year. As a matter of fact, last night I forgot I can’t even walk. I was laying in bed, it was around midnight, and I told Daniel, “I’m gonna go hit a few miles really quick so I can sleep, I’ll be back.” He looked at me like I was crazy, and then I remembered I can hardly walk, and I dropped my head back to the bed in defeat. (Yes, running is THAT ingrained into my system… anyone else ever experienced this sort of thing?) Also, I had to leave the house last night, and I drove past my favorite training grounds, Fort Yargo, on the way to my destination. I almost swerved into the park! I got all teary eyed. What would I do there? Crutch to the trail head and turn around? I SWEAR, I really feel like a teenage girl who’s daddy made her “break up” with running. SUCKS! So..I took a pic and kept driving. sob. For real, that is so lame. Why I’m writing this for my small world of friends to know is beyond me…not like you guys don’t know this stuff about me anyway. Somewhere in this mess of a year, I apparently lost my ability to care about what anyone else thinks… (?)…
I’ve spent the past couple of days helping a close friend of mine revamp her blog, so that’s been keeping me distracted. Beth McCurdy is a fabulous cook, and has a lot of great recipes geared towards runners, check it out : betheats2run.blogspot.com . It turned out to be a nightmare of HTML code input for the header, which I haven’t dealt with in years. Also, when I committed, I forgot that my new laptop has no photoshop or editing software installed. I’m a wiz on photoshop, but I had to use a crappy generic photo editor to create the logo and it took foooorrr–eevvvv–urrrr. (No really. Forever!) Regardless, it turned out pretty good for my first attempt at designing a blog for someone & with minimal tools to do so. She really liked it, so that’s all that matters to me.
Dan’s kicking my butt…err, upper body, with whatever cross training I can handle. I’m looking forward to the body changes with it all. I’ve lost a lot of weight since Hinson, surprisingly. Probably because I’m not hungry. I can already see a lot of cuts and definition returning that I had lost during heavy distance training. I’m eating way less than 1000 cals a day. My body is so used to burning 3-4000, and consuming even more than that on a daily basis. I guess my body just doesn’t know how to react! It’s kinda weird.. I’m so fascinated by how our bodies respond to training
Another thing keeping me distracted are the looong and meaningful conversations I have had with so many of my friends. I’m the type of person who you DON’T want to get into a phone conversation with… no really.. most people just text me to avoid it! Ha. Everyone knows that I prefer deep conversation versus meaningless chatter, so I’m surprised at how many people are willing to actually CALL me! SOOO many friends, and other ultrarunners have taken the time to chat with me, and I’m loving it! Thanks guys, it’s keeping my mind off of NOT running. Huge help! Some conversations have been FUNNY. I found out that a girl at Hinson Lake thought I was trying to “show off” by sprinting a few loops after already running over 60 miles. Ha. Actually, I had no intentions of showing off, and every intention of trying anything in my arsenal to shake out the pain I was feeling in my hip. A true runner knows that sometimes a good solid block of natural form sprinting can fix your gait & stride and help tame some muscle pain. So no, I didn’t WANT to run a sub 7 pace for half an hour on crappy legs, I just felt like I needed to try it. (Shakin My Head)
(enter random facebook rant)
Things like that chick talking smack about me- that reminds me of how much I LOVE being off of facebook. All of the political correctness and fake friendships used to drive me up the wall. When I hear of silly things people say about me, I’m reminded of how people used to write that kind of stuff to me on my facebook wall… I can only imagine the crap I’d get if I was on there posting stuff about breaking my hip during Hinson! —Bet this would be verbatim :
Continue reading “Staying Distracted, Lifting Weights, and a Facebook Rant”
Find a freakin’ way!
No Surgery? PTL!
Yup, no surgery! Surprised everyone, I think! All I will require is some physical therapy and rehabilitation to help me walk again, and eventually run again. I’m very thankful for this news, as I’ve always had this idea that surgery is the “kiss of death” for endurance athletes.
