Progress?

Today I went back to yoga for the first time in two months. I was excitedand scared at the same time. Saturday morning yoga is sacred time for me so I was thrilled to head back. But I can still feel a sensation in my back where the disk slightly ruptured. The doctor says I can't run until I don't feel that anymore, so I was pretty apprehensive at yoga.

The class started fine, but I'm not supposed to twist so that stopped several moves before they started. Still, I felt pretty good but more tentative than I'd have liked. I don't want to be so timid. But I didn't want to overdo either. I'm afraid I'm still using my back muscles instead of my core sometimes.

Tonight, my midback is tight (used my back muscles instead of core?). We'll see how everything feels tomorrow or Monday. I see the chiropractor again on Friday. Hope to hear that planks are OK and get cleared to run even a little.

Oh and I've decided to do my first sprint triathlon. It's not until late summer so I have plenty of time. Plus my friend Joyce agreed to do it with me. We can finish last together.

No running just yet

Saw the chiropractor on Friday. The back is coming along. I can go back to yoga but no twisting. I can keep riding the stationery bike and walk as much as I want, but no running yet. Maybe in two weeks.

I feel good, but when I overdo it, Iknow it. Lifting boxes last weekend when organizing/cleaning closets probably wasn't the smartest thing to do. I noticed after the closet cleaning that when I was on the bike, I just didn't feel right. My tailbone was tender. Five days later at the chiro's office, she said my pelvis was out of whack -- probably from lifting the boxes.

It's hard to take things so slowly. It's been 8 weeks of no running or yoga and I had to go 7 weeks with no workout of any kind. I'm going a little shack whacky. I want my endorphins and I want them now!

I started reading the Total Immersion swimming book. I've decided I want to run not only a half-marathon in 2009 but I'd like to try a sprint triathlon in the summer. I haven't been in the pool for years. I decided to try Total Immersion because I heard it had a lot of the same philosophies as ChiRunning like -- relaxing instead of muscling through and of listening to the body.

So here's my new mantra: I will listen to what my body tells me it wants to do not me tell my body what I want it to do. Boy, that's going to be tough. But really it's the only way I'll ever get to the half marry or the triathlon. I'm sure of that.

Ready to run?

I've been on the bike with no problems, doing my exercises and spending time on the inversion table all without issue. So am I ready to run? Well, I am, but is my doctor ready for me to run? We'll see on Friday.

I spent the MLK holiday weekend organizing and cleaning closets and just trying to get organized. I know that I overdid it with my back -- I could feel it. But when that would happen -- usually after a few hours of work, including lifting some boxes I suspect I shouldn't have -- I would lie down for 30 minutes. I could feel a sore spot in my back but it never flared up. I think the inversion table is really helping, too. I have been hanging at about 30 degrees 10 minutes each morning and night, and I definitely think it helps. I'll try to post some photos or video of the inversion table soon.

The good news about the overuse of my back this weekend is that my back is strong and I think is ready to progress to the next level -- running!

Keeping my fingers crossed for a return to yoga and running by the weekend.

Corporate America suprises me

Nothing about running or working out. Today I have to share an experience with corporate giant AT&T wireless. I've been a customer for about 4 years but in the last 18 months or so my coverage has gotten pretty miserable and I drop calls all over the place. In fact, I haven't been able to use my phone at home on many occasions.

I called customer service in August and was told a new tower would be up in December and would clear up my problem. I didn't really want to wait, but I also didn't want to pay $175 cancellation fee on my contract. So wait I did.

Earlier this week, I called AT&T again since December had passed and nothing is better. Actually, I called about the cancellation fee since I was really to bail on AT&T. The operator was quite nice but he wanted to try to fix the problem, and frankly I'd lost faith in the company and was ready to get a contract with another company -- and for no other reason than the quality customer service.

When I realized that he wasn't going to be able to relieve me of the $175 fee, I said my thank yous and moved on. I did an Internet search and easily found an e-mail link to the president of AT&T. So I sent him a note explaining why I was cancelling. I told him I thought he should waive the cancellation fee because I wasn't cancelling just to try some new phone but because his company wasn't providing me the service I was paying for.

Two days later, I cancelled my contract and went with another carrier. The next morning I get a call from the president's office where a nice young woman explains to me that she will look into my complaint. She says if she can fix the problem with one call, she won't be able to waive the $175 fee but if she finds the problem is more involved, AT&T will waive the fee.

She seems a little surprised that I'd already cancelled my contract but I told her I didn't really expect a response other than maybe a polite e-mail saying, "We're sorry you're not happy with our service but it's not our fault or there's nothing we can do."

I was impressed, the company not only contacted me but contacted me personally by phone. The young woman did just as she promised in the time frame she promised. She called this afternoon to inform me that the work I'd been told would be done back in August to fix my problem had been delayed, and, as a result, AT&T had removed the cancellation fee from my bill.

So let's hear it for corporate America doing the right thing. And for being truly responsive. I'm still amazed the president has an e-mail link right out there for anyone to contact him -- and that his office actually responds.

I have to say I'm pretty thrilled with the coverage of my new carrier so far. But I will certainly give AT&T another look someday.

Relaxing the back

Got a massage this morning. Usually, my massage therapist is working out all kinds of knots and tension, but today things were much looser. And it's not just my imagination -- my massage therapist noticed it too. My hips are looser and my shoulders aren't nearly as tight. So what's the difference?

