Pregnant pics, come help my indecisive self

Help me design a new header.  I LOVED my Ironman St George journey, but alas, that was almost 2 years ago now, and it's probably time to move on.  And my life couldn't be more different right now than during IMSG times, so I better put a new header up as temporary as it may be.  Or maybe I'll keep the rounder version of me up for a while after the baby so I don't go too crazy too quickly  :)  I have to say, most of the time I'm pretty relaxed right now and just accept that I really have no idea what next year will hold and I'll deal with it after the baby is born to see how all 6 of us (yeah my family sounds big now!) handle life with a new baby.  But then sometimes I worry I'll cop out with the baby excuse (yes I know I can take time for the baby and I, I will).  I haven't had a real training plan since IMSG in 2010 and honestly, I've never really followed a training plan so closely.  I LOVED it.  I knew what every day held workout wise, there was no "hmm, wonder what I feel like today" i.e. nothing productive gets done that day.  I am always one to say if you need motivation sign up for a race.  That's why I almost don't want to wait till next summer to see if I'll be up for anything epic in the fall, I'd almost rather sign up now so I can enjoy the early spring with the baby, but then be ready to go and committed come summer time.  Next year is my last in my age group so that sways me with certain races.  Anyway, we shall see.
Here are some fun pics my good friend Heidi took for me.  Help me vote for a new header pic (or 3, may do a collage header) with the poll on the right sidebar.  You can select 3 boxes.  Thanks!  *UPDATE*  So the poll is gone obviously, thanks to those who voted!  You're welcome to leave a comment still if you wish.

Hope everyone enjoys a nice Thanksgiving, I'm grateful to have my twin sister here from Michigan for a few weeks and even on our 28th birthday on the 28th!  My family had a lovely day Saturday baptizing our beautiful 8 year old, then spent more family time the next day with my little brother who is getting ready to serve a 2 year LDS mission for our church at the end of the month.  Oh and I hear the highs are supposed to be in the 50's for the next few days, lovely!  Maybe I'll even venture outside - gasp!

Anyway, here's the slideshow of all the images including some of in black and white.  Enjoy and feel free to click the slideshow image to make it bigger.  Below it are the images to vote on.  I'll take them down next week as to upset blogger with a long post.

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While these guys aren't a part of my header poll, they are amazing and cute as can be.
They'd win the contest hands down so I had to fair things up  :)

Half Pregnant Half Marathon

Or 10k...So my good friends Craig and Matt (crazy ultra runners) heard my pleas wanting a longer trail race before I was done with this pregnancy, and organized one for me!  Just something small, more like an organized group run, but hey, I'll take it!  I'll be honest, real races do really have pressure to them even when they're not big deals to me.  I never really noticed that, but even at the 5k I ran a couple weeks ago where I was in so much kidney pain, yes I wasn't going fast and could have cared less how I placed, but I still felt internal pressure not to stop, not to walk.

Anyway, I've been battling some real tough issues the last 2 weeks.  A strange right side belly pain and bad pubic symphysis (SPD) pain, something like my pelvis was being pulled apart, not a lot of fun.  This last week I've made it a whole mile before it was just too much.  I was getting really worried how this race was going to go.  I know I wasn't there to win, I know I didn't have to impress anyone, but I wanted to do it for me.  My goal this pregnancy was to do a half marathon while noticeably pregnant.  Now my body was giving up on me the week of this race.  I was and am completely willing and ok with not running the last 2-3 months at all, I really can be ok with that since I can still be active in other ways, but now?  Right before this race created for me?  It was really depressing and frustrating.  I am thrilled to be carrying this life, he/she wasn't in danger at all from my activity, I just physically couldn't will my body over my own pain.  That's a different place to be in.  A humbling place.

Ok, sorry for taking a while getting to the whole point.  So after a sad week moping to my husband, we headed out that morning and I just figured I would walk the 10k option.  Not what I wanted, but I just figured it would take me hours upon hours to walk the 13 miles and there was a bbq after so I just settled for the 10k.  I let the guys go on ahead (there were about 20 people total I think?) after I was all situated at the car with my new Altra Lone Peak trail shoes and Ultraspire pack, I took a pre race bush prego stop and started a trot.  Figured I'd make it a mile then just walk the rest.  It was really ok being by myself.  No pressure to run from others, no one to impress, just some nice solitude for me and the baby.  The weather was good.  Cloudy and a bit windy, but not raining/snowing or too gusty and not bitter cold.

The sweet new Ultraspire running hydration pack I won last month!  Was so excited to finally have an ultra pack (it's not your usual hiking water backpack, but meant for running) and it's got so many great pockets and features (I'll review it soon), but the best one has to be the fact that it fits above my belly!

