Are you ready to hear all about my NYC Marathon experience?  If you continue reading this, you will get to do just that and will probably learn more than you ever wanted to about it!

First off, let me explain how difficult it was actually getting to NYC for the marathon.  Period.  No, I am not talking about my car dying, or traffic, or getting lost.  In the week leading up to the marathon it seemed like everything that could go wrong did.

TUESDAY

• As B and I attempted to go up and get ready for bed, he somehow managed to fall down 3 wooden steps and hit his head.
• I panicked, called 911, and the first responders showed up.  
• Long story short we ended up in the ER for most of the night.  Luckily he checked out ok in the end, but it wasn't without a ton of worry on the part of my husband and me. 

• Got a call from my mom letting me know that my Aunt had passed away.  She was old and had been sick with cancer for sometime, but it did not make things easier to take.  She always sent me a card on my birthday EVERY single year of my life with $5.  So incredibly sad.  

• Got a mid-day call from daycare telling me that B was throwing up, but with no fever or other symptoms.  Immediately I thought...concussion.  
• Left work immediately and took him to the doctor.  He checked out ok, neurologically, though.  They told me that he might be coming down with something.
• Got an email from daycare saying that a child was diagnosed with Coxsackie...again.  Uh oh.

• Had to keep B out of daycare (24 hours after throwing up) and fully expected to be dealing with HFM again, but luckily he never threw up again and actually behaved quite normally all day.  PHEW! 
• I didn't get much work (or packing) done though since I had to watch him.

• Saturday morning, my Sister and BIL met us at the hotel and took the baby for an outing while my husband and I jogged to the marathon expo and got my number.  It was about a 4  mile run, round-trip, and it was raining pretty hard the whole time.  The expo at the Javits Center was insanity.  It was so huge, but very well organized.  I was able to get in, get my number, get my shirt, and then walk around to the different vendors before heading back to meet up with my Sister and BIL to grab some lunch.  I had to be careful not to eat anything that might upset my stomach so I stuck with an egg-white omelet with herbs (ok...I snuck a few fries), which was a safe and tasty bet. 
• Saturday afternoon, we got back to the hotel and put the baby down for a nap.  Since there was really nothing that we could do while he was napping, we took a nap, too.  First nap I have had in a while and it was quite nice!  After the nap, I worked on decorating my race shirt with my name and laying out all of my stuff for the next morning. 
• Saturday night, my husband ordered me an awesome half of a roasted chicken with sauteed veggies and roasted potatoes for dinner.  It was a perfect race night meal.  After eating (and getting the baby to sleep), I ordered a 4:30 AM coffee delivery, set my alarm for 4:25 AM and called it a night.  Thankfully I got an "extra" hour of sleep with the time change and B only woke up once.

• I woke up bright and early and started my pre-race routine.  The coffee was delivered right on schedule, which really helped to get me going.
• I wore: a long sleeve Lulu shirt, w/ a Lulu bra & tank underneath, my black Lulu shorts (can you tell I'm obsessed with Lulu?!), Features socks, Zensah compression sleeves, my Nike Lunar Glides, cheapo black gloves, headband, RayBans, my Garmin, my homemade pace band for a 3:24 marathon (haha), a "throw away" fleece, and a "throw away" pair of sweats.
• In a bag I brought: extra "throw away" sneaks to wear in case it was muddy, chapstick, water bottle w/ Coco Hydro in it, running "fanny pack", 2 packs of Annie's fruit snacks, a banana, baggie of cereal, applesauce, BodyGlide, 3 trash bags, hand warmers (x2 packs), extra toilet paper, an extra water, $60, credit card, ID, and my husband's phone (since I have the iPhone 6 plus and it is HUGE).
• I headed over to the NYC Public Library to catch the 6 AM bus to Staten Island.  
• Security was pretty tight, but fairly well organized.  They had police and volunteers checking bibs before you could get into the bus corral, again in line for the bus, and then again before you could get on the bus.
• I felt like I was the only person from the US on the bus that I got on.  No one around me was speaking English!   
• The bus ride over took almost an hour and about 40 minutes into it I realized I had to pee.  There was lots of traffic, even at that early hour.    
• When the bus got to the "Athlete's Village" everyone filed off the bus and walked almost a mile to the village.  Security was even tighter.  We had to have our bibs checked and re-checked, had to go through metal detectors, and had to have our bags searched (and I think they also went through the detectors, as well).  
• Of course, once I was in, I made a beeline for one of the hundreds of port-o-potties they had there.  
• So I got to the village around 7 AM and my wave didn't start until 10:05 AM.  It was about 40 degrees, cloudy, and extremely windy.  Luckily I had brought trash bags and hand warmers with me.  I literally huddled for several hours in my trash bag along with thousands of others.  There was really no where to go to have the wind broken.  I sat next to a guy from Brazil for quite a while.  It was his first trip to the northern part of the US and, needless to say, he was freezing!
• Waiting was so hard.  I was literally in denial that I was about to run a marathon.  My teeth were chattering and I just could not get warm.  It was a pretty miserable wait.
• At around 9:30 AM they called wave 2 to get in line.  I made one last stop at the porto and then filed into the corral.  One of the most miserable things about the whole experience was taking off those "throw away" clothes!  
• I pushed up to the very front of the corral and heard a few guys say that they were also in the wrong wave, meaning that they should have been in wave 1, so I felt like I wanted to stick with them.
• They unhooked the corral gates and everyone pushed up to the starting line.  I was mid-wave 2, but tried to get as close as I could to the starting line once they took down the gates.

