My first encounter with the 26.2 mile monster

My last few weeks before Disney were really non-productive. I just started some medicine that week and the effects were just, um…….let’s say not tolerable and had really bad timing with the marathon. I lost 11 lbs. the week before the race. Needless to say, my nutrition was horrible. The two weeks leading up to it, I kept experiencing black-outs. I stopped training completely for almost 3 weeks before the marathon. My mom had a “serious talk” with me before I got on the plane. She knew how much the marathon meant to me - I had been planning this for a year! And she also knows me and how sometimes I will push myself when I shouldn’t. She told me that I should just go and watch Eric run because I was in [no shape to run] then. I nodded my head and told her that I would just see how things went, but I also made her a promise to not race if I felt bad. Then, on the plane, of course I had to derive my thoughts from actually flying to keep my sanity, and that’s the first time the thought of NOT doing the marathon actually became a possibility. Of course, I told Eric that I would want him to do it no matter what I decided to do. After being persistent, I convinced him to run whether I did or not. But if I really did have to be on the sidelines that day, it would have broken my heart. I really did fly to Disney not knowing whether I would do the marathon. I told myself I would wait to see how I felt on race day. Well, that day came very quickly. The alarm clock blaring at 2:30 and I was wide awake. Couldn’t remember feeling that energized for weeks. I was very mentally prepared. Only one thing. I made myself the promise that if I started the race, I would finish it. There would be no dropping out for whatever reason. Even if I was dying, I would be running in that race. I fumbled around for my neatly organized pile of clothes and marathon stuff I gathered together the night before. Slipped on some socks, then right shoe, left shoe. And with the lacing of that first shoe, that promise to myself was set in stone. Eric reassured me that if I needed to stop, just to vocalize it, and he wouldn’t mind taking a break for me. He never knew about my promise. Race morning was very hectic, even with the little extra time we allotted ourselves. As we bundled up to head out the door - layers and layers of clothes to prepare ourselves for the 32 degree weather we had to stand in for two hours pre-race. We go to our hotel’s cafeteria and eat breakfast. I grabbed a banana. Yeah right. What was I thinking?! I couldn’t eat anyways, let alone with all the nerves of race morning! I stuffed the banana in my bag as I nauseatingly watched Eric eat his bagel. 3:45 we caught the bus that would take us to the start line. It was so freaking hot on that thing, and all of us had like 14 layers on. I thought I was going to have a panic attack right there because I was hot and cramped between the seats. If that happened, I kept telling myself, that would be it. There would go my chance. So maybe I mentally delayed that one. It was still dark outside. I hate it being dark. Plus my body was screaming at me for being up so early/late. The buses left and I was hyped. I was ready. Ok let’s do this. But somewhere in the back of my mind I doubted myself. I knew I always would. No matter if my training would have been right on key, I still would have felt unprepared. I knew that it would take myself crossing that finish line to know that I could do it. Nothing else I could say or do at that point would convince me that I could actually do it more than actually doing it itself. I’m not sure that scared was the right word describing my feelings at that point. Because I wasn’t afraid. I was more unsure of what to expect and it made me nervous. I never ran, walked, crawled, or shuffled a distance of 26.2 miles at one time in my whole life. What would my body say? Would it have none of it and I would have to stop?? Like I said, I mentally prepared myself for race day very well the week before and I think it replaced some of the slackness of my physical preparedness. Our race pacer told me that morning that you run the first 10 miles with your body, the second 10 miles with your head, and the last 6 with your heart. Little did I know at that point that I would very soon find that out for myself. So, we froze our butts off for two hours. Sometime around 5:30 I remembered that I hadn’t eaten anything. Not good. I found my banana on the ground and peeled it to find it crunchy with ice. Yes, that is how cold it was. In retrospect, it was worse sitting there for those two freezing hours then the race itself, IMHO!! I hate coldness. So then the gun goes off. Not that we could hear it or anything since there are about 29 million gazillion people in front of us! I knew by the screams and the slow shuffling of the movement forward. This was it. I was about to run a marathon.

