Double, Double Toil and Trouble

44 Replies

Clever title, eh?  It’s taken from Song of the Witches/Macbeth, written (of course) by William Shakespeare… you know… trivia.

This is a post I’ve put off writing for about a week now as I have slowly come to grips with the reality of the situation.  However, if you follow both me and my husband James at 50 in 50 Marathon Quest, then you know what I’m about to say.

We won’t be going to DC next month to run Marine Corps Marathon, which was to be my very first marathon.  We had to defer our entries to next year.

The reason being…

Last week it was discovered that James may have blown a disk.  Today was his appointment with the spine physiatrist who confirmed that James does indeed have a herniated disk with a trapped nerve.  James will be getting conservative treatment with physical therapy to see if that helps before he goes all out with injections into the back.

This is not a running injury, so please don’t even go there.

This puts an end to James’s race season before it even begins.  It throws me a little off track as well, and we are very saddened by these recent developments.  However… my family does not wallow in self pity.  We adapt and improvise and get the hell over it.

So!  New plan people!!  I will continue on with my training and racing as scheduled, all except for MCM.  I have now chosen to run Rock N Roll San Antonio as a full marathon in December.  We are hoping that James will be well enough by then that he can at least participate in some way, but if not, he and AJ will be there to cheer me across the finish line!

And fear not!  It’s not all been doom and gloom here in the hot and dry Pacific Northwest!  AJ and I attended the PAX Conference in Seattle on Labor Day.  For those who don’t know, it’s a huge game convention.  As AJ has known since he was 8 that he wants to be a game designer when he grows up, we encourage all development in that aspect, so we were off to the convention.  What a great day it was.

We got to watch the Mario Super Smash Brothers Tournament while it was being streamed live on Twitch.  These kids were playing for a $10,000 purse:

And we even ran into Jack Septic Eye, a famous gaming YouTuber, of whom I once wrote about here:

And I completely understand that I may be speaking Greek to everyone over 20 in regards to gaming, but when it’s your child’s passion, you try to keep up.  KnowwhatImeanVern?  Okay, yes, confession time… if you didn’t already know it, James and I are gamers too.  I’m in the middle of re-playing the Kingdom Hearts series before the new one is released in December and James just started a new Final Fantasy.

Anyway, my friends, onward I go with my running, with high hopes for a speedy recovery for Jamesy!  I will race the Sounders 5K this Saturday, the North County Wine Run Half-Marathon the following week, then it’s on to San Antonio in December!  Woo hoo!

 

44 thoughts on “Double, Double Toil and Trouble”

  4. Lady G

    So glad that you have set your sites on another goal for December. Sometimes we have to make adjustments. I love your family’s motto of adapting and moving the hell on!
    It’s the only way to make it in this world 🙂
    Send best wishes from me to James and keep being an awesome mom to AJ!

    Liked by 1 person

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  7. Janet wilson

    You go show em kiddo!!!! Even if James don’t run they will cheer you home in San Antonio. Good luck for this weekend. Loved the pic of you and AJ. Onwards and upwards PK. JX

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  11. CJ

    omg the WORST! being injured and not being able to run because of something else not related to running! OUCH! I slipped a disk in my back last year… I have NEVER had so much pain in all my life! HEAL WELL P’sHubby 🙂
    Pops… run your race, but right there… where you live… it still counts as a marathon, doesn’t have to be an organised one!
    Sarah (simplyfythegetgoing.com) trained for, planned and ran her own ultra! She killed it! 🙂
    Rock and Roll sounds AMAZING! Good luck this weekend! and you’re a gamer? oh how FAB! My son would LOVE a uberkewlgamer mom!!! 😉

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    1. Paula Post author

      Hahaha! I TRY to be the uberkewlgamer mom, but my child still thinks I’m a dork, lol! That’s okay though… I know when he grows up, he will look back with fond memories of how his mother tried to keep up with him when he was a kid. He makes me watch so many mind-numbing videos, lol!! But I do it happily as it’s what he loves! 😀 Thank you for the love, CJ! James is going to get well and my marathon will go off without a hitch! Right?? Right!! 😀 (positive vibes always, hehe)

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  12. matt

    Sorry to hear about the setback. That’s tough.

    Out of curiosity, what area of games development does AJ want to get into? There are so many great free resources online for that nowadays. I work in software development, a skill I picked up when I was heavily into MS Flight Simulator: I was never happy with the gauges in the default aircraft, and I figured I could do better if I knew how. So I learned how. If he wants to get into game design/development, there’s no reason he couldn’t start now.

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    1. Paula Post author

      Hi Matt! Thank you for reading and commenting!

      I don’t think AJ has narrowed it down yet which way he’s going to go (as I’m not sure he’s aware of all his options), but he’s had a couple of design programs that he’s worked on to “create.” Can’t remember for the life of me what they were. And he’s built his own Raspberry Pi, with a little help, and most recently designed and built a brand new gaming computer from scratch, so we’re working on it slowly but surely. He’s only 12, hopefully we’re headed in the right direction. He coded his first beginner program when he was 8 or 9, a trick virus that he played on me and his father, and now goes in and adjusts code willy nilly to suit him. But I will definitely tell him about Flight Simulator, especially if it’s something he can tweak himself. 😀

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      1. matt

        FS isn’t really around any more, in the same way. There’s an open source flight simulator called Flight Gear (http://www.flightgear.org/) if he’s into flight sims.

        Otherwise, I’m sure he’ll home in on what he likes to do. I think the encouragement is a good start. 🙂

        Liked by 1 person

    1. Paula Post author

      Hahaha, thanks Brian! Yes, you are my one gamer friend. For the record… I’ve played a little bit of Fallout myself… isn’t that the one where you can scale tall buildings and blow tons of stuff up, or am I confused? Regardless, AJ loves that game, and he seems to think you should definitely play Fallout 4 when you’re done with New Vegas as it’s the best. ;D

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  14. mawil1

    I was so sorry to hear about James, not just for him but for you too. I forget how big the US is which makes running in every state a major challenge! But I’m glad that you have a plan B – I’m sure that you can and you will!!

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  15. wanderwolf

    Oh no. You two are great models of not wallowing in self-pity. It makes you likable as heck. I’m really sorry about the bad news for you and James, but the alternative for Dec. sounds great! Just take it easy on the training, so you don’t peak too soon. 🙂

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    1. Paula Post author

      Thank you Dorothea! You’re too kind! Yes, we’ve had to re-evaluate the plan to save from all kinds of burnout, and I took about a week’s mental break from training while we were evaluating the situation, so that may have done me some good. But back in the game now, yay!! 😀

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    1. Paula Post author

      LOL, it was a fabulous day! So much stuff and even I was over-stimulated by day’s end! AJ thinks he has the best mom ever now as I just walked up to Jack and asked him to take his picture with us with zero hesitation once I knew who he was, lol!

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