There's one month to go until the Royal Parks Half Marathon and the bad news is I'm still not training due to gluteal tendonitis. Last time I suffered from this (in 2013-14) it took months before I was back to running. I really only just got my running fitness back before getting pregnant (April 2015) and I remember being really pleased I was able to run during pregnancy.
I went to physiotherapists (first private, then NHS) so I have an exercise programme to do and I just need to follow it. I've been out for a couple of little short run/walks to check whether it's possible...and it always makes the pain worse which is a big indication that I shouldn't be doing it.
However!!! there's no way I can drop out now after all the fundraising for Sense and kind donations from friends and family. I'll be doing the race, maybe mainly walking or maybe slow gentle jogging. I'm considering bringing Angel along in the pushchair as a visible justification of why I'm not going faster...I need to check whether that's allowed for a start. So never fear, I will go ahead with it.
Incidentally, my training partner Vic has just run a full marathon in 30 degree heat in Germany...so she's doing rather better than I am. If you want to donate to her efforts she's at http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/fundraiser-web/fundraiser/showFundraiserProfilePage.action?userUrl=VictoriaHowarth1
Anyway. In between doing my tendon stretches and looking after Angel, there's been a few other things going on over the summer. My husband finished his masters dissertation on the 10th of August, which was a big event. He's worked so hard, which has left me with the baby more, so it's a big relief all round now he's more freed up to be with us. Since he finished we've been mainly cycling round London with Angel in the Bakfiets, visiting all the great places round here...Surrey Docks Farm, Russia Docks woodland, Southwark Park, Burgess Park, the river, Greenwich, the Emirates Skyway, Peckham Pulse, Dulwich Park, Peckham Rye, Hyde Park and...many many other parks.
We're going away in 10 days to visit family in Italy, which will be our main summer holiday this year (taking advantage of about the only time we'll ever be able to go away out of school term time). However, we've had two beautiful weekend "holidays": one at my parents' in Christchurch, where we swam in the sea, paddle boarded, barbequed, had a baby-free lunch date, walked in the woods and generally enjoyed their massive garden; and a "staycation" at home over the bank holiday weekend, which mainly involved plenty of picnics and cycle rides.
The staycation genuinely felt like a holiday to me, partly because I took a holiday from the internet for the duration. Well, I still responded to the odd WhatsApp message, but I had a break from Facebook and other websites and bought the paper in hard copy for once. And it felt great.
It's already become a cliche, people taking to the internet to blog about how great life is off the internet... and I don't want to be too negative, because I love all the things the internet enables. And I totally agree that we need to be sceptical about pre-computer nostalgia as discussed on the Like Real Life blog here: http://www.likereallifeblog.com/2016/04/26/so-glad-i-grew-up-doing-this/ But staying away from the internet for 3 days made me feel more relaxed and, crucially, it made me pay more attention to my daughter. I also read the book "Toxic Childhood" on my staycation, parts of which I found interesting and alarming. I didn't love or agree with all the book - I thought there were far too many class-based assumptions about acceptable positive culture and I thought the author took a lot of ideas about gender far too much at face value (buying into what my gender in education lecturer at the IoE called "the poor boys discourse"...patriarchy has ensured boys have far more opportunities than girls for the last few thousand years but now that a few girls are able to out-perform a few boys in a few subjects in a few public exams we're going to wring our hands and declare a crisis? ;-) ) but I definitely bought the basis for recommending that babies under two have no screen-time whatsoever, and for limiting it from then on.
I don't want Angel to grow up thinking mummy always has her phone in her hand, feeling jealous of it, or never having my full attention because it's always partially shared with whatever article I'm reading online. Equally, the internet (and easy portable smartphone access to the internet) has been a lifeline while stuck at home with a small baby, awake all night with a small baby, or trapped on the sofa under a small sleeping baby who just won't be put down. So I don't want to be too apologetic about it. However, following the staycation I resolved to set a few more limits about what is acceptable while I'm alone with Angel. The current rules are...no Facebook while she's awake: concentrate more on what's going on around us. I'm not stopping myself from checking the odd message but I'm trying to be more aware of how I spend her waking time. And I'm in the process of getting devices out of the bedroom, to which end I've purchased us an old-school alarm clock. Now I need an actual watch so that I can rely less on checking my phone (and getting distracted by it) when I really just need to know the time.
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