I completed my half marathon yesterday. Whew. It was intense. I’m glad I did it and I’m glad I’m done.

My original goal was to run in the Drake Relays in Des Moines which take place next weekend. But, between traveling with the girls and Jonathan starting a new MBA class that weekend, it just didn’t seem possible. I didn’t want to forgo all my training from the last 2 months, so I came up with a better idea:

Run for Haiti

I told Jonathan that we should organize our own run, inviting people to run various miles to raise money for Haiti to send to Compassion International. We wanted to make the run on a donation basis – ranging from $1-5 per mile. I talked to Leah, since she was the first person I knew who would be on board with it. She said she’d run one of the routes and I went from there. After doing a facebook event and sending out an email, we had 10 runners (including myself) who either ran or walked anywhere from 3, 5, 13.1 or 16 miles. I even was blessed to have company for the vast majority of my run. One of the girls who ran is training for a marathon and used today as her long run. God really knew what He was doing, because we turned out to run the same pace, which was delightful. Very nice to have a running buddy for a long run like that!

I ran the last 3+ miles on my own. I’ll be completely honest – I ended up walking about 1/2 mile or so. I started getting so dehydrated that I was feeling faint and starting to blackout. Not good. I stopping running and walked to a gas station that was on my route. I took a break while I got some water. After that I ran the rest of the way home, but at a much slower pace than before. Initially I was disappointed for having stopped, but realized it was the best thing for me. The last two miles were the most challenging, yet I stuck to it. My reward when I got home? Julia running to me full speed yelling “Mama!” as I was crossing the finishing line. Nearly made me cry.

My recovering has gone smoother than I expected. As soon as I crossed the finish line I felt like I hit a wall. The last 3 miles of the run I started getting a headache (most likely from needing more water) and it was pretty intense once I got home. We ate some pizza (my request – Papa John’s pepperoni) then I got cleaned up. After that I was pretty useless for about 2+ hours. I took a long nap, drank plenty of water and took some ibuprofen. Stairs are presenting some challenges, but over all, aside from the headache that last all day yesterday, I feel pretty great. I’m thinking I might be able to bump my recovering run up to Tuesday instead of Wednesday.

I am thrilled to say, that as for helping Haiti, we had spectacular support. We raised a total of $260 for Compassion International. How amazing is that?!

I want to say a big thank you to all the people that ran with me yesterday. I was, still am, blown away by your support and desire to be apart of this event. I also want to say thank you to everyone who has cheered for me along the way. This has been a great experience for me and I truly appreciate everyone’s encouragement and support. I can officially say “Been there. Done that.” Now to check it off my 30 before 30 list:

#1. Run a half marathon