 

I first thought about my pace. We were going to fast to start out with. I knew from numerous amounts of experienced marathoners that this was a bad BAD thing. Ok, slow down, Crystal or you’ll never make it. My feet were also numb at this point. I thought this may aid in masking the pain, so I should take advantage while I could. Second thoughts were of my parents back at home. All warm inside while I was out doing something stupid like this. Many people were there on behalf of Leukemia and Lymphoma Society who raised thousands of dollars each to come run the marathon. Nope, not me, I was just doing this for fun. Not for a cure. Just pure stupidity. I thought if my parents would get an alert that I crossed the start line. I also wondered how mad my mom would be at that moment when she found out I decided to go through with the race. I signed them up to receive alerts on their phones and email when I crossed the start line, mile 10, mile 13, mile 20, and finish. Surely I would get an earful from mom when I talked to her next about how I wasn’t prepared and had no right to do the race. Yay for that thought because it made me go back to my rebellious teenage years, and my WANT to do the race at that point quadrupled, just to prove her wrong. Third thoughts, “where the hell is Eric?!” Surely if I lost him during the first 3 miles, I would never find him, and then where’s my support?? AHH! After a few brief moments of OCD-ness, he appeared, right behind me. Okay good, I can think about other things now…. My layers started getting warm. And it felt really weird running with a winter coat and sweat pants on. I moved over to the side and ditched them. All except my green long sleeved hoodie. Amen for bringing that along, even though it WAS cotton. I didn’t pack any sort of warm running clothes. You think you go to Florida and it would be pretty mild. Well, the weather people on the news even said this was unusual weather that weekend. (I knew I was in trouble when we first pulled up to the hotel and the flowers were covered with plastic for the freeze warnings.) So I kept on the green shirt for awhile. Before I knew it, I was at mile 5. What just happened there? I can’t believe I just ran 5 miles - it felt more like 1 or 2! I thought, wow, today will be a good run day. Yay, go me! Epcot was all lit up pretty for us. Actually, it was really awesome. We got our own personal fireworks show too. And a lot of the people who work in the parks at Disney were there along that part of the course just smiling and saying words of encouragement. I thought, wow, that is really nice of them! But then again, Disney’s gotta throw in some kind of incentive for them to be there THAT early. Anywho, they were really nice. Then we exit Epcot and head out on what appears to be a highway to me. What the hell? I REALLY don’t want to run on a highway. Yep, it’s a highway. Oh well, what do ya do? One foot in front of the other, one foot in front of the other . . . The sun starts to come up and it gets really foggy. Maybe it was the whole time, I don’t know, but it didn’t look foggy in the dark. Still on the highway, heading toward Magic Kingdom. Wondering when my knee will start acting up. Not a question of if but definitely when because it normally does around mile 6. So far, so good. I can only see about 5 people in front of me because the fog is so dense. Then we get a BEAUTIFUL sunrise. Pink - my favorite! I want to stop and take a picture, but I already stopped twice in Epcot and didn’t feel like doing it again or reaching in my fanny backpack thingy again. I never ran with that before and couldn’t seem to get the strap around my waist where I wanted it to be. It just kept moving - I guess because of my curves. I have a small waist, and I have hips too, so it kept wanting to ride up. It was so heavy too! I had to pack so many things. My camera, my shot blocks, a pack of gu, tissues, the room key, a map of the course. Thankfully I couldn’t jam my phone in their earlier, otherwise I would have been hauling that around too! Yay, we are in Magic Kingdom, where we had spend the previous day. I was so excited that they let us run THROUGH Cinderella’s castle. And then Main Street was a blast with all of the fans there. Tons of Disney Characters lined up along the course. And tons of runners lining up for their photo opts with them too! I just had to stop for Twiddly Dee and Twiddly Dum! Eric snapped my picture and then off we went again. After I crossed mile 10 I got emotional. Not sure why. I thought I would be at 13. But 10 was it for me. I wondered about my mom again, and her getting the alert that I made it that far. I assessed myself, and to my surprise I felt completely fine at this point. Asked Eric how he felt, and he was good too. I was alternating water and poweraid at the water stations, which I knew I should do to prevent hyponetremia. That kinda scared me because I was very much at risk for getting it. My age, my weight, my sex, and my finishing time all put me in the at risk group for that. Even though I hate drinking anything but water on runs, I forced myself to now. I stopped and walked to drink which helped a lot. Now we head out of Magic Kingdom, and off to, um……….at this point I didn’t know where we were off to. As I look back, I realize this is where my mental alertness started to wear down. I wanted to grab the course map out of my bag, but that was too much work at that point. Ugh, highway, AGAIN??