• The gun went off and it was several minutes before I started actually running.  I sauntered over the starting line since most people around me were barely moving.  This was exactly my panic-scenario...not being able to run because the people ahead of me were too slow.  
• Going across the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge was beautiful, but so windy.  I was also very focused on passing people to get to a place where I could just run straight ahead.  Even though I told myself I was NOT going to weave through people during the first 3 miles, I did.  People were stopping randomly on the bridge to take selfies or pics of others.  I get that people wanted to commemorate their experience with pictures, but at least they could have stepped to the side to do so!  I clocked my first mile at 8:28, which was much slower than my targeted pace of 7:46 so I really stepped it up for mile 2 and hit 7:06.  BIG MISTAKE!
• My 5k split was 23:47, which was an average 7:39 pace and still way too fast.  For some reason I got this idea in my head that I could bank miles.  Ha.  No.  In case you were wondering, it doesn't work like that in a marathon.  Maybe a 5k, but not the marathon.  Silly me.
• Running through Brooklyn was exciting because my sister was parked on the course around mile 7.  As soon as I got into Brooklyn I started looking for her.  She said she had a sign so I figured that I would be able to easily find her.  Nope!  There were way more spectators that I ever could have imagined.  It was incredible.  People were blasting music and several punk bands played.  It was so cool!  I had my name on my shirt and it was incredible how many people were cheering for me as a result.  I felt super special!  :)
• My 10k split was 47:29, which was a 7:38 pace.  Way too fast.  I felt good though until mile 6.5 when I started to get familiar shooting pains up my right calf.  Sh*t, I thought.  Not good.  I guess this is what happens after huddling in a trash bag for 3 hours and then then trying to pass hundreds of people while going up-hill from a dead stop.  Oops.
• When I got to 7 miles I started to slow down to look for my sister.  I could not find her.  I looked from miles 7-9 and did not see her.  I was kind of upset, especially since my calf was seriously hurting me and I was starting to favor my left leg.  Seeing her would have really made me perk up, but no dice, unfortunately.
• I didn't realize that so much of Brooklyn would be up hill.  This bothered my calf a ton.  I stopped enjoying the surroundings and started thinking to myself. "If I quietly slink off the course and take a cab back to Manhattan, will anyone notice?"  Then I remembered that lots of my friends and family were tracking me in real-time.  So yeah, that might have confused them.  I kept on going.  At mile 10 I ate one of my packs of fruit snacks and that gave me a little pick-me-up.
• I got to the 1/2 Marathon point at 1:41, which made my average pace 7:44.  I was definitely slowing down, but I was still on track to make my goal.  I was very worried though because both of my legs were starting to feel heavy.  Cardiovascularly speaking, I could have gone faster, but my legs were just not having it. 
• Around mile 15/16 my Garmin decided to stop working.  This was right after I had gone across the Queensboro Bridge, which in my humble opinion, was the most difficult part of the race for me and where the wheels started to fall off.  It was so windy on that damn bridge.  The wind blew dirt, dust, leaves, and trash at us.  The hill (which is the upside of the bridge) seemed to go on forever.  I passed so many walkers and dejected runners, but I know that I slowed down, too.  I had no idea how much I had slowed down though because my GPS malfunctioned.  This really hit me hard in the moral department.
• Running through the streets of Manhattan was cool, but the wind made it super challenging.  There were points where I felt like I wasn't even moving though.  The miles felt like they were getting farther and farther apart.  
• By the time I got to 30k, my time was 2:26.  I had slowed to a pace of 7:49.  I had no idea how fast I was going because I was so far off my pace band at this point.  I made the decision then to just finish the best that I could.  My legs were feeling really bad and it was a struggle to move one foot in front of the other.
• Running on 5th Avenue was pretty awesome.  There were so many cheering fans.  Even though I started to go into survival mode and stopped paying attention to the little things, I did see this, which made me chuckle:

