My body is craving daily exercise, and not just the milder form of pulling kids to school on a sled, which I did last Monday, but a longer, more intense, and more interior version: swimming, running, yoga. And so, I thought I'd try to indulge this restless body. Yesterday I went for a run in -20C (without windchill); my ninth consecutive day of exercising.
What have been the results? Well, I was so tired last night that I couldn't even stay up to chat with my husband. He seems to be missing me. I am rising early several mornings a week in order to squeeze in something every day, because early morning is my only time, on many days. Other days, I have to run fairly late in the evening, in order to squeeze it in. And I'm tired. I'm feeling sleep-deprived. I love rising early, I love the quiet and solitude of the early morning; but unless I start adding in afternoon naps, it just isn't sustainable.
There is so much to balance. I cook and bake all of our meals from scratch; that takes time and planning. I have four children, aged 2-9; enough said. I have my marriage; take it from any long-married couple, a marriage does not flourish when it is left to fend for itself. I have my writing, and a deadline looms. I have friendships; like marriage, those, too, both feed me and require feeding. I have my family of origin, more relationships that need tending. Into this, I am throwing a new ambition: the desire to become so fit than I can complete a triathlon and/or a half-marathon.
At first glance, it seems so incredibly selfish that I wonder at myself for attempting it. But at second and third and fourth glance, I think even my husband would tell you that the training required has changed me for the better, and I don't mean just physically, but emotionally. I now have in my mental-health-toolbox the long run and the yoga class (and, even, the lane-swim). I have easy, convenient, relatively inexpensive means of calming my mind and my body, of finding renewed strength and courage, and of pounding out the grumps, anomie, depression.
Late afternoon, yesterday, a rough day for our family (nothing dramatic, just quietly unhappy), I said, I need a run, and my husband said, go for it. He trusted that I would return home the better for it. It would have been damn near impossible to motivate myself to get out in the extreme cold, but I wasn't doing it so that I could complete a triathlon, I was doing it so that I could feel my self--the good strong core of my self--again. I am grateful that my fitness level has improved enough that this resource is available to me.
And I did feel better; but the run was more challenging in the cold. And by the time the kids went to bed, I craved bed, too. Am I tired because of the run? I wondered. Am I wearing myself out? Is all this exercise good for me? Am I spending my limited energy on exercise rather than on feeding my marriage and my kids?
Not sure. Will I get out for a run tonight? That remains to be seen; but I hope so. And I hope I figure out how to get more sleep, too. As far as I can discover, there is no perfect formula. There is no perfect balance.
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