 

Yes, about 5 miles of it this time. How boring. I thought Disney was supposed to be Disney-like the whole time?? Yay, a water AND food stop!!! I asked Eric what kind of food they had. Bananas! I was so excited because I was famished! The lady was cutting up one banana in four sections and handing one of those sections to runners. I ran past her and snatched a whole one from the lady peeling them. HaHa! They can’t catch me anyways! : ) God, that banana was good! Mile 16 already?? This race is flying by. Maybe I’m just in Crystal’s world and not paying attention. When we do pass crowds of people, they yell “Go, Crystal!” or “Great job, Crystal!!” because our names were printed on our bib’s. And believe it or not but that was really encouraging and a booster to hear someone rooting for ya. Then, the smell hits me. OMG. What IS that? Is it just me? Am I getting sick?? Then I hear the moans of fellow runners around me. Oh no, it’s not me : ) It’s the Disney Sewer Plant. N I C E. Thanks, Disney for running us RIGHT next to that! It a nauseating smell that forces you to breathe through your mouth for the next 10 minutes. Self-assesment: eh, I feel OK. It’s definitely not “good”, but hey, it could be worse. I can live with “ok” at this point. That’s the last thing I remember thinking at that point. And then all of it hits me. I hear these two women behind me talking about how “Mile 20 does funny things to your mind…” I was thinking, mile 20?? It’s mile 17 and all I want to do is sit down! I do remember vaguely asking Eric if I could sit down? That’s all I thought I said. But Eric informed me that it was not all I said. I wanted to sit down. I also wondered when the dinosaurs where going to come out to get us. And apparently was very concerned with this - Eric said I continued to inquire about the dinosaurs. I don’t recall any of this. I guess that’s where I hit the wall. Man, I thought I’d at least make mile 21 for that! Come on, mile 17? What a whimp! LOL. But when people were struggling at 20, I was fine. So, into Animal Kingdom we go. Really cool Jamaican band playing for us. Big fan base here again. By this time I had shed my long sleeves and the weather couldn’t have been better! My only complaint here was the ground. It was concrete with animal imprints in it which made for an interesting running ground. . . .especially after you have almost run 20 miles already! Where is Eric? Again? Found him behind me on a walk break. Hey, that sounds really nice….so I joined him. I could tell by the look on his face that he was in pain. But I didn’t ask him if he was ok because I knew if I did he would tell me that he was hurting. And once you admit that you are hurting, you start to think about where it hurts and how much and it just snowballs from there. He acknowledged that he knew I knew and we left it at that. It’s just a thing between runners. I told him we could walk for as long as he wanted even though I was still, surprisingly feeling great then. Out of Animal Kingdom we go, and that was a big disappointment that we didn’t even see one animal! I really wanted to see some hippos! Man, what a let down. Now we are approaching, what I believe to be the worst part of the course. It’s an out-and-back stretch where you can see the runners on the other side of the road! And it’s mile 20 through 22, which really sucks too, since most people are hitting the wall then. We are still walking and I see a volunteer on the side with some biofreeze. I run to her and ask her to put some on the back of my knees, which feel like they are about to pop out of my legs. She was WONDERFUL! She even massaged it on for me! Ahh, the guilty pleasures of running a marathon! Eric joins me too and get some put on as well. I ask him if he can run again and he doesn’t think he can. Or he thinks he can, but just really doesn’t want to. This is where I think Eric gets a little smack from the wall. I picked out a visible point for us to run to and he said ok to that. It actually feels better to run than to walk at this point to me. But then I get distracted by a very large (both wide and tall) man standing in the MIDDLE of the road. I see runners part like the dead sea around him. My eyes now set on the silver foil thing he is holding in his hands. That means food!!! I run up to the 7 foot tall man and look up at him. But I forgot to say anything. So he laughs and says, “would you like a cookie?” and all I could muster was “yes, PLEASE!!” and he said, “ok, but only if you give me a hug!”. Yup I gave the big guy a hug for the best cookie in my life! Then I catch up to Eric and wouldn’t share my cookie. We continue running some, then walking some, then running, and so on. We finally get on the other side of this turn around. All I remember during this part is the food. Hey, I was REALLY hungry. I ran by the sidelines where volunteers where giving out twizzlers, pretzels, jolly ranchers, and I took all of them! Yum! And I was STILL hungry! Crossing over mile 20 now. Going over the champion chips mats again. Wondering if mom is having a heart attack now since she just got the 20-mile alert. She is gonna kill me for going this far!! Haha I love it! I thought I’d cry at mile 20 but I didn’t. I tried to think about emotion and could care less. I kind of felt numb even. And then we turn the corner, and they literally rolled out the red carpet for us! And there was gold rope to hold back the fans. Lots of flashes like we were Hollywood stars. It was great! At this point my feet were killing me. But not one was hurting significantly more than the other. They were both hurting but it was tolerable. Walking hurt the worst. Eric isn’t in too good of shape at this point. I knew we would make it though since we got this far. I started talking about pizza to Eric and I think it cheered him up a little. I always thought I would be the one to struggle the most, but today it wasn’t the case. We start having a large fan base now. People holding up signs. My favorite was a lady’s sign that said “If it were easy, everyone would be doing it!” I loved that one! We are coming into MGM. And we get to run next do a lake and on a deck. Man those wooden slats will get you if you’re not careful! I tripped once. Just a bit earlier, Eric stopped to use the bathroom and I “pulled over” too to wait on him. There was a concrete bench so I though, “hey, I can use this time to stretch!”. BAD IDEA. One leg up, and over I went. I scratched my knee pretty bad on the concrete, but was more embarrassed that other people saw I had no balance. I was asking too much of my body at that point. I was afraid to sit down in fear that I wouldn’t be able to get back up so I just waited. Eric came out, and on we went. So many people watching us run now. The parks had opened up by this time and ticket-buying people were looking at us like we had mad cow disease. Yes, don’t you think we are aware at how stupid we are for doing this?? We know! Then we get to go “behind the scenes” after MGM to see where they make Disney costumes. That was really awesome. We ran inside this place and they turned on everything for us. Very cool part of the race. I see the silver ball!!!! That means we are back in Epcot! Holy Bad Word!!!!!!! I just ran a freakin’ marathon! I want some pizza. Eric tells me he sees the finish, but I can’t yet. The I see it. I slow down to take it all in. Wow. Indescribable feelings. There come the tears. Then the lady in front of me starts to sprint to the finish and she drops her cell phone without noticing. Stupid people who carry their cell phones during this - who would do that?!?! Gah! So, being the good person that I am, pick up her cell phone, and also sprint to the finish in hopes of catching up with her because I know she won’t know where she lost it. Made a nice finishing picture with that cell phone raised high above my head…..NOT. But, in the end, she got her cell phone back. And I got a measly little “oh, thanks”. Yeah, no *huff* problem *puff* lady. They guide us through the finish where someone puts a space blanket around you and takes off your chip. Thank goodness for that! If I bent over right now, who KNOWS what would happen. Then the moment I’ve been waiting a year for…….the medal get strung over my head. Wow! It’ heavy!!! Oh, what?? Picture time already? No time to catch my breath. Ok, where is the bus to go back? I wanna nap!

