Training While It's Raining

There’s something super exciting going on in my life that I’ve totally failed to blog about until now. I’ve kind of put it off blogging about it on purpose, because I haven’t been entirely sure that it was going to happen. I’m getting more and more confident about it every week, so it’s finally time to reveal what I’m so excited about!

Last November I walked in my second Breast Cancer 3-Day, and the San Diego event was an absolutely amazing experience. So amazing, in fact, that I wanted to share the experience with my mom, Sherry, who battled breast cancer in 2006. I immediately started talking to her about walking with me in the next 3-Day, but since Mom wasn’t really in shape at all at the time, neither of us were really sure that the 60 miles would even be doable for her.

So back in February or March, I started a sort of feasibility study with my mom. I created a 16-week training schedule for her, to build up her walking endurance so that she would be able to walk 3 miles, 4 times a week by the time the recommended 24-week training period began. She started with just a mile of walking at a time, and slowly built her way up to walking 4 times a week. Then she began increasing her mileage, until by the beginning of June, she could pretty easily walk 3 miles at a time. She wasn't as consistent with her walking as I wanted her to be, but she got to the point where she could start the official training schedule none the less.

Since Mom still had a long way to go before she was walking 20 miles in a day, we still didn't officially register for the walk, just in case her mild arthritis or an injury got in the way of our lofty goal. We decided that we'd keep following (a slightly modified version of) the suggested training schedule for a few more weeks to see how the mileage increases went before making a final decision about registering. Our plan was to wait until mid July or so before deciding if we would for sure make the trip to San Diego.

Last week, I started feeling very confident that Mom was going to stick it out through the training and make to the event in November. She seemed to have a renewed excitement and energy regarding her walks, and she was consistently getting up super early every morning to get her scheduled miles in. Yesterday morning, she came to Lawrence for our 6 mile walk and got up at 5:30 to do so! Not only was she here bright-eyed at 6:30 a.m., but she also powered on through the end of our walk even though we got caught in a pretty heavy rain shower! Chad drove around the neighborhood and came to find us to see if we wanted to call it quits, but Mom wanted to finish even though we were both soaking wet! I was so impressed with her determination!

I can't even express how proud I am of her for taking on this challenge. She has come so far in the last few months, with regard to her fitness level and also her motivation and dedication. We still haven't officially registered, but I'm so excited that we will most likely be walking together in San Diego come November!!