The only thing I'm doing differently is the inversion table -- for only the last 6 days. I don't know if it's just a fluke or if inversion is really loosening me up. I started at only 2 minutes a day and am now only up to 10 minutes at barely 20 degrees of inversion (60 degrees gives the full benefits of invversion). I have to admit, I thought it was helping relax my back, hips and shoulders but then I thought maybe it was all in my head. Now, maybe not.

We'll see how my back does as I return to using the stationery bike and later when I return to running and weights.

Flannel jeans and the doc

Am I the last person in a winter state to buy a pair of flannel-lined blue jeans. All I can say is, "What was I waiting for?" I LOVE these babies. I love jeans, in general, but an Ohio wicked winter wind can cut through jeans like a insult to Stuart Smalley (make that Senator Smalley). But no more.

A friend of mine told me about flannel-lined jeans more than five years ago. You'd think with the way I complain about winter and the white stuff, that I'd have ordered a pair before he got the words out of his mouth. Shows just how big a procrastinator I can be. But they are here now and I'm not sure when I'll take them off. And why should I? Who doesn't like the feeling of soft flannel against the skin? I may just wear them until the first day of spring. Sure beats a pair of long johns.

On another note, I saw the doc today. She said everything feels back to normal in my back and gave me a bunch new exercises to do and says I can start riding the stationery bike. Woo-hoo! I'll start with 15 minutes and no tension and build up 5 minutes per day until I'm at 30 minutes with no discomfort. Then I can start to add tension. And I can walk as many miles as I want. Shoot, with those new flannel jeans, who knows how far I can go :)

I am stoked about getting active again. I'll try not to get ahead of myself, but I'm hoping a return to yoga classes and then running aren't far behind.

Turning things upside down

My back is healing really nicely but still no real exercise, but I'm hoping the doctor will let me start using the stationery bike tomorrow and maybe start walking 1 mile on the track.

In the meantime, I have decided not to do decompression. The doctor doesn't think I need it either. Instead I bought an inversion table. Did some research on the Internet first and found that inversion therapy uses your own body weight as a natural form of traction. "Inversion elongates the spine by increasing the space between the vertebrae, relieving the pressure on discs, ligaments and nerve roots. Less pressure means less back pain."

It also helps improve circulation and accelerates the cleansing of blood and lymph fludis, reduces pain in overworked muscles, improves balance, strengthens ligaments and lots more.

I have had to start slowly both in time and degree of inversion. No starting upside down for me. I could barely go past level before I started to feel a little motion sick. I get motion sick pretty easily. The good news is inversion therapy may help that, too.

So I've been doing it for 5 nights now. I'm up to 10 minutes (that's all you need) at about maybe 30 or 40 degress. Apparently you don't have to do full inversion (90 degrees) to get the benefits. In fact, 60 degrees is enough.

So far so good. I really like it. My mid back was sore this evening and after 10 minutes on my inversion table, I felt much better.

Let's hope the doctor is ready to let me start exercising tomorrow. I feel good.

Lying or delusion?

I’m not sure whether I’ve simply been lying to myself or deluding myself. Either way, I haven’t been honest with myself about my running. Having been forced into this running break as I recover from a herniated disk, I realized just how off base my running has become.

I came back to running three years ago after an 8-year absence. I’d given up on ever running again after shinsplints, shredded knee cartilage and constant backaches drove me from it. Then I found ChiRunning and it gave me my running life back.

This time, I promised myself, my running wouldn’t be about the miles, the splits, the races – none of that goal stuff. Running would be what ChiRunning Danny Dreyer suggested, it would become a practice much like yoga, pilates or Tai Chi.

I failed miserably, and it wasn’t until this latest hiatus that I realized it. I became a certified ChiRunning instructor and told myself and my students how I run for the joy of feeling my body move. That was true, but it wasn’t the whole truth.

I told myself I carried a Garmin to make sure I didn’t run too fast and or too far. I told myself running was not about burning calories. I told myself I wasn't being obsessive just because I made getting my workout my biggest priority and would feel like I failed if I didn't get the predetermined number of runs in. And above all, I told myself I wouldn't compare myself to other runners. The truth is I cared too much about weekly mileage totals and splits (as slow as they were), number of calories burned and how many workouts I got in each week -- and of course, how I didn't stack up to other runners.

So now having made this confession – or realization – I try again once more. I won’t be running for several more weeks at least. And when I do return, it will be slow, slow, slow and not a lot of mileage to start I imagine. Not that my weekly mileage was ever that much to begin with.

I’m declaring here and now yet another effort to keep running in its place. That’s why I’m going to make biking, weights and eating healthy the primary way to help drop a few pounds, and put running into the same place I put yoga.

My Saturday morning yoga class is sacred time. For nearly 2 hours, I attempt to go within and simply focus on breathing (not all that successfully most of the time). I never (well, rarely) compare my ability to others, and even if I do, I don’t judge myself for not being as flexible or as strong. With yoga, there’s no focus on achievement just on the doing and being. And now I just want the same attitude in running.

I don’t consider myself a “yogi” because I do yoga; I just do yoga to do it. I want to run simply to run not to be a “runner.”

I want my running to be sacred time. I want to stop if I need to (no make that “want” to) – and not care or feel like I’ve failed. I want to run as slow or as fast as I want – and not care if it’s fast or slow compared to other runners. I want to run because it feels good not because I want to slim down. I want to run because it makes me happy not because I feel compelled to get a certain number of runs in this week.

I realize this philosophy will be met with disdain by many a runner, who live for the races, the splits, the weekly totals, the goals. But here’s the thing: None of that has worked for me. What’s the definition of insanity – doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results? So it’s time – for me – to try something new. If only I can.