Monthly Archives: November 2018

Autoimmunity, Reflection, Running, Transformation, Uncategorized

Chronic Illness: A Reconciling

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It was Thursday evening, November 15th. I was tired. REALLY tired. As in, I can’t get myself off the couch or even read a book tired. Again. M had been gone for nearly three weeks, at training for a new airplane. And despite having the best week of training since at least April the week prior, I hadn’t ran a step in a five days and counting. But I wasn’t frustrated, mad, or disappointed. Of course I was tired.

It’s been three years since the flare of Hashimoto’s thyroiditis really ramped up and laid me flat for the first time. Four years since it started percolating in the background. During that time, it’s only been in the last 17 months that I’ve fully committed to regaining health and wellbeing. The first few years consisted of a heavy dose of denial with a side of stubbornness and a shot of insolence. Because I lived with Hashi’s for so long without any of the “normal” complications (I was initially diagnosed in 2000 at the age of 25), I assumed I was different, special even. I trained harder and at a higher volume than medical professionals said I could, I didn’t follow a paleo diet or the more restrictive Autoimmune Protocol. In fact, I was vegetarian for nearly fifteen years, which flew in the face of known best practice (in my defense, none of this I knew for the first ten years). I held stressful a job, and trained hard even while giving plenty of attention to my career. It wasn’t unusual for me to get up at 4-4:30am and run 10-12 miles before work. I didn’t consider the pace I kept to be remarkable or unusual, most of my runner-friends did the same, many raising a family on top of it. M and I traveled, going on vacations where we hiked or skied the days away. I thoroughly enjoyed my life and how I spent my time.

When I first started to get sick, I didn’t realize what was happening. I thought if I just waited it out, it would resolve itself on its own. Initially, signs of the flare only showed up in training. My exercise tolerance was down, my weight started to creep up despite few changes to diet or training volume. I thought I was just getting “old” as this was about the time I turned 40. And recognizing that I’ve been running since I was 11, I expected my performances to plateau sooner than some of my friends who didn’t begin training until later in life. I could explain it all away. My job was stressful, but I didn’t consider this to be the source of the problem, even though intellectually  I knew the dangers of chronic stress. After six months, I went to see a Naturopath in Fort Collins who worked with athletes. My local endocrinologist was terrible and I knew she’d be no help. He uncovered some nutritional deficiencies and saw some warning signs in regards to the Hashi’s, but being a Naturopath couldn’t do anything about it. Looking back, this is the moment, in late 2014, when I should have found a functional medicine MD. I don’t know how much of what followed could have been prevented, but with the right medical care I’m guessing a fair amount of it. I worked with a dietitian to address the nutritional deficiencies, which included adding meat back into my diet (something I still haven’t fully reconciled, four years later), and talked to my endocrinologist back home in Illinois about the Hashi’s. He didn’t see anything that concerned him, he assured me I was fine. I trusted him.

Throughout 2015, things got much worse. I’d run my last marathon in April of that year, which coincidentally was also my last Boston. I ran well through the summer, but my dad getting diagnosed that August coupled with an even more stressful new job seemed to be my undoing. By October of that year, my weight was as high as it’d ever been and I was barely running. My endocrinologist continued to insist I was fine – the 20-25 lb weight gain was not a red flag to him, neither was my nearly complete intolerance to exercise. Late 2015 is when I finally found a few doc. I’d researched Hashi’s extensively by now, and knew what I needed. Using the website for the Institute of Functional Medicine, I found Dr. Sarah Zielsdorf. I saw her for the first time in January 2016. We talked about chronic stress and diet, but I still underestimated the work I needed to do to get well. I didn’t make meaningful change to my diet, still riding the wave of cockiness born from 15 years of doing what I wanted while living with this condition. I worked part-time from Oct. 2015-Oct 2016 – this was my “sacrifice” – and in seeing some recovery, assumed I was out of the woods. My weight was still high, my training still a third of what it used to be. Turns out, I was still standing in the middle of the forest, not remotely close to finding my way out. I took a full-time job at the local health department in Nov. 2016 that kicked off the final march to rock bottom.

