Catch the Wind: Running Again
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Was this an inspired act or simply temporary insanity? It was a little of both, I suppose, but now this running business is starting to take hold on a regular basis, with me placing running shoes and socks in a reminder spot by the kitchen door. I no longer wonder whether homo sapiens were ever intended for this activity.
I had been walking for a few months, trying to work out some kinks in my hips and legs and just generally trying to get to a mildly better level of fitness. My ambition didn't exceed two and half miles per hour. But as the weeks ticked by, a rhythm kicked in. I was seeing results with better sleep and less aches and I was no longer begrudging the time I had to set aside for my therapy. Besides, it gave me a great opportunity for some head space. Then something odd happened one evening. There was a little inexplicable spring in my step and I was off to a trot. A quarter mile passed before I puffed back down to a walk. I know without a doubt that urge to speed up was the unintended but inspired response to meeting up with an old friend earlier this year. She taught me that health is not only a gift but that it is a frame of mind.
I ran into my old high school friend as I was turning away from a cursory conversation i and clumsily stumbled over the foot rest of her wheel chair. Sherry B. flashed the same wide grin she was famous for decades ago as she used to dash through classroom doors in a perpetual state of tardiness. But she had made it on time to the reunion despite some obvious setbacks that life had since dished out to her. Early in her twenties, Sherry was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. She raised a family of three boys over the next twenty some years, all the while contending with whatever the MS slung her way.
As spunky as ever, Sherry gave me a colorful and comical summary of raising her three sons to varying stages of young manhood. She asked for the same accounting from my life and listened intently. She caught me by complete surprise, when as I mentioned I was currently contracting with an adult diapers company, she grabbed my arm. She let me know we were on some more common ground. Ever since her youngest left the diaper scene, she had been grappling with her own incontinence, coming to grips with the idea that it was going to have to be a fact of her life. It was a struggle that was not ever going to be over for her. But always a big fan of Dolly Parton's as she was, she kept a saying of Dolly's on the fridge. "We cannot change the direction of the wind, but we can adjust the sails." "So," she said, "I have been taking sailing lessons for quite a few years now."
Up until then, I had been looking at my glass as half empty, cranking about getting older and fearful of the limitations that might impose. That afternoon Sherry inadvertently shook that out of me. Yes, there was that ache in my hips (diminishing with the walking exercise though. Hmmm.), and occasionally an unanticipated sneeze threatened to send me off for a change but nothing that resembled the need to reach for adult diapers.
Sherry unfairly had to cope with incontinence from a young age because of her disease's progression. Women in a healthy state like mine have to blame "transient incontinence" on deteriorating muscle tone that comes with aging. The female anatomy which so wondrously accommodates all the changes of childbearing relies on two tiny sets of bladder sphincter muscles to hold back the contents of that ballooning organ. Childbearing, impact exercise (running, sky diving, etc.), along with aging can all lead to the betrayal of those muscles. That is primarily why of the 25 million or so Americans who suffer from incontinence, nearly 80% are women. With numbers like that reaching for adult diapers and various incontinence products, it is easy to see that the message of developing healthy attitudes about this phenomenon, such as Sherry's 'sailing lessons', is an important one to disseminate.
Every day now, Sherry and I FaceBook each other. We're not going to let the years come between us again. I have reacquainted myself with a very special woman, one who inspired me to run again. Today I sent her a message that read "I have a new technique for engaging 'the wall' [a silly concept for someone who only goes a mile or two!]. I lift my head and get my eyes off the ground. As I watch the clouds, I can breathe easier and am no longer worrying about the remaining haul. It works." She replied with her trademark encouragement: "Set your sails and catch the wind. And for heaven's sake, buy a good sports bra.
Article Source: Articlelogy.com
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