• Those last 5-6 miles, second to the Queensboro Bridge, were the most abysmal.  By the time I got to 40k, I was really slowing down.  I hit 3:19, which is an 8 minute pace.  My pace between 30k to 40k was about 8:30 per mile.  You could say that I hit the proverbial wall at this point.  I was pretty devastated, but continued soldiering on because I couldn't give up now.  So many people around me had also hit the wall, but harder than myself because the amount of walkers that I passed was astounding.   
• Running though the park and seeing the mile 25 marker gave me a renewed spirit.  In my anger and sadness about slowing down so much, I had forgotten about my goal of qualifying for the Boston Marathon.  I tried doing the math in my head (which, I'll be honest was not exact and quite difficult) and figured out that I might still have a chance.  I picked up the pace as much as my lead heavy legs would let me.
• The course was marked with the last 800 meters, then 400 meters, and so I tried to play mental games with myself to say that I could sprint that out with no problem.  I passed people left and right and had several near misses with people that would randomly stop or zig-zag in front of me.  
• Then I saw the finish, in all its glory, and I "sprinted" across.  I don't remember what the clock said because it was running from the first wave and was ahead of me by quite a bit.  I was just so happy to be done.   

• Walking through the finishers chute was a challenge.  I received my medal.  I got my finishers bag.  I got a Mylar blanket.  I shuffled, slowly, with all of the other marathon finishers through the park.  
• It was at this point that I remembered that I had tracked myself on my husband's phone so I decided to take a look.  There is was (along with over 40 congratulatory text messages from family and friends).  My finishing time was 3:30, about an 8 minute average pace.  So far over my goal, but a solid Boston qualifier. 
• I started crying because so many emotions hit me at once.  Happiness to have qualified for Boston (a life-long goal).  Sadness and anger to have come so short of my goal and what my coach thought I could do.  Pain because my legs had seized up and walking was so difficult.  Confusion as people tried to point me in the direction of the exit.
• Getting out to the family reunion area seemed to take forever.  I just wanted to sit down with a cup of hot coffee and put my feet up.  I also cooled down very fast and started to get shivery.  I walked several blocks until they gave us a pretty sweet fleece poncho to keep us warm.

#Microblog Mondays?  Read more about it here!

#Microblog Mondays?  Read more about it here!

I have about 7 weeks to go until the NYC marathon so I thought that it might make sense to write a little bit about where I am with my training.  This is my 3rd marathon, so I knew what to expect with regards to the time commitment.  I did not have a 16 1/2 month old during training for the first two, so this definitely is an added "twist" which has been a lot more to manage than I thought!

Personal Marathon Goal: 3:30

BQ Goal: 3:35

Average Weekly Mileage: ~40 miles per week

Highest Weekly Mileage: 49.1 miles

Longest Single Run: 20.03 miles (7:57 min per mile average pace)

Average Pace: ~8:07 min per mile

Interval Pace: Between 6:30 and 6:48 min per mile

Usual Schedule: 
Mon- 7/8 miles easy
Tues- Speed/track workout (~6-7 miles total)
Wed- OFF
Thurs- 5/6 mile tempo (includes 3 miles of faster running)
Fri- 60 min easy
Sat- Long run
Sun- Recovery 45/60 min easy

Diet: I try for paleo, but I'd say I am more gluten free right now because I need more carbs than I feel like I can get from just fruits, squash, sweet potatoes.  I am constantly hungry and I CRAVE carbs (I am also still BF 2-3 times a day).  Seriously.  I eat so much right now.  I am OBSESSED with Multigrain Puffins.  I seriously eat almost 2 boxes a week.  

