{"id":602,"date":"2019-04-30T13:50:21","date_gmt":"2019-04-30T20:50:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ebtherapy.com\/blog\/?p=602"},"modified":"2019-04-30T13:50:21","modified_gmt":"2019-04-30T20:50:21","slug":"recovering-rando-style","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/balboaparkholisticwellnesscenter.com\/blog\/2019\/04\/recovering-rando-style\/","title":{"rendered":"Recovering, Rando-Style"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished\u201d ~Lao Tzu<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another spring weekend. It\u2019s partly cloudy with light winds. The citrus blossoms are fragrant, birds are frolicking, and a storm is brewing which won\u2019t hit for another day. It\u2019s perfect cycling weather, yet once again I\u2019ve ignored my alarm in favor of extra snuggle time with my husband and cat. I\u2019ll go out a bit later, I rationalize. And at 10:30, I look at my drawer full of bike shorts which are now a size too small, glance at my other drawer of ride snacks which are a year past their \u201cbest by\u201d date, stare blandly at my bike, and opt to have a leisurely breakfast of homemade ham, eggs, and cheese crepes. This seems to be my new reality, and I\u2019m not sure I know who this person is who is choosing leisurely time at home over an adventure on a bike <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Out for an easy spin on a sunny day.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

In December 2017 I attempted my last 200k ride. I was 2\ncycles into chemotherapy, desperate to prove to myself and the world that it\ndidn\u2019t matter \u2013 that I was still the same hard core athlete, that I could do\nANYTHING even when my body was in less than optimal condition, that life would\ncontinue as I knew it despite a cancer diagnosis which would require 2\nsurgeries, 4 cycles of chemo, 20 radiation treatments, and at least 5 years of\nhormone therapy not for a cure, but to minimize the risk of dying from this\ndisease I will now live with for as long as my heart beats and my body breathes.\nI managed about 80 miles of the easiest 200k in San Diego County on that\nDecember day, and next picked up my bike in February. While I had planned to\ndrop to a P-12 from an R-12 while going through treatment, a wildly unhappy\nliver and a bout with sepsis which led to beginning 2018 from a hospital bed\nforced a new plan. For the first time in my adult athletic life, \u201cpushing\nmyself\u201d meant getting out of bed in the morning. It meant forcing 3 liters of\nwater down my throat even though it tasted like a blend of metal and mold. It\nmeant trying to get through a work day without falling asleep with a patient\nresting on my treatment table. It meant figuring out strategies for keeping\ndetails in my chemo-brained mind long enough to write them down. \u201cExercise\u201d\nbecame standing in my back yard for 30 minutes, or walking to the cul de sac\nwith my cat. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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New Year’s Eve, 12\/31\/18<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

After chemo, I was desperate to ride, to break a sweat, to\nfeel that high which comes with a hard workout. I rode short distances through my\nmonth of radiation, and built myself back up to 70 miles before having my\novaries removed in June. Again, I couldn\u2019t wait to get back on the bike and was\npedaling 4 weeks later \u2013 the absolute earliest my surgeon, who is also a cyclist,\nwould allow. I trained again, and rode a 55 mile charity ride in November which\nI finished an hour ahead of that surgeon. I was ready for a come-back. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Padres Pedal the Cause, November 2018<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Except, I wasn\u2019t.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

December 2018 brought rain, and, for San Diego known for its\ndesert climate, a LOT of it. I was cold all the time, and the colder and wetter\nit was, the more my joints ached \u2013 an unfortunate side effect of the hormone\nblocking medication. In January and February, it rained EVERY. SINGLE. WEEKEND.\nIn years past, I rode in all weather. I\u2019ve got epic stories about riding\nthrough midwestern thunder storms, losing my brakes in a sleet storm and using\na driveway as a \u201crunaway bike ramp\u201d, hitting a rock and crashing in the middle\nof the night in the pouring rain, and more. Yet this year I simply couldn\u2019t\nbring myself to take my bike out if the weather was less than perfect. A few\n10-30 mile rides per month became the routine, and I picked up hiking again. Cleaning\nmy bike after riding in the rain was simply too much work and not enough FUN.