enfinblue's Bluey (credit to Fifi for the nickname!) Diaryland Diary

"I am seeking, I am striving, I am in it with all my heart." -Vinc3nt V@n Gogh

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Just some thoughts on running and so on. Please excuse the lack of editing as this is - as usual- being done off the cuff.

You know I was just thinking upon waking about a couple of entries and posters.

One thing that I've always found very interesting is that people have the a priori expectation that women will be physically weaker after having a baby, i.e. that if they are athletes their times will fall off. (Incidentally, people also expect that women will be less mentally focused/capable after having a baby, which was part of the long-standing employer bias. But researchers have actually demonstrated that even with sleep deprivation women's mental acuity INCREASES after child birth (at least for a period of time), they think serving the function of facilitating care of the child under increased physical strain. The same effect does not hold for fathers, unfortunately, but I guess they did not in primitive terms have the same need to serve in the locality of the baby.)

The truth is that anecdotally, at least in my sport of running, women run *faster* after having babies. Most of them report just feeling stronger. Many of them report that they're simply happier, with something other than themselves to focus on. (Athletics day in day out can aggravate one's obsessive compulsiveness.) Whilst I don't believe that there is much medical evidence to support this yet, mostly because the research hasn't been done, there is some suggestion that it might have something to do with a change in hormone balance. There is also the suggestion that these athletes who were probably overtraining have given their bodies a time to rest and rejuvenate, in a way, during pregnancy - in fact, many of my friends got pregnant during periods of injury in which they knew that they would not be able to train.

At any rate, all of my friends at high levels in the sport have run FASTER after having babies. The previous world best time in the marathon was held for many years by a woman who ran it when she had two little children. So there you go. An interesting reversal of the expectation.

I think that the big thing that would make training or competing a bit difficult is simply the time involved in being with a child. But these women of my acquaintance have had supportive spouses and/or nannies. Also, as I mentioned above, perhaps the issue was that they started training smarter or better, rather than simply harder as one has a tendency to do when one is training at a high level. For sure, I was way overtraining when I was in Australia with Sean, simply because I couldn't not do something if I felt that I could physically drag myself through it. I was not contstrained. It's the way it goes. And it was bad for me.

I think this is why I'm so happy to finally be free. I really feel no compulsion to run these days, and I regularly skip runs. I'm getting cellulite and I really don't care. I want to be easy and gentle with myself for the rest of my life - both on my body and my mind.

I realize that I've been in pursuit of a state of "perfection" that can't exist, for a long time. I thought on my run last night along the canal that I'm finally feeling the reins loosen on that. I see the purpose more as enjoyment. My big goal right now is to figure out how to express myself more openly and honestly - in relationships, in my work, and creatively.

Life is much better than it has ever been.

You know, when I was running last night I was thinking about how I always tire myself out by running these days. And then I realized that when I run I do stupid things!

When I run I always do this thing whereby I jump up (vertically) and try to touch tree branches. There are trees all along the distance of the canal. So for about four miles each way I was jumping up at trees, feeling joy. But no wonder I was "all fagged out at the end," as I said to C. on the phone. I think I jumped up to something between 20 and 40 trees.

I love it though. It makes me feel like a baby. And, in fact, last night, I was thinking that it reminded me of Fifi. This is because when I think of Fifi I think of a model of pure joy. And that is a beautiful thing.

OK. I should shower and go to work. I'm going to wear the pirate dress. It turns out that it is SOOOO cute. It's a bit too big on top but had I bought a smaller size it would be a bit too short. Overall, because it is a wrap, it looks good. And the bottom swings. I love it!

Have a wonderful, wonderful day.

8:20 a.m. - 2008-07-11

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