Hospital Anniversary

A couple weeks ago marked six years of being out of the hospital. It’s the second longest stretch since my first time being hospitalized in 1997.

This time of year can often be a challenge. The days are still short and the weather’s still cold. Oftentimes I get down this time of year, but this year has been one of the best Februarys I can remember.

Being hospital-free feels good. There’s a lot of little things I do to stay mentally healthy, and another year out of the hospital confirms that I’m doing a lot of things right. In her book, “Preventing Bipolar Relapse,” by Ruth C. White, the author uses the acronym SNAP, which stands for sleep, nutrition, activities, and people.

To stay mentally healthy, I try to keep all these things in mind in my daily activities. I go to bed about the same time every night. Most days I get at least five servings of fruits and vegetables. I also keep a workout routine and keep people in my life who help me stay mentally healthy.

And while I do my best to stay mentally healthy, part of staying out of the hospital has been help from my friends and my family. I receive a lot of understanding and support, especially from my wife. Without her understanding and sacrifices (like taking care of the kids' middle-of-the-night wakeups), along with reminding me to take my pills, I would not be where I am today, and I almost definitely wouldn't be hospital-free for this long.

Home Update

There have been a lot of highlights this year, so here comes some more.

In May we went down to Nebraska to celebrate our niece's graduation.

The two little ones got to run races this spring. The youngest one won her age group (granted the biggest one of her races had three toddlers in it).

The kiddos got to spend the summer at Children's Country Day School.

The older kiddo and I got to have our annual tradition of camping in Laura's sister's backyard.

We got to take a trip to visit my side of the family to Okoboji, Iowa and Nofolk, NE. Some highlights included waterparks in both Iowa and Nebraska, running and riding on the Cowboy trail, and some dinosaurs at a gas station.

 

A big highlight of the summer was having both the kids vaccinated. 

Swimming at Country Day was another highlight of the summer.

The older one got to do circus school.

We got enjoyed some time at Camp Omega where Laura and I met when we were camp counselors.

We got to spend some time at the beach at Lebanon Hills Regional Park.

Family bike ride to Dairy Queen!

A trip top Teddy Bear Park in Stillwater.

We got to go to Wicked in Minneapolis with some friends. Great show!

First day of first grade,

First day of Preschool 1.

Afton Apple Orchard:

Stay tuned for my next round of home updates. Who knows? Maybe I'll catch up by the end of the year

Running Update

In some ways, running has been going pretty well. I've hit 40 miles for a couple weeks in a row, and I've been pain-free during all of my runs.

Over the past few years my foot and ankles had been giving me some problems, but since adding metatarsal pads and Superfeet insoles, things have been much better.

In other ways, I'm not thrilled about my running. My speed just isn't coming back to even close to where it was before my foot problem. I'm trying to be patient and hope that at least some of my speed will come back. I've already resided myself to the fact that I'll never PR in any standard distance again, but it's still hard to accept.

I'm training for a marathon, and I'm trying to balance home responsibilities and spending time with the kids with putting in more time running and strength training.

When this marathon is over, I'll start to reevaluate what my running will look like.

Run well.

Home Update

 For this woefully neglected blog, I thought I'd bring a couple new posts to share some goings on in my life. I thought I'd start with a highlight reel of our family's first four months of the year.

In January, our little ones turned two and six. We keep telling them to stop growing up, but they just won't listen.

In February, we made a trip down to Pensacola, Fla. to visit Laura's parents, get out of the cold, and spend some time on the beach. I enjoyed getting in some runs on ice-free paths.

Our six-year-old got to do swimming lessons and skating lessons this winter. It was fun watching him skate around after just a little practice.

We did a lot of snow time again this winter. It's nice to have a little hill in our yard.

No particular reason for this photo. I just think it's cute.

I took the older one ice fishing a couple times. No luck. The younger one joined us for this photo, but didn't do any actual fishing.

Mom and son on Valentine's Day

Teaching possibly the most important game to our future neurosurgeon.

Easter!