In the eight months I worked at the health department, I came down with five colds, had the stomach flu for the first time in over a decade, had more asthma flares than the entirety of my previous 41 years on the planet, and gained an additional five pounds, just for good measure. My training came to a complete halt that spring. I’d applied to Wilder a week into my new job, while still riding the wave of progress I made in 2016. I learned I’d been accepted before Christmas that year, and by the time I arrived at Caldera in late May 2017, I was a sick as I’d ever been. While I would give about anything to go back and attend that retreat healthy and fit, meeting those women for that weekend in the woods at precisely the moment I did gave me the courage to make the radical sacrifices needed to get well. In them, I could see how sick I was. How I could barely complete the workouts, how much I missed being able to use my body in sport. I’d go home from the retreat and give notice at my job, committing to myself to take as much time as needed to get well.

It would take another year and the onset of some fairly disruptive digestive issues for me to finally tackle my diet, but in doing so, I’ve found what I believe the last piece of the puzzle. I’m still frustrated with myself, that it took this long for me to finally address my diet, but stubbornness is a hard drug to quit. My weight fluctuated over the last year, consistently hovering 15-25 lbs above my former training weight, with another high point coming this past September. Since I’ve been addressing nutrition, I’ve lost about 10 lbs and started training again. By early November progress was coming quick, quicker than it has in some time, before fatigue forced some time off mid-month.

Addressing the digestive issues brought forth an unexpected benefit, a full reconciling of how life has changed with this flare. Somehow in recognizing that my body won’t tolerate certain foods as it has in the past, it allowed me to make peace with other things that were altered by this flare. I acknowledge that my body will likely never tolerate the stress levels it did before, which dramatically shifted how I think about my career, and role it plays in my life. In October, I took a part-time job as the education coordinator at the local arts center, working with a friend I made through rotary when we lived here the first time. The flexible schedule and reduced hours (~20 hrs/week compared to 40+) fit perfectly with where I’m at right now, as does my lack of responsibility when compared to my previous work. I’m still considering going back to school, having been accepted to an online Masters program that starts in January. Working part-time and with less stress leaves physical and mental energy for me to devote to other areas of my life such as training and traveling. During the flare, work got most of my focus. It was a choice I made, but not consciously. It took taking a break from my career to really sort through how I wanted to divvy up my much smaller pie. We’re going to Breckenridge in January, and I expect to have the energy to ski for the first time in a few years.

Lastly, I acknowledge that getting over-tired is part of my life now. I can’t just power through being over-scheduled as I did pre-flare. I can’t train through fatigue as I did pre-flare. De-programming YEARS of “just endure and persevere” mentality, which running and training only reinforced, has been very, very hard. But I’ve done it. Which is how I found myself couch-bound last week, without much disappointment or animosity. Of course I was tired. We traveled to see three concerts in October. M was gone for three weeks in a row, highly unusual for him outside of deployments, leaving me to get up with our early-rising pup while I was already short on sleep. I started a new job. Lots of good stuff, but lots of good stuff that made me tired. So I took a week off of running. A week off, immediately following the week where I had a breakthrough with training. A recognition that it would be a big set back, as I don’t have enough training under my belt to just jump back in after a week away. But by eating a nutritious, anti-inflammatory diet, and resting as much as I could, I knew that I was doing what I needed to do to ensure the fatigue resolved itself as quickly as it could. And that I’d be ready to resume training when it passed.

I still don’t know what all of this means for racing, if I’ll ever be able to train for and race marathons again. I don’t know if I’ll be able to work full-time in the future, at a job with a nice office and fancy title again. I don’t know if I care. My pie might have permanently shrunk itself during all of this. If it did, I can live with that. I have a lot of pride for what I accomplished professionally and through running while I was healthy. I never thought I’d be fast enough to run Boston five years in a row, or that I’d be a dean. But those accomplishments don’t carry as much weight as they used to. They didn’t make me a better person, or more valuable to society. I’m certain I over-valued them at the time. I appreciate the perspective I’ve gained while being sick, the clarity it fostered. The recalibration of priorities. I’ve been forced to make hard choices about how I spend my time, as doing it all is literally not an option anymore. I’m young enough that I hopefully still have quite a bit of time on this earth. It’s safe to say that the next 20 years will look radically different than the previous 20. And while I wouldn’t have chosen any of this, and I occasionally do get very angry about it all, I’m curious and invigorated by this knowing.

