Greetings from the 2009 Maratona di Roma
More about the trip and race in a few days after I return home.
Ciao! synthroid litigation aura soma lava cialis warnings
Off to Italy………
The bags are packed, the legs are ready, and the lungs… well who knows, but in just a few hours, I’ll be on a plane to Italy!
For the next 2 weeks I’ll be calling the medieval town of Zagarolo (located in the foothills about 30 minutes southeast from Rome), my home.
I have wonderful friends who live there from whom I’m renting an apartment. I love making Zagarolo my home base when I’m in central Italy, because it’s so peaceful and laid back, yet still very close to the hustle and bustle of Rome.
I’ll also be taking a side trip south to Sorrento , with visits to Ercolano and Pompeii . I really wanna do the Mt Vesuvius hike this time if the weather is OK.
Back in Rome, I’ll be visiting the Vatican Museums again ( there’s so much to see there) , Largo di Torre Argentina –the famous cat sanctuary , and of course on March 22 , there’s a certain little marathon that’s I’m supposed to be doing:-), which is basically a grand tour of all the famous Rome sites. A lot to see and do on this short trip.
I wont be bringing a computer along on this trip, so the next blog update will be towards the end of the month ….Hopefully with tons of pictures and maybe even a race report!
Ci vediamo presto! dizziness from taking zovirax and benadryl
Getting down to the wire..
One week from tomorrow, I’m supposed to be on a plane heading to Italy, but as luck would have it, looks like my lungs might have the final say as to whether that actually happens. As is usually the case when it comes to me and marathons or travel…. it’s gonna get down to the wire.
I started flaring- up about 2 weeks and haven’t really recovered since…at least not to my baseline. That, plus the inability to train the way I should be for this marathon , has put somewhat of a damper on my enthusiasm for this long awaited trip. Hopefully, I’ll turn the corner in the next few days and everything will seem exciting again. I would hate to have to cancel the reservations with my Italian hosts on such short notice.
In the meantime, I’m just gonna start packing and getting things in order for the trip as if everything was normal. Man, you wouldn’t believe the planning that goes into a trip like this when you have serious health issues… especially when you travel alone. With just one suit case and one carry on to work with , I have to transport two separate stashes of medications, plus two separate nebulizer machines ( in case get my luggage gets lost, like it did last time). I also have to have multiple contingency plans in place, in case I get sick over there and need hospital care. I basically have to have a back up plan for everything I do when I travel. Not only costly, but a huge pain in the ass.
We’ll see how this all plays out by next weekend.
Oh..Almost forgot….as you can see , the old blog is getting a make-over. Should be finished in a couple days.
Training schedule
To give folks an idea of just how much walking I do to prepare for a single 26.2 mile event, I thought I’d post the actual training schedule I’m following for the upcoming Boston marathon.
Because I’m semi- training pretty much continuously throughout the year, I usually stop at the 14th week mark on this schedule (and also because my lungs can’t handle multiple 20 mile walks.) Currently , I’m at week 12 and will do weeks #11 and #12 when I return from Italy. As you can see, the key to building endurance , is by gradually increasing the distance walked every week and then maintaining it with alternating shorter distances. If you were to complete this 18 week training schedule as written, you will have walked 415 miles!
This particular example is probably more suitable for advanced walkers who have a lot of time on their hands and a couple races under their belts, but there are beginner and intermittent level training schedules out there as well…. for both full and half marathons.
There are also organizations that will train you to walk or run a marathon in exchange for fund raising…“Team in Training” song commercial the from cymbalta neurontin tingling hands arms pain comes to mind (what I call the purple people)!
Asthma Purgatory
Whenever the weather is bad, so is my asthma. My lungs are extremely sensitive to humidity in the air and/or the slightest changes in barometric changes. Changes in the climate, changes in the seasons, you name it…. my lungs will react to it. I’m a walking weather station! Well, it’s been raining on and off here in the San Francisco area for almost a month now, and while I love stormy wet weather, my lungs absolutely hate it.
For the past week, I’ve been in that old familiar breathing zone that I call “asthma purgatory”. You know, when your peak flows are only slightly off , but you feel like your suffocating anyway? You’re tight, but you’re not gasping for air? You feel like someone is sitting on your chest, but you’re not wheezing? You’re sick, but you’re not sick enough to warrant an ER visit. Ever feel like that? Well, if you’re a chronic lunger , chances are you have. In my case I think the symptoms are due to a mix of air trapping and some mild airway obstruction caused by the damp environment and possibly by last weeks extra long walk.
For lack of better words, I get these “breathless flare-ups” several times a year, and unless the symptoms snowball into a true asthma emergency, I usually just ride them out by taking extra neb treatments, doing some diaphragmatic breathing exercises and basically just trying to chill . Sometimes I have to take a little Ativan to take the edge off, but for the most part there’s not much you can do except wait it out, which can take days or even weeks. I just wish it wouldn’t happen so close to a big race or an overseas trip…makes it even more nerve racking.
For me, the key to surviving these mini flare-ups without going crazy (or ending up in the hospital), is refusing to get stressed out about by them …..which can be very difficult when you can’t breath . Rather, than giving into the feeling of helplessness that these breathless bouts bring on, I will often tackle them head on by forcing myself to exercise despite my increased shortness of breath. This morning for example , I will go to the Gym to do some easy exercise. I probably won’t be able to spend much time or walk very fast on the treadmill, but the mental boost it will give me, will last all day!
Option #2 it is!
OK…If I get sick, it’s all your fault! ……… just kidding. Thanks everyone for your input
You know, I could easily lock myself up in an air tight plastic bubble for the next two months until the Boston marathon rolls around, but experience with this disease has taught me that no matter what I do to avoid getting sick, if my lungs wanna act-up…their gonna act-up.
So, after carefully weighing all the pros and cons, and assuming that I’m breathing well enough to travel in a couple weeks, this is where I’ll be on the morning of March 22nd………along with 100,000 other manics.
And this is where I’ll be that afternoon…….
I think that as long as I don’t over do it during the marathon, that I’ll be OK for Boston. The bulk of my training has already been completed, so in a worst case scenario ( ie…if I were to get sick during or immediately following my trip to Italy), Id still have about 4 weeks to recover and get my s**t together before B day.
With that issue resolved, I can re focus my attention on my upcoming Roman adventure. In addition to Rome and the surrounding communities, I’m also gonna head south, just past Naples for a day to see the ruins at Pompeii grifulvin and Herculaneum