I will never understand how pain levels can skyrocket so quickly. I just went from a tolerable 4 to a "Are you freaking kidding me?!?" 7 doing nothing but sitting in my recliner with puppies on my lap. I managed to displace the dogs and get up to find my pain meds. I have now taken my Norco and just need to wait for it to kick in. Fingers crossed that it eases me back down to a tolerable level soon. I know it distresses my husband when the pain causes me to hold my breath and breathe funny. Anyone else have that experience? For me, when I realize that I'm starting to do the breath holding thing because of pain, I know I should be thinking of pain medication.
When I last posted, I was getting ready to do a 72 hour race. It is now on the books. Although I didn't get the 100 miles I was hoping for, I did manage to make my 100k goal. Actually, because the course is just a smidge over 1 mile, I actually got in 101k, or 63 miles. If you don't do that extra lap, you only end up with 99.97k and that was just not acceptable! Since my previous best for 72 hours was 51 miles, I'm happy with the new PR. I think the terrible cold and rain we battled this year impacted me more than the fibro did.
Although I have crewed for my husband and friends at this race for the past few years, this is the first year I actually ran it myself. I can honestly say that the weather was colder and worse than any other year we've been out there. Typically, lows might dip down into the 40s but daytime usually goes up to the 60s, making for comfortable temps for the race. This year, nighttime temps got down below freezing, one day might have made it to 50, there was periodic rain, and I'm pretty sure there was one day that never got out of the 30s. In other words, it was fairly miserable for everyone out there. Most everyone I know who was out there, myself included, found themselves adjusting goals downward, particularly if they were in one of the multi-day events.
I was a little trepidatius about how I would hold up with the fibro and then doubly worried about how the cold would impact my pain levels. Overall, I was relieved that it was less of an issue than I feared. Here's the thing. With fibromyalgia, you get used to being in a certain level of pain pretty much all the time. I'm pretty sure that the same is true, at some level or another, for everyone competing in an ultra. Even the best runners I know will have times during a race where they hurt, often badly, and have to decide whether to grit it out or toss in the towel. Most grit it out. What I found interesting is that it was pretty easy to tell if the pain issues were related to the fibro or to the race. They are
definitely different kinds of pain. The pain that comes from putting in mile after mile are much easier to deal with. There's a sense, after all, that you've "earned" it. Fibro pain is just there, for no reason, and, as I noted at the beginning of this post, can escalate for no reason as well.
The first day went pretty well. I took my pain meds at regular intervals, which kept things under control. I did, however, make a strategic error when I laid down for what was supposed to be a 3 hour sleep break at about 9 pm. Although it wasn't time to take another Norco yet, I had been taking a
Tylenol and a muscle relaxer midway through which got me through until it was time for the next one. For some reason, I did not do this before I laid down. I think I thought that just getting off my feet and stretching out on the bed would be enough. It wasn't. My husband came in two hours later, to take his own break, and when I tried to move my whole body seized up. Even though it was still an hour early, I had him get me a pain pill and stayed in bed until about 5 am.
The second day, it took me a few laps to get everything situated. Once I was happy with my clothes and shoes, things went pretty well, although I was having more general pain issues. Consequently, I was going fairly slowly and stopping more than I wanted but still felt like I was making good progress. Since the rain was expected to come in the next morning, I wanted to log as many miles as I could. I had a couple of nice laps spent with my husband which gave me something to focus on besides the pain. Even then, the pain was only at about a 4-5 - enough so that I was definitely aware of it but not so bad I couldn't keep going. That changed in the space of one 30 minute lap where my pain levels shot straight to an 8. I managed to finish the lap and keep going until I got to our RV, which was less than a quarter mile away along the course. That was at about 8:30 pm and I had wanted to get in two more laps before stopping for the night but that was just not in the cards. I took pain meds and called it a night.
Consequently, I was not where I wanted to be mileage-wise when I started out on Wednesday morning. It was COLD out there but not yet raining beyond a light mist. The temps were just above freezing. I was going pretty slow and stopping after every lap or two to put my feet up. My shoes were just not comfortable. A friend had mentioned the night before that she was wearing her boyfriend's shoes, which were big but much more comfortable than her own. I decided to try a pair of my husband's to see how that went. They were big but felt much better than mine did and got me through several laps. Eventually, I switched to the pair he had just gotten for Christmas and absolutely loved them. I ended up wearing them for the remainder of the race. I kept going that night until the rain started and then called it a night. I wasn't where I really wanted to be but I'd passed into PR territory earlier that day so I knew that even if I didn't get any more miles in, it would still be a new personal record.
In spite of how cozy and warm I was in the RV, I made myself get up and back out on the course around 6 am Thursday morning. That gave me 3 hours to get in the nearly 7 miles I needed to get to 100k. It was definitely doable but there was no time for sitting around. The temps were just below freezing and I kept having to adjust the layers I was wearing. Although I would have really have liked to be able to stop and rest, I was afraid that doing so would keep me from meeting my goal so I only gave myself one 5 minute break after three miles. I really pushed the last few miles and finished with something like 15 minutes to spare, managing to pull up enough to be able to actually run acros the finish line. I'll admit, I was happy to be done!
So, what have I learned about doing ultra endurance events with fibromyalgia? That it's definitely possible. That you might have to adjust your goals and accept that things won't always go as you want them to. That I'm going to keep doing them as long as I'm able to. After I had posted about the pain flare on the second night, my oldest sister suggested that maybe I should find something that wouldn't stress my body as much. I'm not really sure that such a thing exists. As I told her, walking is one of the exercises recommended for fibromyalgia. Of course, they probably don't think about someone doing it for mile after mile for days on end but it's not like I do an ultra every week!
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