TL;DR: I
won a giveaway for a race entry to the NTUC Income Eco Run (NTUC must be my
favourite local entity) on 30 April 2017, and to amuse myself*, I have decided to keep a
training log for the five weeks leading up to the race (I signed up for the half-marathon, not sure
why).
*With reference to my previous post,
I may find my work meaningful in general but that doesn’t mean I don’t feel
weary from some of the more tedious and uninteresting matters, especially where
I feel Legal is just being made use of.
Because I belong to the generation
that overshares and generally enjoys kaypohing in other peoples’ business, here
is Part 1 of 5, which covers almost all of Week 1 (Monday to part of Sunday). You don’t need to read it, or even any of the
subsequent parts, but if you’re bored and spend too much time on Facebook
reading random stuff anyway, you can just skim this and look out for what I
have underlined and made bold in the text. And of course, I will be sure to
#haolian about this achievement which will take place #9monthspostpartum,
regardless of how I perform.
P/S I am not very fast, sorry to
disappoint.
Some more background: The week beginning 20 March, i.e. the week I entered the giveaway,
started off really painfully. I figured I was burnt out from being a mum – when
all you want is just 20 quiet minutes for a power nap and your toddler insists
on marching around you as you lie on his bed, lustily singing THE ANTS GO MARCHING ONE BY ONE HURRAH!
HURRAH!, then refuses to sleep unless he is curled into the crook of your
back just so and you no longer find
it endearing but have to resist the urge to shake him then give him a good
spanking, something’s up. Plus I was a bit sick, and generally feeling that I
wanted to get away from both Husband and the kids even though we had just had a
wonderful family staycation together, to celebrate our fifth wedding
anniversary! **
**Sarcastic
tone.
So these five weeks of training,
come what may, are my gift to myself. I’d already been training with a Ministry
10k in May in mind, maybe doing a half-marathon towards the end of the year, but
since this came up – why not?
“Them” collectively refers to Daniel
and Andrew.
Week 1 (27 March 2017 – 2 April 2017)
27 March, Monday
Rest day. This is also the day I am
informed that I won one of three race entries from @mokyingren’s giveaway for the
Income Eco Run (so shiok that training starts on a rest day, hor?). I usually
go for RPM on Mondays at lunch, but had to take a break today (see next
paragraph). Also, I went for a stroller run the day before. Was, however, all
haolianned-out from all the Instagram action and couldn’t bring myself to post
about it. I think it was a good ~5k run at a good pace, considering that it was
really humid and the stroller fan battery gave out about half-way through (it
had already been used earlier in the day during the very long journey to and
from church). Did 5x slope repeats at a not very steep slope (I hesitate to
call it a “hill”) near my block after, and some small boys kicking a ball
around peered curiously at my thankfully asleep baby in the stroller. Daniel
also slept whilst we were out for the run, lucky Husband.
I take half a day’s leave because my
mum, our beloved PP, who is on Monday Them Duty, had a terrible bout of stomach
flu over the weekend and although she was recovered, felt she might have needed
some help. I contemplate doing an easy shake-out run, because how rare is it
for my mum AND me to both be around with Them on a weekday evening?! But I decide instead to have a nap, take my
time making dinner, and iron Husband’s formal pants (he’s able to be mostly in
polo shirts and jeans at work, thank God) because he is flying to the
Philippines for business tomorrow night.
During my bedtime prayer with Daniel,
we give thanks for my winning the giveaway. I finally acknowledge the thought
that has been nagging at me the entire day, namely that I have absolutely no
idea how training for this is going to go, because the quality of the training
depends a lot on the boys’ health and sleep, but I know that this is entirely
in God’s hands so I try to stop worrying about it.
I go to sleep at around 11pm,
excited to do some intervals tomorrow (as I have been doing on Tuesdays since
mid-January) with a goal in mind.
Note: The
late hour was due to the fact that I spent some time drafting a snarky email to
HPB highlighting to them Regulation 11(2) of the Infectious Diseases (Diptheria
and Measles Vaccinations) Regulations, and undertaking to take Daniel for his second MMRV booster shot before
he turns three, as he had his first MMRV shot after he turned a year old (our PD recommended delaying the
second jab so as not to exacerbate his asthmatic tendencies whilst they were
being treated. It has been about 9 months of Singulair so far. It is cheaper,
and available OTC in Malaysia. FYIP).
