A small curve ball!

Ok so recently I had one of those curb balls that life throws at you some times – every things going along well when all of a sudden things change!

We all have them from time to to time and they come in all shapes and sizes.

Mine came in the shape of a suspected Minor Stroke (TIA).

Now this sounds kinda scary but it wasn’t really (at least not for me!), its not until you take time to reflect on what could of been that you realise how scary it really was.

This is how it unfolded,  a couple of weekends ago as we were getting ready to go out for my running club annual dinner, I lost sight out of my right eye.  I was sitting in the kitchen chatting to Simon and my dad when it suddenly felt as if I’d been staring at something bright which had left an imprint on my eye – you know how that feels?  I looked around and realised I couldn’t see any thing bright.  After a couple of minutes the “funny” vision in my right eye only got worse, so I did what all techies do, I went to my computer and starting typing into Google.  The only problem was that as I typed and the text went from the left of the screen to the right it basically vanished – I described it as if the letters were falling into a pool of quick silver.  When I moved my head to right, my left eye was able to read all the letters.

It was really strange and was starting to make me feel nausea – as you often do when your vision goes a bit funny.  So I went back into the kitchen and told Simon and Dad what was going on, after repeating it a couple of times they finally understood that something was not right.  They both buzzed around me for a bit looking in my eyes and being concerned, however after about 15 minutes my eye sight had returned.  Much to Simon and dads disapproval I still insisted on going to the dinner and told them I was planning to race in the Cataract Challenge the next day!

20 minutes later Simon is driving us to the dinner and asking me all sorts of questions about who will be at the dinner – secretly I was feeling a little strange – anyway I couldn’t remember anyones names.  I can clearly see peoples faces in my mind BUT could not for the life of me remember their names.  Then Simon mentioned a couple of names for the people I had described but even when he gave me the right names I could not make the associations – you know when someone reminds you of a name you’ve forgotten, you get an “a ha” moment?  Well I didn’t get any “A ha” moments, and I felt really weird!  You know, just not myself – my head felt quite foggy.  Again Simon tried to get me to detour via the Emergency department – I didn’t see how funny vision and a little forgetfulness warranted a trip to emergence!  Off we went to the dinner.

For the first hour of the dinner I was in a bit of a fog – peoples names were a massive struggle to pull out of my head.  However I managed to keep it together and even gave a small speech when I picked up trophy for winning a race at the beginning of the year. The rest of the evening was uneventful and even fun.

On the way home Simon and I discussed whether I should run in the Cataract Challenge the next day (also Simons birthday). As neither of us would give in we decided that we’d ring the after hours GP line and they could decide whether I had experienced something “serious” or just a blip. So I rang the GP phone line around 11.45pm, explained my symptoms to the nurse (little did I know that I’d repeat the story many times before I got to sleep!).  The nurse said it sounded like I’d had a minor stroke or TIA …. oh dear ….  She told me that she’d  have a doctor ring me back within 30 minutes – when the doctor rang back I repeated the story and he said, you need to go to hospital now this is very important … oh dear …

At 12.30am on Simon’s birthday we drove back into town and did the emergency thing for 3.5 hours – eventually being sent home after repeating the symptoms numerous times and having various observations taken.  They organised a CT Scan and ultra sound of my neck for later in the week..  We got back to bed around 4am and now I was just too tired to run in the race – although the discharging doctor had said I could!

Where are we now with all the hoopla?  My GP says we have to assume it was a minor stroke until we prove otherwise, so I’m having a number of other tests to make sure my brain is working – one of them is an MRI, but I have to wait for a Neurologist to order that (might be a while).  The other possibility is a migraine, however as I’m 44 my GP thinks I would have demonstrated other migraine symptoms before now, if that is what it is.  There is also a possibility we could never find out what went wrong and I could continue as normal, however thanks to Doctor Google we are very well informed as to all the “possibilities”.

Upon reflection this whole episode has been hardest on Simon – he has been very concerned, watching my every move.  When you research stroke you find out that 20% of people who have a TIA will have another stroke (minor or major) within one week of the first.  A minor stroke is considered a warning, hence Simon’s concern, even loosing sleep over it!  The first week is over.

For me its a strange sort of place to be – I feel like I’m in limbo until we get some kind of answer – physically I’m pretty fit and healthy (actually I’m fitter/healthier than most people), but my brain may not be as happy.  This whole thing is like a silent attacker just waiting in the shadows or maybe its nothing and we are just “jumping at shadows”.  It would just be nice to know.

Of course there is the whole mortality issue that a thing like this makes you face!  Its seriously not something I have spent much time thinking about in regards to myself – you see I’m going to live till I’m 100 at least, so this little blip doesn’t fit into my world view!  Plus, two weeks before this episode I ran my fastest marathon time ever – by a whole 14 minutes (3.36)!  So you can see why this all just feels a bit surreal.

Believe it or not, I am quite a shy person underneath – I can hear all my friends laughing   Yes I talk a lot but I generally only share the stuff thats working and stuff thats not super personal!  I’ve decided to change that a bit and write about all sorts of things including the things I don’t usually talk about – why?  Two reasons: if I share some of my stories, I may be able to help others with similar challenges and also just for me – a little self counselling if you like.

The fall out of this curve ball is that Simon and I are even more determined to follow our dreams, smell the roses and create a life worth writing about!

I’d love to hear from you, so please leave a comment or share this post if you think it might help others!

Talk real soon

This is a step up from my 42.197k marathons & as I step over that distance it is also called an ultra marathon!

Training at this time of year has its advantages the biggest being a ‘guilt free’ Christmas

However todays run was not that easy.  Looking back I can see all the mistakes I made before setting out on my weekly LONG run, which is needed when training for long distance.  I didn’t really plan to run in the afternoon, it just kind of fit in with what the family was doing and meant I could get it out of the way

Before you run a long run – which could mean various lengths depending on your experience/goal race etc. – you need to prepare your water, gear (including glide to stop rubbing), the track, your food and even a day before think about getting some sleep..

Well I broke many of these rules before my long run (24.5k) today, this can be a very dangerous thing when you are out pounding the pavement/paths for 2.5 hours and your not prepared..  These are the things I didn’t think about much before I set out today: not enough water (it was warm), only 2 glucose tablets, no food since breakfast (ran at 4pm), for the last 2 night I went to sleep after midnight & I had a filling replaced yesterday (including the numbing drug).  So all in all the fact that I actually finished standing was a miracle!

Lesson here:- “Be prepared.”

I do feel awesome now because I’m getting closer to my goal at the end of February and every long run is one more important step towards that ultimate goal – every run between now and then is a small goal of its own achieved!   Lots and Lots of little steps towards the 50k goal!