“Illness is the night side of life, a more onerous citizenship. Everyone who is born holds dual citizenship, in the kingdom of the well and in the kingdom of the sick. Although we all prefer to use the good passport, sooner or later each of us is obliged, at least for a spell, to identify ourselves as citizens of that other place.” ~ Susan Sontag

Introversion, Politics, Uncategorized

Confessions of a Campaign Staff Newb

The noise was deafening. I don’t know how many people they anticipated at the party, but the room was packed. I have no idea what this crowd was doing on Election Day two years ago, but I was at home with my husband watching early returns through horrified eyes. I went to bed extremely early that night, unable to watch the train wreck that was taking place. Upon waking Wednesday morning, November 9, 2016, I immediately checked Twitter to see my worst fears confirmed. Our country elected a foul-mouthed, misogynistic bigot as president. I honestly don’t remember much about the other races on the ballot that year, beyond my senator Tammy Duckworth (Tammy Duckworth!!), mostly because of how unbelievable the race for president became.

For me, that election was a reckoning.  Hillary Rodham Clinton’s candidacy laid bare once and for all how far women still had to go in order to break through that final glass ceiling. Much would come to light thanks to #metoo about how terrible men in media shaped our national dialogue about her candidacy, her viability as a candidate. Men such as Matt Lauer, Charlie Rose, Mark Halperin. But the deed was done as they say, and no measure of consequence could set back the clock a decade or two (or three) to change the conversation about the woman who was bold enough, ambitious enough, to want more.

But her candidacy and ultimate failure lit a lot of us on fire. I’m guessing there was no shortage of people, particularly women, in that big hotel lounge on Tuesday night who were there in large part due to Hillary Rodham Clinton. Women like my dear friend Jill, who the morning after in 2016 said “what next?” and immediately got to work connecting with other people who felt the same. I’ve known Jill for ten years, since we worked together as administrators at the local community college. We became good friends after we moved back from Colorado several years ago, and the conversations she, myself and our friend Julie have about politics at our regular dinners are always a highlight of my month. These women are thoughtful, articulate, well-read, but most of all gracious and kind. I’ve learned so much from them in their willingness to talk about Hard Things.

Several months went by, and we’d get regular updates from Jill regarding the local meetings she attended. Soon enough, she floated the idea of running for office. Deliberately and intentionally, she set her sights on her state house race, as the current representative had been in office for nearly 20 years and ran unopposed for the last decade. This was summer 2017, and I couldn’t have imagined in my wildest dreams that just a few months later I’d be joining her campaign staff. But there we were at a dinner that September, with Jill mentioning her difficulty at finding a campaign treasurer, and me just a few months into my sabbatical to finally address my persistent and debilitating health issues. Knowing nothing of political campaigns, but with an affinity for numbers and mundane details, I thought I could help. So before I could talk myself out of it, I jumped in. We were nearly a year into the Trump presidency and in many ways, he proved as terrible as we feared. Voting wasn’t enough at this point, I needed to DO something.

So that’s how I found myself at a watch party Tuesday night, an event coordinated by the McLean County Democrats. Being an introverted introvert means I didn’t attend many events during Jill’s campaign, preferring to work anonymously in the background, but I recognized a lot of faces that night. I felt part of something bigger than myself, part of something even bigger than Jill’s campaign. This was the start of a movement, regardless of who won or lost.

As the night wore on, the energy in the room got more intense. Returns on the east coast started coming in, the crowd cheering or booing with every result. I took refuge in the war room for a time, sitting with Alanna, Jill’s campaign manager, while she watched for returns. Even though I rarely stay up past 10p, I wanted to be there as our local races were announced. Lizzy, Jill’s volunteer coordinator and a candidate for county board in my district, rode the roller coaster of thinking she’d lost but then learning she’d won. Two more county board candidates won their races, as did the dem candidates for state-wide offices. Jill would lose her race, despite running an incredible campaign, as would the other dem candidates for state and US house.

Even though the results were a mixed bag for local candidates, Tuesday night felt like a tremendous win. Not only did local residents have more ballot choices than they’ve had in decades, but local democrats were energized and mobilized like never before. All residents benefit from an engaged and participatory electorate, and the increased organization by local democrats is no exception. Voter turnout in my county increased from 49.2% in the 2014 midterms to 61% this year. Because so many races were contested, elected officials participated in debates and answered questionnaires…or didn’t answer them, which was feedback in-and-of itself. Many of these same elected officials hadn’t been held to account for their votes in years. So even though a number of our candidates lost, they forced increased engagement from those who did get elected, a win for all constituents. The fire that started on November 9, 2016 is in many ways still just a spark. It will take time for democrats to build the visibility and infrastructure to win more elections locally, and this year was an important next step.