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Hiking in Arizona with my husband<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Something curious has happened in my 18 months without randonneuring.\nIf you\u2019ve only known me from rides, you probably don\u2019t know that before I\npicked up this sport I was an award winning jewelry designer and glass artist.\nMy torch and kiln have been idle in the garage since training took over my life\nin 2012. There simply isn\u2019t enough time in the day for full time pursuit of\nincome, a marriage, maintaining a household, keeping up a fitness base to ride\na 600k, AND art. One of my greatest joys as a cyclist was always exploring new\nplaces, getting lost if only for a little while in the far corners of the\nbackcountry around my city. Once I started pursuing award goals, my rides became\nbrevets and perms, routes created and prescribed to be the shortest points\nbetween controls so distance couldn\u2019t be \u201ccheated\u201d, sometimes without regard\nfor safety or scenery of the route. And many of my favorite roads were not on\nthe list. My language gradually changed from \u201cI can\u2019t wait to get out on my bike\nand explore\u201d to \u201cI\u2019ve gotta do this 200k to keep my R-12 going.\u201d The truth is,\nI was bored with the routes I could easily access from where I lived, tired of\nriding on someone else\u2019s terms, and while I loved the challenge of meeting\ncontrol times and the comradery of riding with a group, as a slower rider I was\nworking CRAZY hard to simply keep up so I wasn\u2019t solo all the time. Like the frog\nwho hops into a pot of cozy water and doesn\u2019t realize he\u2019s being cooked until\nit\u2019s too late, I was gradually losing the joy I got from riding in exchange for\nthe pursuit of \u201cgoals\u201d and \u201cawards\u201d which, at the end of the day, meant\nnothing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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My latest design – copper and turquoise<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

I mean really, who cares if I\u2019ve ridden 71 consecutive 200k\u2019s\nand 4 consecutive Super Rando series and PBP but never earned a RUSA Cup? Well,\nI cared. I have friends who have succeeded in these goals, and if THEY can do\nit, I should be able to, RIGHT?! Each new event completed earned a brief accolade\nfrom my husband, cheers from social media, and a declaration of insanity by my\nfamily. But in the end, what did I really gain from all this achievement? What\nwas the goal? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the heart of the word \u201cendurance\u201d is the root \u201cendure\u201d.\nAnd if I\u2019m brutally honest with myself, the last 2 years I was in the rando\nworld enduring was exactly what I was doing. I couldn\u2019t eat enough calories to\nsustain my activity level, and I was losing muscle mass as my body consumed\nitself. I was struggling to keep enough glycogen in my system to keep from\nbonking, and hormonal changes were leading to a completely different set of\nnutrition needs I couldn\u2019t figure out. I got injured, a stupid thing really, a\nfoot sprain while sprinting through an airport. But it was enough to make hill\nclimbing torturous and it limited me to the coast with the least amount of\nclimbing. After 5 months of struggling to complete the same coastal 200k route\nto keep up with R-12 #6, I was terminally bored. And then I found a lump on my\nbreast. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the last 2 years since my diagnosis, I\u2019ve endured plenty.\nI used to be curious about where the edges were, how far I could push myself,\nwhere the limit of my ability to press on without sleep would be. It took me over\na month to recover from PBP in 2015, yet I fooled myself into believing that\nthis was ok. That I could keep on doing this forever. I\u2019m no longer curious. I\nknow the answer is that I can force my body, under \u201cnormal\u201d conditions, to do\nwhatever I set my MIND to doing. Whether on a bike ride or in the chemo chair. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I also have learned that there is a price to pay for the\nglory of earning the awards and going the distance. The intensity of training,\nthe time away from home, the money spent nearly cost me my marriage. While my\nhusband supported my desire to push harder and further, he was quietly at home\nworrying about me on the road, resenting my being away and playing while he\nmaintained the household, feeling pushed away and left out of my life. And I\ndidn\u2019t realize that we were experiencing a gradual breakdown of communication. When\nyou spend as much time away from home as I was spending, you are either running\ntowards something or away from something. I had a mentor who questioned why I\nfelt such a need to travel, to ride, to spend my weekends away. I labelled it\npassion. And it was. It was also a way to avoid the discomfort of being at home\nwithout knowing how to bridge the gap which was steadily growing between me and\nmy husband. If I ignored it, it didn\u2019t exist. Or so I wanted to believe. