For the longest time, I told the same story again and again when people would tell me to sit still: "I can't relax." I'm starting to learn how and why that's true, but before I get into that, let me rewind to 4 am when the alarm went off.
Photo on Brad's phone, taken by a willing fellow parkrunner, with our buddy, Bob who has become a parkrun tourist through reading about our adventures. Adjusted using the Microsoft Photo Editor because the light made my face look washed out. Or maybe it's a sign that I'm actually washed out.
We had one more parkrun to do to complete the whole of South East Queensland. We've also been working on Brad's "Cowell Club" challenge (i.e. going to 100 different parkrun locations). This meant we needed to wake up at 4 am, be in the car by 4:30 am, so we'd have time for a bathroom break, a warm-up run and time to find the briefing area all before the First Timer's Welcome at 6:45 am, for a 7 am (parkrun) start.
It was a pleasant, undulating course through the Botanical Gardens at Toowoomba (west of Brisbane City). There were around 300 people (typical for that location) which made it pretty squishy where I was running in the middle of the pack.
I ran well. I "stayed inside of myself", as Brad tends to say when he's being mindful of what his body is telling him and not overextending just to keep up with others. In this regard, I listened to my body well today. My right calf I've been rehabbing was okay. My lungs were okay. My heart was okay. And the long, slow, gentle but seemingly-never-ending hill that everyone else bitches about on that course and than most middle of the pack peeps have to walk parts of I just slowly sailed right through.
I guess the cooler weather must have helped. Only a few days ago it was (strangely) 30'C in the afternoon; this morning in Toowoomba it was 14'C-feels-like-10'C. I managed to speed up for the final 400 metre loop around the oval to the finish line. If I look like I'm breaking here at the finish line (below), I am; just beyond the finish line was a line of people collecting their finish tokens, so I had to slow down quickly.
Running steps, done. Finish time, 33:44. Awesome.
Next, it was off to the markets conveniently on across the road each Saturday morning. I wanted to pick up some good quality sourdough - my favourite I've found so far (inconveniently available 2 hours drive from home). And since I really like a particular farmer ("John") I grabbed some asparagus from his stall before we headed out.
Before we left that part of town altogether, Brad lead me to the epic playground. He knows how much I love play equipment and wanted to make sure I saw this. Maybe it was the cold. Maybe it was that it rained overnight. Or maybe I just felt a bit too big to be sharing the equipment with the 3 and 4-year-olds on there. The most enthusiasm I could muster was to balance on the climbing web; very unlike me.
We had one last planned stop before returning home; Table Top Mountain. We love climbing things. We love hiking. And we'd seen views of Table Top Mountain in previous trips to Toowoomba.
I knew it was steep but I was a bit surprised when the sign said it would take 140 minutes to do this (just less than) 2 km return trip. How hard was this track?
Turns out it was hard. Even for my generally fit, strong body. Even for my very-experienced hiking legs. Even for my I-can-tackle-almost-anything-feet.
This was the view from the first knoll (read: little hilltop).
To get there we'd had to climb up very steep dirt and rock tracks (that most of my family and many of my friends really wouldn't be up for doing). And then we had to continue climbing over (literally) tonnes and tonnes of this loose rock.
And then we had the "rock scramble" that Brad had read about (but failed to tell me about in advance). Whenever we see the words "rock scramble" in the description of a hike online I know I'm going to need to pull out my rock climbing skills from my life as a climbing guide (over a decade ago). Yes, it was steep enough that I actually had to use my hands and feet (and place each one thoughtfully and deliberately, because a fall from this wall would have resulted in serious injury or even death).
It was not a short rock scramble!
Knowing I was probably pushing the limits of my physical endurance I told Brad we needed to turn around at 10:30 am (40 minutes after starting up this steep climb). Luckily this allowed us to get to the top, do a loop and take a bunch of photos. We were back up at the car, having already clocked 18,000+ steps for the morning (& 3x my daily elevation goal) by about 11:15 am.
Next, we needed to drive home. Thankfully Brad was up for driving and, with a quick stop to refill water bottles, we made a beeline for home.
I drank my pre-prepared green smoothie as my second lunch (having scoffed 3 protein bars and some corn chips for elevensies soon after parkrun... at 9 am :P) and read a text from my boss telling me he had Covid. Ho hum.
By 1:30 pm we were home. The plan was to shower briefly and sleep deeply (alone) to recover from a big morning and help my immune system fight anything it might have picked up from work yesterday.
But it didn't work that well. Thinking. Worrying. Stressing. Playing out scenarios in my head. Before I knew it, Brad was opening the bedroom door to slowly wake me up ahead of dinner (as I had asked).
I was shattered, so shattered I could cry.
Instead, I prepped a green smoothie for him to have his daily dose of green and then asked him to finish off the super-loud-noisy-awful-can't-stand-it part while I went to another room, closed the door and sat with my emotions.
I tapped (used EFT). I breathed. I let myself tell the truth about how I was feeling. I lay down again. And I breathed some more.
And once I was calmer I was able to give myself a genuine pep talk. I realised how big my day had been (for me). I congratulated myself on how well I was doing in trying to care for myself. And I remembered what I'd been learning from Nervous System Expert, Irene Lyon (and is the reason I'm still overdoing it, still struggling to care for myself, still endlessly worrying about things outside my control and still struggling to relax, and therefore sleep):
When we have unresolved trauma in our system we can't turn off the stress response. We stayed locked in patterns of fight, flight or freeze (or switch between them) and struggle to regulate our emotional state. When we are locked in these stress states we cannot relax and we cannot heal. We are endlessly tired. We get sick and we struggle to get well.
I've paraphrased, but that's the gist of her main (expert) thesis. And it's so helpful for me to know, that as much as I know I am incredible, and the things I can do inspire the heck out of some people, when I struggle to relax, when I struggle to sleep and I wonder if I'm ever going to be as calm, healthy and resilient as I used to be, these teachings help me understand what's going on and where I need to put my focus next in order to be the happy, healthy and wealthy woman my soul knows is possible.
(All photos, bar the very top one, were taken by Brad, aka. 