My drafting of said email was
hampered to some extent by Husband, who kept coming up to me in 10- minute
intervals to tell me that I was abusing my legal training, and reminding me
that I was responding to a computer-generated
letter which I told him I felt insulted by because I felt it insinuated
that I: (i) did not want to vaccinate my child against measles because it
causes autism; and (ii) had broken the law by not doing so. He disagreed with
my reading of it, pointing out that it was computer-generated
and that we had in any event complied with the law. I ignored him, but because he distracted me, I later found two
errors in my email, which annoyed me further. Want to be snarky and take moral
high ground must be grammatically and factually correct, correct?
28 March, Tuesday
2am: Daniel wakes up because he wet
the bed (despite the fact that he was wearing a diaper). After cleaning him up,
we give him some milk and cajole him back to sleep.
4am: Daniel wakes up and comes to
our bed. He nudges into Andrew whilst he is worming his way up the bed to lie
down next to me, waking him, and they both ask for milk. Or rather, Daniel asks
for milk in the Most Whiny Way Possible, and Andrew just makes a heckuva lot of
noise so we make him a milk to keep him quiet.
It works. They both go back to sleep.
6am: Andrew wakes up, and to get him
to go back to sleep, we make him another milk. After finishing the milk,
because we are derelict parents and it’s like 6am and I can wake up earlier
than that for a run but not to burp my baby, we do not make him sit up so he
can burp. He tries unsuccessfully to sit up but Daniel and Husband are blocking
his way. He coughs a few times, and regurgitates most of his milk onto the
k’Tan carrier I decided to leave on our bed for convenience. A good part of it
lands on our bed anyway.
I get a towel and wet wipes, we wipe
Andrew’s face, place the towel over the wet patch, calm an excited Daniel down
(“Didi votited!”), and go back to sleep. To avoid getting kicked in the ribs, I
shift myself to the foot of the bed, where my head is at Husband’s feet and I
have to curl up, but in a not uncomfortable position.
8am: Everyone except Andrew wakes
up. After I do last night’s dishes, I clean Daniel up because he has pooed, and
hustle Husband out of the bathroom so I can take a shower. Whilst I am
showering, I hear a thud, followed by a cry. I hope against hope, but it turns
out that Andrew has rolled off our bed (again) (I told you we were derelict
parents).
8.40am: Jon has carted Daniel off to
his parents’ place, and although I am already late for work, my mum has not yet
arrived, so I take the time to play with Andrew. He is pleased. After a while I
smell poo, so I take him to the bathroom to wash him up. I take off his diaper,
and note that there isn’t very much poo.
As I am preparing to wash his bum,
he poos in the shower.
There is a lot of poo.
I manage, through sheer force of
will and what I think is laudable acrobatic ability, to get the roll of toilet
paper off the top of the cistern whilst holding on to my squirming baby. I
manage to tear off a length of toilet paper, and proceed to pick up the poo. I pick
most of it up, but when I try to toss the poo-filled toilet paper package into
the toilet bowl, I miss. It lands on the toilet seat, and due to the
semi-liquid nature of the poo, some spatters on the wall. The next bit of poo I
scoop up and try to toss into the toilet bowl also misses and lands on the
floor next to the toilet.
I momentarily lose my grip on Andrew
and he slides onto his back in the shower. Some poo gets on the sleeve of his
romper. He cries unhappily.
I take off his romper, give him a
bath, douse the affected areas of the bathroom floor and toilet with Dettol
(neat), and hope for the best in terms of the spreading of poo germs.
Haolian of the day: I manage not to get any poo, and only a minimal amount of water, on my
work clothes.
12.30pm: After a painful morning of
reading some very long comments (why does Microsoft Word keep collapsing
them?!) and drafting, I finally head off with some excitement to the gym for
the first interval workout of this admittedly very short training cycle.
Today’s workout consisted of:
- 20
minute warm-up at 6:00/km (~3+km)
- 8x800m
at 5:15-5:21/km, for an average speed of 5:19/km in effort. Took 1 minute
breaks in between, at 6:00-6:19/km, and after each interval from 5-7 I had to
hit pause for about 40 seconds each time. But who cares, I managed to finish
all 8 intervals.
- 1
minute rest at 9km/h
-
Total
distance – 10.98km (let’s call it 11), in 1:02:24.
After I am done, I feel a little
like vomiting, and I remember why I set myself a measly sub-55 10k goal 1 year
post Andrew. But what to do, won race entry and signed up for half-marathon
already.
3.43pm: I am typing this at my desk
and trying not to fall asleep.