Run Nutrition: That's All Fruit Bars (mid-long run).  CocoHydro Sport drink for runs of 13 miles or more.  Rise Protein Bars after most runs of 6 miles or more (or hard workouts).

Sleep: About 6.5-7 a night on average.

Injuries: Mostly nagging stuff.  My right hip is tight.  My right shin gets sore unless I wear a compression sleeve (which I would strongly recommend!).  I generally always feel a little sore in my hamstrings/glutes.

Shoes:  Nike Lunar Glide 5 for easy days, Nike Lunar Glide 6 for long runs/tempo, Mizuno Wave Sayonora for speed/races.

Other Favorite Running Gear: Feetures Elite Ultralight Socks

Most Fun Run So Far:  Running 12 miles in NYC from Brooklyn to Manhattan and back with my sister (she rocked it).

Complaints:  I feel like I am getting slower from all of the long and plodding miles and I miss running in 5k races.  I feel like my muscles and ligaments are getting shorter.  I am kind of bored with the long runs.

Positives:  I get lots of compliments on my muscular legs.  :)  Overall I feel good.  I am so excited to be done with this training and to run the race of my life!

Some of you might remember me crazily mentioning that I was going to sign up for the New York City Marathon this November.  Well I signed up.  I paid my $266 and started running 6 weeks postpartum.  Things were going great while I was on maternity leave.  I was running 3-4 times a week with long runs on Saturdays that started at 6 miles and progressed to 10 miles last weekend.  Yes, I was slow as $#!t, but I was getting faster and faster with each subsequent run.  Then I went back to work.  Suddenly I found myself not being able to keep my eyes open let alone run after the baby goes to sleep at 8 PM.  Today was the first day that I have been able to squeeze in a run this week and it was only 4 miles.  Thinking about getting out of bed at 5 AM (after not sleeping more than 3 hours straight) to do my 12 mile run tomorrow morning makes me cringe.  Isn't this supposed to be fun?

This morning I logged into the NYRR website to finally select my transportation and baggage options after getting several threatening emails from the NYRR staff.  Unfortunately the mid-town Manhattan option was gone leaving only the Staten Island and NJ options.  Procrastination screws me again.  I then noticed a cancel button at the bottom of the screen with some fine print so I decided to take a closer look...

As you can see, my blogging has gotten pretty sparse lately.  I knew having a baby would make me have less time for things like writing, but I think I grossly underestimated how much less time I would have.  When I do have a free minute I tend to do things like throw laundry in, do the dishes, make the bed, get dressed, go to the bathroom, call my grandma to thank her for my birthday present 2 weeks late...

The crazy thing is that I have a ton of stuff to write about.  I am going to try to make a better effort to write out all of these posts that I am thinking of writing, but for now I am just going to give an update since I have exactly 1/2 hour before I have to feed baby B and go to bed.

Baby B
I can't believe that he will be 6 weeks old on Thursday.  He is awesome and amazing.  Cute and snuggly.  He smells so good.  He is a great eater, but spits up quite a bit and is pretty gassy.  He is very strong and can lift his head and move it around with almost no support.  He is also extremely fussy!  He loves to be held all of his waking hours.  I went out and bought some gripe water to help with his fussiness.  I am still not sure if it is helping or not, but he does seem a little happier.  He also likes the stroller, taking rides in the car, and being toted in the M.oby wrap.  He is growing like a weed.  At his 1 month appointment he weighed 11.1 lbs (up from 9.5 lbs, 2 weeks earlier) and he is now 22 inches.  He is only sleeping about 3 hours (at the most) consecutively at night.  Needless to say, mommy is pretty tired.  He likes a pacifier sometimes, but tends to spit it out after a few minutes.  His fav paci so far has been the S.oothie, but we introduced the N.uk and it seems to stay in his mouth better.  He loves having a bath!  He also loves being swaddled in the S.waddle M.e wrap, which I would STRONGLY recommend.  It makes swaddling in the middle of the night so much easier.  He likes newborn music class!  He will laugh and smile if you catch him in a good mood and squeak his soft rattle.  Seeing his smile makes all of the shit that I went through over the past years worth every last sucky minute.

