Goiter-man no longer

I haven't posted in forever since things have been busy with Scott's surgery and we have family in town. Most of my spare time has been devoted to working on the flooring so my blogging has been neglected. Plus, this is mostly a blog about triathlon and there isn't a whole lot of that going on right now.

Scott's surgery went as planned so that was a relief. He had his left thyroid and goiter type mass removed on Friday. The waiting was excrutiating since I said good bye to him at 10:30am as they wheeled him off to the OR holding area and I didn't see him until 5pm. His surgery started at 12:30 and then I didn't hear from the surgeon that he was OK until 4pm. I honestly couldn't eat since I was so nervous, plus I was afraid to leave the waiting area, so I basically sat in the same spot reading the same magazine over and over again for 6 hours. It is a relief to finally have the surgery behind us since it has been in the back of our minds for a couple months.

I just read lots of race reports and I feel so anxious to get back out there training, but I know that I need more rest. This Friday I have a follow-up appt with the Sports Med doc to find out more details about my MRI results and what he recommends about returning to training. I do realize that I should have gone for this follow-up appt weeks ago, but in general the sport of triathlon really pissed me off with this injury nonsense and I just didn't feel like going back to the clinic.

So now Scott and I are both in the healing phase. It is kind of nice to not have anything big looming on the horizon and we can just focus on getting healthy and getting our house out of the 1970s. Have I mentioned that our bathrooms are all pink...pink tub, pink tile, pink toilet? We have a lot of work ahead of us.

Progress

The house:
We have been home 10 days from our trip to the West coast and already we have gone crazy on the house. It has been such a great feeling to put all of our energy into making the house exactly how we want it. Our list is really long, but we have already put a big dent into it. So far we have done the following since we got home: paint the guest room and hang blinds, rip up carpet and sticky rubber carpet pad in living room (no easy task), rip up carpet in dining room and start the hardwoods, paint Elena's room and hang blinds, and move kitchen wall a couple inches and dry wall so fridge will fit. We are just going nuts, but we are having so much fun doing it. It is actually really nice to not train.

Scott doing his demo
Scott's Aunt Jo and cousin came over during the week and helped me rip up the carpet. Those girls can work!!!! They came back to help us lay the hardwood

Having fun with the staple gunThe hip
I finally feel like I am recovering! Most days this week I have been pain free which is a big deal since my hip has been bothering me since February. I definitely feel out of shape, but that is OK. Triathlon will be there when I am healed and ready to get back into it. I am in no rush since the extra time and energy to work on the house is exactly what I want to do. It amazes me that when I am not training I don't need nearly as much sleep.

Other randomness
Elena is actually slowing down a bit on the climbing, thank goodness! I still found her doing this the other day, you would think the tray on the highchair would be a deterrent but I think it is just a bigger challenge.

She has been focusing a lot of her energy on learning new words so we have been doing a lot of books together. It is so wonderful to be able to sit down with her even if it is only for 5 minutes.

A couple days ago we played 'pony ride' and right after that she figured out that she should get Snoopy to give her a ride. In case you are wondering, that is a stuffed groundhog in his mouth

Scott's surgery is Friday so wish us luck with that. Scott's mom is flying in Wednesday to watch Elena so I can be with him in the hospital.

Re-acclimating

I am trying to re-acclimate myself to the mindset of being a non-athlete. My hip still hurts so the thought of training any time in the near future hasn't even crossed my mind. Then there is the issue that if I start back training too soon I could end up with a real fractured hip and need surgery. I don't even feel like a triathlete anymore and really have no plans for the rest of the year so I guess I will just chill for while. It has been 5 weeks since I have done any real training and my body is really starting to feel it. It is frustrating to know that I worked so hard and have nothing to show for my training efforts in terms of race results, but I guess this is how it goes and there isn't much I can do about it.

The good part about not training is that Scott and I now have a ton of time to work on updating our house. We have a LONG list of projects and I am really excited about some of them. For example, there is indoor/outdoor brown carpeting in our kitchen so that must go. This weekend we picked out the hardwood flooring we will put down so we will probably get that done in the next couple months.

Here are a some pictures from our visit with Scott's parents (post IM) at their house. Elena had a blast hanging out at Grammy and Grampys house (they live outside of Seattle).

We visited a state park abou 10 minutes from their house called Scenic Beach. Elena had a lot of fun exploring the marine life.
Elena had enough of the beach and decided to make her way out towards Puget Sound

The race that was never meant to be

On the Saturday before IMCDA our friend Alex, who was going to stay with us in CDA and race but couldn't race due to a hip flexor injury, called Scott to wish him good luck and then asked him "Are you sure you should race? Don't you think too many things have gone wrong?" We weren't sure if he was joking or serious, but he knew the karma for this race wasn't good. It was like the rental house was cursed...all 3 athletes who were going to stay in that house either didn't make it to the starting line or the finish line.

The important thing is that Scott is safe and sound; but, hearing him tell the terrifying experience of his swim makes me sick to my stomach. The short story is that within minutes of his swim he was pummelled and hit hard over and over again and could just not get any air and starting taking in water and seriously thought he might drown. He experienced his first ever panic attack and tried to get help from the kayaks. He said there was just no way the kayaks could get to him and other swimmers around him noticed that he was in trouble and offered to help. At that point he was on his back able to breath again and felt like he could continue kicking on his back to where he could swim again. He continued on and actually wanted to quit after the first lap, but couldn't find us in the crowd so he figured the worst part is over and went on to finish his swim. The rest of the race just didn't go well and he had an off bike and then tried to run, but got dizzy and cold and had to walk starting at 3 miles. He walked until mile 13 where we finally saw him and he was pale, wrapped in those metal blankets, and was just staggering. I have NEVER seen him look so horrible. He told us he had enough and we were all so thankful that he made the smart choice and quit.

