Elephant's Sitting On My Chest

Last week when I started feeling sick I stopped taking my iron because I thought that might be the problem.  I take iron almost everyday because I get quite low iron and the best guess at why is that I have very heavy periods.  Well I didn't start taking the iron again until the middle of this week because I wanted to give my tummy a chance to recover fully.  The down side (and sorry for too much information) is that I got my period just as the illness stopped.

When my iron gets low I can tell in many different ways but one that I didn't even know was a symptom a year ago is that my running gets so much more difficult.  My legs get heavy, I get totally exhausted and it's so much harder to breath.  Today's run was one  of those runs where I felt like there was an elephant sitting on my chest.  It wasn't humid but at some points it felt like I was trying to breath through a mask.  At first I thought it was just because I've been such a lazy pants the last few weeks and I'm sure that had something to do with it but I think more of the problem is low iron.  The wonderful thing is that my doctors are all on the same page where this is concerned and they have all given the same instructions for what to do and when.  So I'll follow the plan and hopefully by Tuesday things will be better.

On another note it felt so good to be out there this morning.  I kept it to 5k which is the most I have run since my half.  I plan to up to 6 or 7k on Tuesday and then 8k next Saturday.  I have been running long enough and have enough mileage behind me to know that I can run further and that I don't need to spend too much time building up.  I have decided not to officially train for a fall race but will focus on becoming a stronger runner.  I'm going to work up to 10k then push myself to get faster.  I'll keep my weekend long runs at 10k or further.  I got an email that registration for the Niagara Falls Women's Half opens on August 1st and I will be registering as soon as possible.  It's not until June 2, 2013 though so I'm sure I'll do some shorter races just to keep motivated.

I think I mentioned in a post earlier this week that I was going to do a bunch of shopping and then prep all the veggies ahead so that things will be easier for the week.  So this morning on the way home from running I stopped at the market.  I love that we can get so many local fruits and veggies.  I bought peaches, plums, cantaloupe, green beans, lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower, celery and sweet potatoes.  Yesterday Adrian bought a bunch of stuff at the grocery store too.  I spent the rest of the morning preparing veggies and I now have a fridge full of deliciousness.  I also have beets roasting in the toaster oven and will do sweet potatoes later today.  I'm so excited for the week ahead and I think my body will be pretty happy too!