Breastfeeding
Still going...!  Things have gotten much easier.  B is definitely getting enough to eat as he has gained quite a bit (78 percentile).  My only real issues, which are opposite of the issues I though I would have...oversupply and overactive letdown.  When B goes to latch I literally make him choke with my fire-hose of a letdown.  Sometimes I pump a little off first, but I can't do that in the middle of the night.  Last night I tried hand expressing some milk before feeding him in the middle of the night and I can shoot a stream of milk several feet in front of me.  The lactation consultant that I saw last Friday told me to lay off the oatmeal and M.other's M.ilk tea.  Oh and the lactation cookies that I made were unnecessary, I guess.  I have started pumping at least once a day to save up for when I go back to work.  It is hard to find time to pump since B is very demanding, but I want to start introducing a bottle to him at 6 weeks.  I don't anticipate an issue, but I guess I have been wrong about everything so far.  We'll see.

Thyroid/Diabetes
I had an appointment at the Endocrinologist last Tuesday and they checked my TSH and A1C.  My TSH was only 1.01, so I am thinking that she will tell me that I can discontinue my 25 mcg of levothyroxine.    My A1C was 4.8, which was pretty good and equals an average glucose level of around 94.  I still have my 2 hour GTT in a week and a half so I am hoping that turns out ok.  I am still pretty conscious of my diet and I eat way less carbs that I did before.  I have cut out pasta and bread almost completely.  That said, I have been eating cereal and having treats here and there.  I was good for so long, I think I deserve some indulgence.

Postpartum Recovery
Physically, I feel so much better now than I did a few weeks ago.  I still have about 10 lbs to lose, but I have heard that you need to keep on some weight to be an efficient milk producer, so I am ok with that.  I don't think I look overweight so I am fine with it.  What I am NOT ok with is my stomach.  It is completely wrecked.  I have serious stretch marks and my belly button is gross.  I could write a whole post about this, and probably will at some point.  I have diastasis recti.  From my unscientific diagnosis, I have about a 4-5 finger separation of my ab muscles. I went from 6-pack abs to a sagging pouch of a stomach with a huge indentation in the middle.  It has caused me quite a but of depression.  I hate looking in the mirror, it makes me so upset.  I did some research online and asked friends for recommendations and I found a physical therapy program that rehabs women with this condition.  I am going for my first appointment in a week and a half.  I can't wait.  My scar looks great though.  It is almost invisible to me.  I don't mind it at all.  I have no traces of the PUPPPs rash...thank goodness.  I have been walking with B and my dog.  My bleeding stopped about 2 weeks ago and now it is just annoying (TMI) yellow discharge.  Enough for liners 24/7.  I will be so glad when I can stop wearing a liner!  I have been through my entire pregnancy, too!  My doctor prescribed me the mini-pill, but I have not started taking it yet.  I really don't want to take it, but I also don't want to get pregnant any time soon.  Knowing my luck, I would get pregnant with a take home baby if we had sex.  Speaking of sex, we still have not undertaken that activity yet.  I am waiting until my 6 week pp doctors visit before we do it, just to be safe.  I am mentally looking forward to it, but not physically.  I am worried that I'll be in pain.

Other Stuff
I officially signed up for the NYC Marathon.  Yes, I am nuts.  My husband got me a personal running coach and class for my birthday, along with a new pair of sneaks!  I am waiting for my 6 week pp appointment to get the go ahead, but I am not sure they will even let me start running yet and I am not sure I want to run yet.  I feel like my organs might migrate out through the whole in my abs.  Gross.

The dog has been great with the baby.  He is protective and watches B when I leave him in his swing and have to run upstairs.  He likes to lick his head, which we don't let him do often, but occasionally.  :)  The cats have been a huge pain in the ass, though.  They have already scratched up his lovely glider and love to climb in his crib and pack and play with any opportunity that they get.  We have to keep the doors closed, which sucks.  I hope they get better, but I have a feeling this is just cats being cats.

Lastly, I got my medical bill from my 6 days stay...$55,000.  Wowzers.  Thank goodness I am only responsible for $500 of it.  Can't imagine what would happen if I didn't have insurance.

Alright my grace period has expired.  My boobs are telling me that B is hungry.  He is still asleep so he doesn't know it yet, but he will as soon as I pick him up.  Now I need to catch up on my blog list!  I still read when I am breastfeeding, but do it on my iPad, so it is hard for me to comment.  I am still following along with you ladies though.  :)  I hope you are all doing well!