The doctor must know me better than I think, because she won’t set a date for my return to training. My guess is she doesn’t want me to get focused on a date, and get out there well before my hip is ready, which I totally would do. I know it won’t be until 2012 though:-/. She laughed when I asked if I could swim or bike..or pretty much do anything period. She looked at me with this piercing look, as if to say, “ARE YOU SERIOUS?” but instead offered, “You don’t realize how serious this is. You can’t do anything but rest.”
Doc mentioned that I also damaged a few muscles. I don’t remember their names, except for one: gluteus minimus.. I remember that one, because I thought to myself, “There is NOTHING minimus about MY gluteus!” Ha!
But yeah, walking could be more likely to actually happen when those muscles and tendons start to heal in the next few weeks.
The doctor also told my mom something else, “Nobody in their right mind would ever run 140 weekly miles.”
…….
Guess doc never met an ultrarunner.
And guess what else.. The instant I’ve got the green light to run, I’ll be SLOWLY and CAREFULLY making my way right back to the same level of training I love to run at. I disagree that running SO much broke my hip. I think I injured it with the insane amount of speed training I did in the last month of training. I hit a sub 5 mile in august, for crying out loud! I know there must have been a tiny ounce of pain in that hip before the start, and I tuned it out. It got horrendous, yet I still tuned it out.. for almost 80 miles. That’s what I do. Thats what I TRAIN myself to do. Ignore pain. I took a gamble on it being muscle related, and held hope that it would fade out so I could finish my race. That’s what usually happens. This time it didn’t. I’m not a moron, and had I known it was my hip bone, I would have stopped way sooner than I did. Regardless of how it happened, I’m not going to be used as “an example”. Nope. I run….Hard. I get hurt. It’s ultrarunning, not safetyrunning. Sure, I crave longevity. But I also have no interest in settling for mediocrity (thanks Mccurdy for reminding me of that) and I have no plans to change my love for high mileage because a doctor thinks it’s ludicrous. Welcome to my world, doc, it’s twisted!
Don’t take it personally, doc. I have trouble listening to anyone’s advice..just ask my husband. Shoot, he even wrote a whole post inspired by my lack of trainability.daniel’s rant
No News is Good News?
Yesterday I had additional testing done to find out if surgery is in my near future. I still haven’t heard from the doc, so maybe that’s good? Maybe?!! [MAYBE!]
Arthrogram testing was quite interesting. I watched the radiologist put a needle in my hip, and was able to see how deep it went (straight through to the other side) on the X-ray cam. Nasty! Last time I saw a needle that big I was about to give birth to my first child. Geeez..
I ventured out of the house yesterday and joined the family to watch Brett’s game. I probably wasn’t ready for that. It was hard to have to replay the events again and again. These people already think I’m psycho for running so much. “Why did you do this to yourself again?” was the general question. And, “I don’t know,” was the general answer.
I came home and, once again, cried like a little girl on Daniel’s chest. I couldn’t explain myself to anyone and I didn’t FEEL like explaining myself either. It’s times like these when Dan would usually say, go run for awhile, we’ll talk when you get back. I guess I realized that, and cried some more about it.
I told Daniel that it’s hard for me to explain to people why not being able to walk[read RUN or DO ANYTHING] for awhile would have such a huge impact on my life.
Running is not just fitness to me.
No.
Running is my best friend.
At the start of 2011, I needed a life check. I pulled away from almost everyone in my world and did one thing… I ran.
I ran far. I ran fast. I ran slow. I ran well before the sun came up, and far into the long hours after midnight. I ran when I needed to cry, I ran when I wanted to laugh. I ran to feel good, and I ran to hurt. I cried out to God during those lonely hours in the woods. I dealt with every sort of pain, problem, and joy imaginable – ON THE RUN.
So knowing there is a possibility I may not run for another year, or who knows when.. Its like mourning the loss of a loved one.
So I wallowed in all of that a little while longer, and then I started laughing. (I got sick of crying! Ha.) I realized, (yes once again), there is no point in crying about this!!! It’s like when you take a snack away from your kid that they tried to sneak before dinner. They scream and cry out in protest, but you know you’re not going to give it back, because it’s not good for them. In that case, I’m the little kid screaming, “why!!!!”