 

As soon as I stopped I got so nauseous. So I sat down for a few, and when I got up, I couldn’t even walk. I was restricted to an attempt at a shuffle. We finally got on the bus and made it back to the room like 2 hours later. I grabbed my cell phone and saw I had a missed call from mom. I listened to the message. Her and dad were so excited that I finished. I called her right away. She told me that when they saw online that I finished, they started to tear up because they were so proud of me. WOW. Now THAT is a reason I did it! To hear them say they were proud of me, and to be able to hear just HOW proud they were really got to me. I haven’t heard that in a long time and it made all the aches and pains worth it.

 

We got off the bus and attempted at a snail’s pace - I might add, to make it back to our room. That is when I realized my left foot was broken (I‘m in a cast now!) But I just wanted pizza and sleep. Only later did we find out that lying down (especially for hours) is the worst thing to do. We never even thought to look up information on what to do AFTER you run a marathon (What?! There is life AFTER the marathon??) Of course, we didn't make it to the party. After trying to coerce (with money! I might add!) the concierge into delivering ice cream to our room because we couldn't walk, and getting no where with that (all they would deliver is pizza), we decided to "hobble" back to our hotel cafe for dinner. This should have been a 5 minute walk. We shuffled for 45 minutes to get there. (By The Way,BIG THANK YOU, All Star Music Resort for putting us in the FARTHEST Freakin' room possible from the lobby, cafe, and anything!)

 

We came away from last weekend with a lot of soreness, one stress fracture, two really cool medals, and a lifetime of self-confidence. As a few quotes that kept us going are perfectly put: "Pain is nothing compared to what it feels like to quit." and "Tough times don't last but tough people do."

 

And it was really cool to wear my medal around. Everyone was congratulating us, and still looking at us like we were some crazy people. Haha. I slept in that medal and didn’t take it off until I got home. And I can’t wait to do it all over again next year!

 

Crystal

 

 

(*some of the photo's were taken by fellow Disney Dead Nancy Toby. . . thanks, Nancy!)