After the pandemic put a damper on our social life, a much needed night out with friends.

We got to celebrate some Boston runners, including my friend Brittany. I had the privilege writing her training plan.

The kids joined Laura for a walk for Team Caroline and toughed it out in the rain.

Stay tuned for another post. I might try to get this blog going again.

The Ides of March - Sugar Break

The Ides of March — a significant date for civil, religious, and literary traditions. I'm giving it my own significance by taking a break from desserts until Easter. That means just over a month of no sweet treats. 

A couple nights ago I had a friend ask me about sugar. She knew I'd given up sugar before, and when I said I was doing pretty terrible, she suggested I put it out there on my blog that I was going to take a break from sugar.

After hitting my racing weight in the spring of 2021, I've gained over ten pounds. I ran some solid 5Ks that spring, but this year there's no way I could touch those times, partly due to my weight.

Sugar has been a big problem with my eating. Limiting it has been tough, so I thought getting rid of sweets altogether would be more likely to be successful.

It's going to be challenging, but I'm hoping it gets easier as the month goes on.

Wish me luck.

Hospital Anniversary

I’m a little behind on this one. The anniversary of my last hospital stay was actually about two weeks ago.

This one feels good. It’s now been five years since I’ve been hospitalized. There have definitely been some ups and downs during that time, but by and large it’s been a satisfactory five years. 

I’ve done a lot of things for self-care to stay out of the hospital — one thing that has helped me quite a bit are the recommendations provided in “Preventing Bipolar Relapse,” by Ruth White. Her program is broken down into SNAP: sleep, nutrition, activities, people. 

Sleep is pretty self-explanatory: get an adequate amount of sleep using good sleep hygiene: going to bed and getting up around the same time every day, don’t eat too close to bed, sleep in a cool, dark room, etc. Sleep has pros and cons for me the past couple years. I used to have a lot of trouble sleeping — especially  during a manic or depressive phase. Now, it’s really hard for me to not sleep too much. I could sleep ten hours every day if I let myself. I have a doctor’s appointment in a few days, so I’m hoping she can give me some ideas.

Nutrition: I’ve been up and down on nutrition. The big thing I’ve done well is eating lots of fruits and vegetables every day, and I think it’s made a positive difference. Where I want to improve this year is having fewer snacks — particularly the lower nutrient higher calorie snacks. I’m also going to try to not eat as much sugar.

Activities is the thing that’s gone best. Though the pandemic has limited it somewhat, I still have seen friends a fair amount, and I’ve gotten to do some fun things with my family. I’ve also kept up with my exercise and even did a lot of walking and cycling when I couldn’t run due to injury.

People have also been an important part in preventing relapse. I’ve been blessed with positive and supportive friends and wonderful family. A few times I’ve had family come and help with the kids when I was having a hard time. I’ve also kept up with my doctors and therapist who have helped keep me on track.

Here’s to five more years of staying hospital-free.

2022 Goals

It's that time of year again. I really enjoy setting goals for the year. I always have some stretch goals and some pretty doable goals. If I were to hit very few goals for the year, I would realize I made my goals too difficult, and if I meet all of them, I'd know they were too easy. Here they are:

1. Break 18:15 in the 5K
Same goal as last year. I ended up running 17:30 in 2021, but I don't see running under 18:00 this year with the amount of time I have to train and staying injury-free.

2. Run 1,000 miles
If I can stay healthy, definitely doable. 

3. Write 24 blog posts
I only wrote 14 last year, which was the lowest since this blog started in 2010. I'd like to write at least two posts per month this year.

4. Strength train an average of an hour and forty-five minutes a week
Stepping it up from an hour-and-a-half last year.

5. Run a marathon
Last year, due to injury, was the first time in 12 years that I didn't run a marathon. I hope to be able to run a marathon this fall.

6. Get to and stay at race weight
I made it to race weight last year, but only stayed there for a few weeks. I'm now well above it, so I plan to get down to race weight in a couple months, then stay at race weight plus or minus three pounds for the rest of the year.

That should do it for this year's goals.