Or maybe [in the ultra world] it’s like when you’re stuck at mile 50, you’ve hit a rut, but you’ve got a whole other race ahead of you. You can sit there and cry about how sucky life is, or you can move your feet and get past it. It’s life!!!! Stuff happens, right?! Keep moving forward, Ashley!
So… Moving forward..
I talked with Brooks running, and got some good news. They are going to offer collateral for my races! Thanks, guys!! My client, Traci, also has suggested that the donations from my first race benefit a young son of a local runner in our area who is suffering from cancer. His name is also Brooks.. Cool.:) I’m anxious to get all of the details planned out with that.
I want to thank all of my friends, and everyone in the ultra community for pouring on the love. You guys always show how caring and selfless you are. I experienced after Fort Clinch, and here again with this madness! I love the surprise phone calls and emails. I crack up when you guys tell me to stop acting like an idiot. Nothing like a good laugh.:) I know my emo-ness is way annoying, but it’s just unfiltered me right now. PLUS I am not burning 1000’s of calories every day, so how else am I supposed to get this emotional crap out??!?! Being a female is rough, ha.
I’ll post again as soon as I have answers from my doc. Shouldn’t be too long. Thanks for caring!
Response to news of hip fracture and possible surgery–
Response to news of hip fracture and possible surgery– a video by Ashley Ringo Walsh on Flickr.
hahaha you kinda had to see the WORST movie ever to think that was funny.
So yeah, I fractured my hip a few miles into Hinson lake.. And idiot me ran roughly 80 miles that day before I quit in pain. It hurt so bad, but I thought it was muscle related so I kept moving hoping to run it out. Tomorrow I will find out if I will need surgery. Apparently there may be a tendon that is damaging (or already damaged) the hip bone by being pulled too tightly across the bone and as a result- tearing off the bone. The tendon may have snapped, or may be close to it.
Either way, I can’t walk, or do anything weight bearing for a long time….Like months. If surgery- way longer. I’m down, okay, I cried my eyes out.. but I’m okay with it. Promise. Yes, it’s true that running well over 100 mile weeks generally means someone is probably quite addicted to running. So NOT RUNNING basically means NOT BREATHING. Which basically sucks. Lol! But hey, what have I always said? Everything happens for a reason!!! I’m going to focus my energy on planning out races I mentioned in my last post. I’ve already contacted a couple of people about it. I think it will all work out very nicely!! Will feel REALLY good to solely focus on others’ happiness for awhile!
I’m determined not to lose my competitive edge and focus during the next few months. I’ve already got a high count pushup and pullup goal and plans to kayak during the day while my kids are at school. Will be fun! Dan had me out lifting as soon as I got home from the doc. Ha! I know he won’t take it easy on me and I’m glad. That crazy torture loving freak set 25’s down on the ground in front of me and said “go.” (I think really its not about his concern for me, but more that he just doesn’t want a frumpy wife! ;))
I refuse to let anything deter my motivation and discipline!!!!! This year has been (hades) for me- emotionally, physically, mentally. Let’s see– I had a health scare this spring with my spleen, then I almost died at fort clinch (ICU), I cut open my thumb a couple weeks ago(stitched) and then here’s this awesome hip drama and possible surgery. Haha I mean really I have like hundreds of thousand in med bills and no way to pay. It’s been rough. No, REALLY rough. Running all of that crazy mileage this year was my therapy. Not running will be so hard. But the key to going through so much crap in life is to KEEP THE FAITH. GOTTA KEEP PUSHING ONWARD TOWARDS THE PRIZE!! No matter what you’re going through, it could almost ALWAYS be worse!!!! Count your blessings, right? I am. Because there is SO MUCH in life to be thankful for, and not enough time to be sitting around miserable. (remind me I wrote this when I’m crying in a few weeks because im not outside playing and running in the beautiful autumn weather!) 😀 🙂 I
ASHRUNS100s 