The swim story freaks me out because Scott is a decently strong swimmer and has experienced contact in the water before and has never panicked. It also disturbs me that you can ask for assistance in the water and just not get it from the kayaks because of the chaos. I just don't think having the mass swim start is safest option. I don't think Scott is interested in doing another IM any time soon. I think we are both going to stick with the shorter stuff for a while and have fun doing the local races.

So hopefully the curse of CDA is over for us! Since Scott has his surgery in a few weeks and I am still recovering from my hip injury, I am not sure what the rest of the triathlon season will look like for us. We both love triathlon so I am sure it won't be long until we get our excitement back about the sport.

Just hanging out in CDA

On Wednesday morning we woke up bright and early at 3:50am for our 6hr flight from Philly to Seattle. Elena did as well as could be expected for an active 16 month who had to be confined to 2 tiny airplane seats. She slept for the 1st hour of the flight and then we had to entertain her for the next 5hrs. The last hour was the hardest, but luckily the lady who sat behind us started to teach her Chinese and this entertained for the last 30 minutes. Unfortunately the lady who sat next to us was a total b*tch so that didn't help our cause.

After landing in Seattle we hopped in the car for a 5hr car ride. Scott's Mom bought all sorts of toys for Elena so she did really well. It is fun to be here just relaxing with family, but at the same time it is really hard to see all the athletes and walk through the athlete's village and see all the things I should be doing like picking up my bike and getting my packet. This morning I was telling Scott that if I had actually decided to pack my race gear I think I would still want to race and that I wish I never went to the doctor! Totally ridiculous thoughts, but I have been visualizing my run across the finish line at this race for months and up until Monday I was convinced that I could still do this race despite my hip pain. If this was a local race I could care less; but this is IM, I did almost all of the training, I flew across the country, and I don't see myself coming back here anytime in the near future.

But enough whining about not being able to race. Elena is having a great time with her Aunt Jessica and her grandparents. Yesterday we all frolicked in the lake, including Elena, and had so much fun. This was Elena's first beach experience and she was very entertained with her pail and shovel. We also went to the CDA Brewing Company and figured that if I am not racing, I might as well drink up! I highly recommend the Huckleberry Ale.

Elena with her Aunt Jessica
I forgot to pack Elena a swimsuit so this was our drugstore purchase. It had some floatation in it that is why she looks super thick.
I didn't bother packing a suit for myself either and bought one at a drugstore. I also woke up Wednesday morning with pink eye so I have to wear my glasses. Oh, I feel so pretty :) I looked even prettier when my glasses were broken on Wed and Thurs and I had to tape the left lens to my glasses!

No IMCDA for me

All I can say is that I am so grateful that I now know NOT to race IMCDA considering what they found on my MRI. They noted a stress response in my femur, hamstring inflammation, and bursitis. If I kept up the training and racing, I probably would have ended up with a stress fracture. There is a part of me that is grateful that they found something so I don't think the pain is all in my head. I may need crutches and will find that out tomorrow.

So here is my grateful list:

• I am grateful that my friend Alex, who is a doctor and pro triathlete, scared the shit out of me with his list of possible diagnoses when I asked him about my hip. He is the reason that I called around to find an earlier appt.
• I am grateful that the Physician Asst that I saw last week had a very low threshold for ordering an MRI. When we spoke on the phone he apologized for being the bearer of bad news and my answer is that I am so happy that you ordered this.
• I am grateful that Scott is healthy enough to race.
• I am grateful to spend a week in a beautiful location with my in-laws, husband, and baby...and maybe even my sister-in-law.
  

Even though I am trying to be super positive and upbeat, I am kind of pissed about the money that I spent on the race entry and tri bike transport. What a waste! How stupid will it be when my bike just hangs out in the trailer during the race while all the other bikes are out on the course. That part makes me want to cry, which I feel is just stupid because this is only 1 race and it is only money.

So how are your radiology skills?

I had my MRI on Friday morning (those hips up there are really mine) and luckily it was no big deal! My head stuck out of the machine so it was an entirely different experience compared to the MRI of my abdomen that I had at Duke University. It was pretty cool since they gave me a CD of all the images at the end of it. Once I got home, Scott and I looked at the images wondering if something would jump out at us. We really had no clue what we were looking at, but we thought that the femoral heads looked strong. My biggest concern is a femoral head stress fracture, but since I didn't have any of those typical symptoms, I am fairly confident that I haven't inflicted that injury on myself. There is a part of me that thinks the MRI will show nothing at all and I will be left with some mysterious pain for the rest of the season. Oh well, as long as I can rule out the serious stuff then I am happy. It will take 48 business hours for the radiologists at Jefferson University to read the MRI so I probably won't find out the results until Tuesday afternoon at the earliest. Since we fly out at 7:30am on Wednesday, I won't have time to see the doctor for follow-up and I will have to call for the results.

It is hard to believe that next Sunday is the race. All day I kept thinking that next week at this time I will be racing...and then a few hours later I look at the clock again and think I will still be racing...look at the clock a few hours later "yup, still racing"....and I basically repeated this all day long. Ironman is such a long day, there is just no getting around it. I keep reminding myself that I am just going to treat it like a long training day, but then during the last half of the marathon (assuming my hip is still working) is when the race really begins. At this point on the run is when you lose massive time or you can gain some spots in your age group. No matter how I am doing, I am really looking forward to the crowd support. B2B was a pretty lonely race, so I am looking forward to cheering at CDA. I will actually pass the house we are renting 4 times during the bike; I think we will first pass it at mile 15. I could actually see the house when I rode the IMCDA interactive course on my Computrainer so that was fun.