After three weeks of lying on the sofa allowing this virus to take its course, I’m finally up and running again! My first run was on Friday - a 3-miler. My second, Sunday, a 4-miler. And neither were easy.
I had been looking forward to the first one. Over the 3 days leading up to it, I’d been feeling a lot better as each day passed. A lot less chesty. A lot more energetic. I was able to walk into Ealing without feeling exhausted. Climb a flight of stairs without having to stop and recover at the top. Even go to the theatre and have a glass of wine. It would be good to be back out there, I thought. What I hadn’t realised was that I was experiencing the euphoria of feeling OK rather than grim. It didn’t mean I had my normal energy levels back.
Usually, I start with some stretches, making my body feel ready to run. Put on the music, raising my mental energy levels. Drink a glass of water to make sure I’m hydrated. Start Strava, which measures my mileage and speed. And off I go. For the first few hundred yards, I’m finding my pace. A quarter of a mile in, I’m in the zone. I’m not thinking about running, I’m just running.
But these two runs have not been like that. I didn’t really want to do the stretching. The music did not get me mentally ready. I trudged downstairs and out of the door, still debating what route to do. The first few hundred yards were hard like they always are. But both runs continued like that for the whole duration. All the way round I was acutely conscious of how difficult it was and how far there was to go. There wasn’t even a serotonin lift at the end.
As time goes on, I know this will pass. I’ve a 5-miler to do on Wednesday when I will be two days further on in my recovery. And over the next few weeks I’ll be working my way back to where I was before I was ill. Where 10 miles felt easy. And 13 was my next challenge.