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Without sharing all the personal and gory details, I\u2019ll say\nthat our marriage reached a crisis point early in 2016 and both of us had big\ndecisions to make. In the end, we decided that we wanted each other more than\nwe wanted to move on and with a ton of work we figured out a way through where\nwe were and pulled ourselves back to one another. He has been steadfastly by my\nside ever since, and we are more of a team than ever before. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So here we are, spring of 2019. I weigh 20 lb more than I\ndid 2 years ago, 30 miles on the bike feels like an expedition, my house is\nbeginning to feel like a home, I\u2019m hiking with my husband on HIS terms (which\nmeans shorter workouts), I\u2019m riding for FUN and exploring back roads on my own\nwhen the weather is perfect, and I\u2019m creating again. Will I ever return to rides\nas long as or longer than 100k? Truly, I don\u2019t know. Part of me misses the\nintensity, the craziness of pedaling a two wheeled vehicle for 39 hours at a\ntime, the sheer joy of watching the sun rise, then set, then rise again from\nthe saddle my bike. Part of me misses figuring out how to carry enough clothing\nto keep myself warm on a 40 degree night and cool on a 100 degree day; planning\nnew and creative food to manage the inevitable palate fatigue and upset stomach\nwhich was my day-two reality; sorting out transportation logistics for\npoint-to-point and out of state rides. And another part of me is relieved to\nnot HAVE to do any of it. That part of me loves sleeping in and enjoying a\nleisurely breakfast on my patio followed by a 5 mile hike in the local canyon.\nAnd it loves having the time to plan and create fabulous meals, swim a mile (or\nthree!), and play with the aesthetic synergy of metal and glass while designing\nwearable art. That part of me is softer, more forgiving, less driven, and needs\n9 hours of sleep each night in order to thrive. She eats with enthusiasm,\ndances with abandon, and pedals more slowly than before with closer attention\nto the scent of spring flowers, the caress of the sun on her shoulders, the\nsensation of wind in newly grown hair. And while she LOVES to ride a bike, she\nis no longer willing to give up so many parts of herself to pursue the reward\nof an award. For today, the ability to ride, the sweetness of life in relative health,\nthe flick of my cat\u2019s tail against my leg as he passes on his way to chase\nlizards, my husband in the hammock beside me with a glass of wine and a good\nbook \u2013 these are the rewards. And for today, they are enough.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Hammock time with Shaun<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished\u201d ~Lao Tzu Another spring weekend. It\u2019s partly cloudy with light winds. The citrus blossoms are fragrant, birds are frolicking, and a storm is brewing which won\u2019t hit for another day. It\u2019s perfect … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,8,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-602","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fitness","category-health_and_wellness","category-lisas-bicycle-adventures"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/balboaparkholisticwellnesscenter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/602","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/balboaparkholisticwellnesscenter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/balboaparkholisticwellnesscenter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/balboaparkholisticwellnesscenter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/balboaparkholisticwellnesscenter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=602"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/balboaparkholisticwellnesscenter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/602\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":613,"href":"https:\/\/balboaparkholisticwellnesscenter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/602\/revisions\/613"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/balboaparkholisticwellnesscenter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=602"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/balboaparkholisticwellnesscenter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=602"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/balboaparkholisticwellnesscenter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=602"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}