Saturday, April 30, 2011

I'm blessed to have my body

That's my affirmation I keep saying in my head.

For the last couple months, running has sucked! I'm so slow and tired, and just don't have the energy to go. It all came to a head during Pat's Run. I just could run. My legs felt like lead. Lead that's on fire (if that's possible), and I couldn't get a breath. I just was remembering running before where I was pushing myself but I could still find a rhythm where my breathing was adequate for my level of exertion. That wasn't happening. I watched Ryan run away in front of me while I trotted and finally walked. When I saw the one mile to go sign I told myself, no biggie, I can pump out this last mile at a good pace with no walking. Nope. I was almost in tears as I couldn't go more than half a mile without walking again! I figured my heart rate must be though the roof and looked down at my watch to see it was at 89! Okay, something was wrong. I ran into the finish, sprinting the last little bit, and my heart rate was still in the 80s. :(

When I got home and plugged in my run, I saw that my heart rate started out good, I was in the 165-175 range, and then before I reached a mile, it dropped down into the 80s for the remainder of my run. I also counted the times I walked. TEN times in 4.2 miles. I cried myself to sleep that night.

Went to the Dr., he took my blood and referred me to a cardiologist. Blood came back that I'm anemic. That explains a lot - why I'm so tired (I've been blaming it on waking up super early), why I'm out of breath when I go up a flight of stairs (I thought it was because my backpack was so heavy), why my legs feel so heavy while I'm running (figured my legs couldn't support my added weight), why i've been getting so many headaches (figured it was all the reading and lack of sleep), and the light headedness (so I'm not just an airhead!). Sweet. Now I take supplements throughout the day giving me an additional 600% of the RDA for iron. Then to the cardiologist with my fingers crossed that the iron is responsible for the irregular heartbeat too. He did an EKG, but it was inconclusive for my symptoms. I'm scheduled to go back at the end of May for a stress test, an echocardiogram and an ultrasound, and he's guessing it's an intermittent heart block that's exercise induced. I'm still crossing my fingers that it's just the anemia, and that it gets better so I won't even have to go do those tests in a month.

So far, after a week of pumping my body full of iron, I'm already noticing a slight difference. Thank goodness too since I have a triathlon this weekend. (I signed up for it in Oct., and didn't realize it'd be RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE of finals) I'm thinking of dropping from the Olympic distance down to the Sprint since my training has been so sparse do to the fact that my heart's going through a rough patch. The poor thing.

So there you have it. If you've seen me out running (or walking) and I was sobbing, now you know why.

**Oh, and I want to add, my time for Pat's Run was not terrible. If it was faster than yours, I'm NOT saying you are slow. I'm saying I'm used to being able to run faster than I did, and without such a struggle. That's all. :)

Monday, April 25, 2011

Easter 2011

Oh man, Easter just isn't the same without our egg hunt at the cabin. :( But we make do. This year Tawnya and Kolby hosted the hunt at their house. (After last year when we tried it at our park and some punk kids took all our eggs! But I did chase them down, and get them back.)
Tara and her kids came to town for their spring break.

The grands with their egg hunt loot.
Gwen
Aubrey
Kit
Jack and Drake
Look how cute this chubby, fuzzy headed, little boy is.

Saturday we also had our "Jerusalem diner", where we eat on the floor (supposedly with our hands), and we eat traditional food that has symbolic meanings. It's pretty cool, and an excuse to eat lamb. Mutton for you brown peeps.
Also, a great time to get the family together to talk about the sacrifice made by our Savior, and how the atonement has blessed out lives.

Then Sunday, we took the kids to the temple for some pics. I just love Easter!



Wednesday, April 13, 2011

vocabulary

Gwen and Drake fight a lot. I hope you're thinking "my kids do too."
Lately they'll call each other selfish.
So the other day as we were driving, and Gwen wouldn't share with Drake, and he said, "Gwen, you're selfish!"
To which she replied, "you don't even know what that means!"
I, overhearing the conversation, and seeing that Gwen wasn't sharing with Drake was proud of him because I figured he DID know what it meant.
He yells back, "yes I do, it means you sell fish!"

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

new me?

This morning I took Drake to school and went to give his lunch to his teacher while he was washing his hands. She took a step back and then laughed and said, "Oh, you look so different today, it took me a while!" Umm, weird. But okay.
Next I hauled buns to make it to institute on time. I didn't, I was late. I quietly walked in and took an empty seat right in the middle of the class. My teacher then walked over to me to shake my hand and says, "tell me your name", I just figured head injury (my teacher was in a motorcycle accident years ago and had a significant head injury that affects his short term memory, and so that's often his excuse). Then a couple of minutes later, while he was teaching he says, "oh KRISTIN!!! I'm so sorry! Of course it's you, but you just look SO different! What's different about you?!" Umm, I don't know? Unfortunately I can't answer him by saying, "oh, I lost ten pounds!" or "botox!!". But honestly, why aren't people I see ALLTHETIME recognizing me today? Because I took a shower? (oh wait, I didn't!) I curled my hair? I lightened my hair like a month ago? Really, what's different about me today?
Okay, that one I have crazy eyes. If I walked around like that I'd understand.
Try again, dork in the library taking a picture of herself:

Does this look different than normal?

Monday, April 11, 2011

so fresh and so clean, clean

Once upon a laundry day, I was washing the bedding from my bed. The comforter to be specific. Well I have an old school top loader washing machine, (oh how I miss my fancy washing machine!) so I can't put the fabric softener in when I add everything else. I have to listen for the rinse cycle and then go add the liquid softener then. (I don't trust the Downy balls to release all the softener at the right time) So when I heard he washer filling for the rinse cycle I went in to add the softener. Inside the washer, was the strangest thing, I found all these pulpy, masses. I reached in to discover that a brand new box of fabric softener sheets had fallen off the shelf into the washing machine apparently before I loaded it. I fished through the water and pulled out the dissolving box and almost all of the 80 sheets. I also figured I wouldn't need to add any additional fabric softener. Well, that was over four weeks ago now. And STILL, every time I climb into bed, I'm welcomed by the fresh clean smell of those fabric softener sheets! I just might have found a new way to wash my bedding!

Monday, April 04, 2011

Barrister's Ball


That's right, we went to a ball.
A fancy shmancy ball where we got to dress up,
and go watch our law school friends get drunk.
Since Ryan's graduating in just over a month (seriously!?),
we figured we'd go to basically law school prom.
Aww fun.

So, we'll be sending out Ryan's graduation announcements soon, so email me your address should you so desire one
kmcphie at asu dot edu

home improvementifications

We have a grapefruit tree.
A big, ugly, overgrown, half dead grapefruit tree.
Behold-
Ryan called up Kolby and asked him if he could borrow his chain saw.
Behold-
There was a little boy who was amazed by his dad and the chainsaw.
He wanted to play too.
Behold-
They worked hard, those two.
Behold-
Behold the before-
And behold the after-
Wow!
And still on the to do list,
building a block wall
installing a sprinkler system

But those things will have to wait since this weekend this happened:
I came home from school Friday afternoon, and our house was so hot!
This is what the thermostat read:
thankfully Saturday the blessed AC people came out to replace the old broken heap of junk on the roof.
A crane had to come out to lift the old one off and the new one up.
We are now basking in the coolness of our new AC.
And trying hard not to think of the price paid for that cool air.