To my surprise I kept running!  It was a little uncomfortable, but not like I'd experienced the last few weeks.  I kept my pace at a long run jog.  Not fast like pre-preg, but faster than I could walk  :)  I wasn't after any time records, so it was nice to just settle into an ultra style pace and trot along.  Even got to run some uphill sections I thought I'd walk!  Part of the pace was the hip binding I did.  Took a couple yards of some fancy purple checked fabric I had and squeezed my hips together tight.  A little uncomfortable, cut some circulation off around my hips, but I got the hang of how to tie it pretty good and I have to wonder if that did the trick.  I also wore the big maternity (well technically it's a larger post partum belt) belt I've had around my belly snug, but I've done that before and it didn't fix everything.  Like the belly pain.  It came around a few times, and I did walk it off once or twice, but was able to run through it another few times by kind of flexing my 'abs'.

Anyway, found the bathroom at the turn around was unlocked - yay! - and headed on back to the start.  As I always do, felt better after those first 3ish miles, and even negative splitted the 2nd half!  I even got some adrenaline and to feel like the old me when I finally caught up and passed some runners that had been ahead of me the last 4 miles.....even if one was in her 60's  :)  
I was getting more uncomfortable toward the end, but was still thinking about turning around and running more.  Just figured I haven't been able to run like this in a long time and probably won't for a while, but yeah, I didn't.  Figured I'd feel it the next few days and I was really happy with the 6.5 I got in.  And I really was!  I can't believe I got to run even 2 miles, let along 6+.  I was still a little bummed not to have done the half especially upon hearing there were no women that did the half and I could have earned a super sweet specialty made thrift store trophy (although I doubt I could have made it that far with my pelvis), but the 10k really was for me that day.  And hey, technically the time I did out there on my favorite trail took me about what a road half marathon does, so that counts, right?  :)  Right

New post

New post about the Duathlon my sister and I did near Boston is below the Halloween post below.  Check it out.  Really hoping my body will hold out for me to enjoy an epic adventure of sorts on Saturday on my favorite trail.  I'll let you know how it goes next week.

Happy Halloween!

Sure did not win the race, but did win the costume contest!

We had a great Halloween week at my house.  You can read more about all our family adventures on my family blog here.  I had planned on running a favorite Halloween race around here, but it didn't work out.  I still wanted to race so found this smaller local race with a free kids race, can't beat that!
I signed up for the 5k so I could be back in time for the kids race, turns out I would have had time with the 10k but oh well.  Actually it's probably good.  We rushed to get my belly painted before the race and I headed over to the start with a minute or two to spare.  First mile felt good, probably was running 8 min/mi pace, so not too fast, not too slow.  Then the last 2 miles of the race my back was on fire right where my right kidney is.  No idea what caused it, I wasn't dehydrated, I stopped and drank, walked, nothing made it better.  It just burned so badly.  I've never been so anxious to get to the finish of a race, and never had such a hard time doing it.  My kids were running faster than I was through the finish.  I cut right over to my husband and had him walk me to the bathrooms.  Wasn't sure if it was just a baby riding on my bladder thing, but nope, that didn't really help anything.  After about 20 minutes the pain went away and I've just been achy there since. Baby is just fine, moving lots, and I had no other worrisome symptoms.
I have been dealing with some pubic symphysis discomfort too.  Lots of relaxin hormone circulating right now, this is my 4th baby, and I have big babies.  Those things combined can really allow stretch in the front bottom of the pelvis, and I get pretty darn achy after each run.  It's annoying.  I have to be careful rolling over in bed, keep my legs together and pelvis aligned well.
It saddens me a little to think of not being able to run the next 3 months.  I know I'll have the rest of my life to run after this baby, but 3 months is still a long break.  Of course if that is what my body and midwives told me to do I would, and I'd just put in more time to swimming than I have and have been meaning to, and try to stay on the trainered bike, but it would still stink a little.  I have an appointment tomorrow so that will be good to talk about it.  I really want to make it just 2 more weeks though so I can run this fun run half marathon on my favorite trail a friend organized.  The kind of thing that I can take at my pace since there won't be a crowd there, is a great fairly flat course, isn't all downhill, and has plenty of sections I can walk.  So that's my goal at this point, be able to run that, and then if I have to take the rest of this pregnancy off running so be it.  I'll walk and swim and bike and hopefully do some more weight training.  I have to stay active though, it is healthy for me and the baby and I get depressed without it.  Daylight Savings is coming soon too thank the heavens since it is so depressing to wake up to dark every morning.  I really need some daylight, not even sunshine, just daylight.  Hope you all had a nice Halloween!  Next post (that may be below this one though) up is the duathlon I did with my twin sister out in Boston a couple weeks ago.  Stay tuned  :)