4.08pm: I decide to get an
overpriced ice lemon tea from FunToast at Star Vista. It’s not bad, at least it
tastes like they bothered to extract the juice from the lemon instead of just
sticking some slices of lemon into a cup of teh-o-bing siu dai.
6.40pm: I arrive home, buzzing from
my second caffeine high of the day, and find that Andrew is slightly feverish.
I give thanks for the extra caffeine boost, because I know I’ll be needing it.
29 March, Wednesday
Last night’s sleep could have been
better – but sleep with two little kids, especially one fighting a mild fever,
can always be better. It was as good as it gets in the circumstances.
I went for RPM at lunchtime with my
favourite instructor, G. I have a soft spot for this class because I attended
it religiously throughout the year off I had after Daniel was born. It played
no small part in helping to keep me sane, and I formed friendships (well,
acquaintance-ships may be a more accurate description) with people I would
otherwise never have gotten to know.
7.36pm: I heat up leftover chicken
macaroni soup, and sit down with the boys in front of yet another episode of
Dinotrux (we’re repeating them already) to eat.
By 9.30pm, we’re ready for bed. Except that sleep is for the weak, and
for those who are not teething. Or fighting off another virus. Or teething, I’m
sure it’s teething this time. I hope those dratted two lower front teeth make an
appearance ASAP.
30 March, Thursday
I suppose last night could have gone
a lot worse in that I could have not gotten any sleep AT ALL, but what
transpired (as I posted on Facebook: many times extended puppy pose, rolling
around my bed whining and refusing to be carried, me praying that the boys
wouldn’t wake each other up) was enough to make me remember why I decided that
my 1-year goal post Andrew was simply to do a faster 10k, then work towards a
solid sub-2 half marathon the year after (current best time – 1:57:13). You
just can’t predict how the nights are going to go. I still intend to go for a
long run tomorrow, but it may have to be shortened somewhat if tonight is like
last night. Husband is back from the Philippines tonight, so he will need to
get some rest too.
There’s been a Buddhist (Taoist?)
wake at our void deck for the past 3 nights, and while I am all for religious
harmony and really proud of Singapore for its stance on racial and religious
tolerance, last night I really wondered whether the authority issuing the
permits thinks about how many young children there may be in an HDB block who
would be affected by the noise at night. I was so annoyed that I brought the
boys downstairs and stood some distance away looking balefully at the entire
proceedings. But what to do? Like that lor. I am not proud of how I reacted; I
was very irritated and shouted a bit in our house (no one could have heard me
over the din, and anyway the windows were closed), and I thought I was a very
bad example to Daniel, who first “sang along” with the funeral band and went
“dong dong chiang” whilst hitting an imaginary drum, then kept an uncertain
quiet after I shouted and after asking me “Mummy, who shout?!”
This morning, when the funeral band
played 世上只有妈妈好 – a surprisingly pleasant rendition, given the instruments used – I took
the chance to tell Daniel that I had been “naughty” last night because didi
wasn’t doing too good, and he had to always show respect to other religions. I
hope I haven’t turned my child into a Christian snob.
Haolian of the day: Managing to leave the house not looking like a total train wreck
(thank you, Love Bonito) after marinating some minced pork for tonight’s
dinner, and turning into the office carpark just before 9.45am, despite having
only left the house at 9.09am to drop Them off at childcare (“Mummy! I don’t
want to go to school! I want to SLEEP!” You and me both, Daniel, but
unfortunately, you can’t always have your way.)
I usually do strength training on Thursdays
with a PT (a relic of my second pregnancy), but I have an offsite meeting
(which just means I will be away from my car) that’s expected to extend over
lunch, so I plan to come back to the office and take a nap with whatever time
there is left remaining of the lunch hour(s).
11.25am: Just before my meeting is
supposed to start, I receive a call from childcare telling me that some spots
have developed near Andrew’s mouth (and over the rest of his body), and I need
to come and take him to the doctor to be certified HFMD-free***. Since the car
is not with me, and I think my boss needs support at the meeting, I ask if I
can come in about one and a half hours or so, and the teachers thankfully
agree.
***ZOMG
1.15pm: With some effort, I make it
to the end of the meeting. I have asked my parents to go over to the childcare
first… And after I make it back to my car and fly over to the childcare, I end
up meeting them carrying Andrew to the car – and he doesn’t look particularly spotty
to me. Because I am not convinced it’s HFMD, I take him to the cheap and lousy
GP instead of our usual nice and expensive PD, which turns out to be a mistake
because the cheap and lousy GP is cursory in his examination (though he finds
no spots IN Andrew’s mouth nor are there any on his hands and feet), and he
also decides to swab Andrew’s mouth, just in case. That’s fine, but the swab
will go to the National Swab Lab (or whatever it’s called, haha) which is FREE
so it will take some time for the results to come. In the meantime, Andrew
can’t go to childcare. If I’d gone to my usual PD I suppose the results would
have come back more quickly. But it’s too late, I’m too tired to bring him for
another doctor’s appointment, and anyway they are closed.
This may reinforce the idea that I
am a derelict parent, but one of my foremost thoughts is whether I will be able
to make it out of the house for a run tomorrow morning at 5.30am.
Andrew is very pleased to be at home
alone with me on a weekday, and proceeds to try to get me to play with him once
we get home.
8.40pm: I get home from dinner at my
parents’, hurriedly clean everyone up (there are 2x poos), and hustle us all to
bed. Andrew, surprisingly, falls asleep pretty easily after drinking a good
240ml of milk (leading to more doubts about whether he has HFMD). I fall asleep
around 10.30pm. Part of my bedtime prayer today is that I will be able to go
for my long run tomorrow morning.
31 March, Friday
Sometime in the wee hours of the
morning: Husband is home!
1.30am: Andrew wakes up, and falls
asleep after guzzling a bottle of milk.
4.45am: Just before my alarm goes
off, Daniel stirs and I wake up with him. After making him a milk, I
surreptitiously change into my running gear. Andrew stirs and gives a small
cry, so I carry him and successfully get him back to sleep.
5.45am: I actually leave the house!
I contemplated Runkeepering the run,
but I’ve been thinking a lot about why I run and eventually decided not to. When I took the picture for the
giveaway, Husband kept asking me why it meant so much to me. Being competitive
and obsessed with my body image is one thing (and I don’t deny that I am both),
but I don’t think that alone can be sufficient motivation to spend practically
all my weekday lunches more or less isolated (except for when I’m at a class or
working with my PT) and committing to training despite not being guaranteed a
good night’s sleep. I thought back to when I did my first sub-2hr half-marathon
in 2013 (at the postponed 2XU one, an AGC colleague gave me her slot!), and I
remembered that I didn’t care about achieving a good time or anything – I just
wanted to enjoy racing. Of late, being overly concerned about distances and
times has started to kill the enjoyment for me, especially with all the stuff I
see on Instagram. So I left my phone at home and headed out with only a
standard army-issue black Casio watch (Jon’s).
This is my first long distance early
morning run in a while; my favourite part of it is the stretch past Dempsey to
the Botanic Gardens. Just for that less than one kilometer, waking up at such a
horribly early hour is worth it. Mist hangs from the trees, and there’s barely
anyone else out running. There’s something about being up and about in these
hours, racing down roads which are usually teeming with people, enjoying the
sound of your own breath in the morning quiet before the sun rises, feeling
your perspiration flick off your skin. When I was still at AGC, running to work
in the morning was one of my favourite things to do.
Distance covered: At least 15-16km,
but I’m not sure. I went down one side of the Ulu Pandan PCN from my house,
down Holland Road, past Holland Village and down past Dempsey. Turned left at
the Gleneagles junction, ran down past CCAB to Dunearn Road, ran down Dunearn
Road, turned to go past Ngee Ann Polytechnic and Maju Camp, and back to my
house.
Time: 1:43:17. I don’t think I ran
THAT slowly either, hence my estimate of the distance covered.
Husband and I finally have a date
night sans children (thank you, beloved PP!), and we join our friends to
celebrate DMC’s birthday. I have a Mojito, a tequila shot, and about half a
glass of frozen Margarita. I am buzzing pleasantly.
Update on Andrew’s health: He has a grand total of one pimple-like spot
on each of his hands, but has been steadily guzzling milk. HFMD? What gives,
man?
1 April, Saturday
There are only two things I have to
say about Saturday:
- I
had a hangover. Going for a quick swim didn’t help.
- It
is irresponsible to overestimate your alcohol tolerance when you have young
children to look after.
I hope I don’t have HFMD. The hangover is not helped by the slight fever I have.
2 April 2017, Sunday
I wake up with a slight sore throat
and a grand total of three small pimple like spots on my left hand and one on
my right, so whatever Andrew has, he passed to me. (HFMD??) I feel much better,
though I think I’m going to call it a rest day instead of going for a short
run. We’ll see.
Someone remind me again why I am
doing this?