For me personally, getting involved with Jill’s campaign provided an outlet for the seemingly endless frustration and despair that accompanied the news reports each morning. I still can’t reconcile that we are a country that imprisons children, that sends the military to the border to confront asylum seekers, that put another sexual assaulter on the Supreme Court. But writing checks, keeping spreadsheets, making deposits provided an unlikely outlet for that frustration. Knowing that I was doing something to get good people elected provided tremendous peace-of-mind.

For my friends who are similarly discouraged, regardless of political affiliation, I encourage you to connect with local politics. There is no shortage of campaigns that need good, dedicated volunteers. While there will always be a need for canvassers and phone banking, there many other things that don’t require knocking doors or making calls. I couldn’t have imagined two years ago that a good friend of mine would be running for office, or that I would be volunteering with her campaign. But I am so encouraged knowing that people like her are stepping up and stepping in, and many of those candidates got elected Tuesday night. And many more people like me were pulled in with them. Together, I believe we are laying the foundation for transformative change in this country.

And I’m going to try to get myself to more meetings now that this campaign is wrapping up (there are still checks to write and data entry to do, even after the election). I want to stay engaged with this movement, to get more connected. There are municipal elections next spring, and then it’ll be time to start looking to 2020. But not until next month. During this month’s meeting I’ll be at the spa.

Autoimmunity, Running, Transformation, Uncategorized, Whole30

42 Days Without Sandwiches Or Bad Foods Do Exist

Six weeks. It’s been six weeks since I had a sandwich. You see, I love sandwiches. Soft bread, crusty bread, lots of toppings, a few toppings (I’m looking at you PB & J), I don’t discriminate. They’re all wonderful little creations that I enjoy immensely. Part of joining the Nutritional Freedom program was reconciling that I’d be breaking up with sandwiches for a while, potentially a long while. Sure I enjoy pizza, burritos, toast, and the occasional beer, but I REALLY LOVE sandwiches. This would be hard. But not being able to run and race, and seeing the physical manifestations of inflammation in and on my body, was much, much harder. I could give up sandwiches for a while if it meant I could train again, if I could repair my relationship with food – a relationship that was heavily damaged over the last several years of being sick.

Five years ago, before the autoimmune flare that changed the entire fabric of my life, I was vegetarian and had been for more than ten years. I certainly held no shame for those that chose to eat meat, but animal welfare was important to me and our food system  was/is terribly broken. I ate when I was hungry, enjoyed treats on occasion, and ran A LOT-50-75 miles most weeks. I was thin, fit, healthy. Having been active my entire life, I avoided the complicated relationship with food that is many woman’s experience. I knew I was extremely fortunate.

Then I got sick, and was sick for a good long while. I no longer had energy to cook, and a stressful job changed what foods I craved. Low iron levels were suddenly an issue, and a dietitian I was working with at the time suggested I start eating meat again. I thought about it extensively and decided that I wanted to be healthy more than anything, so I reintroduced meat into my diet. It was super-weird at first, and while it’s been four years since I began eating it again, I still haven’t reconciled how I feel about our food system and how we treat our animals. I am careful about what meat I purchase, and get the best quality I can find. But this was the start of my using food to heal myself, a journey that would come full-circle this fall.

As my health issues progressed, I read extensively about other women who’ve used a paleo diet, or a modified version of it called the Autoimmune Protocol, to recover from autoimmunity. Inspired by their experiences, I dabbled with changing my diet, never fully committing. Beyond being vegetarian, I’ve never excelled at following dietary rules of any kind. I bought into the “all foods in moderation” philosophy, even though this approach was clearly not doing me any favors. I’d experience small improvements in my recovery and see it as proof that I was different, that I didn’t need to take such drastic dietary measures to heal.

But then this spring happened. As I shared on social media and here on my blog earlier this year, I felt good enough through the winter to ramp up training again, to think about racing. I ran the Tenacious Ten in Seattle in April with some of my Wilder sisters and ran a local race, a 12k, a few weeks later. Both were terrible, but most especially the 12k. I walked the last half of that race because of how upset my digestive system was, eventually throwing my bib in a trash can at the last aid station before the finish. This was the start of what would be several months of significant digestive issues, issues that were made especially worse while running. Things escalated even more when on vacation with my family in early August, which effectively ended my outdoor running until joining Nutritional Freedom in mid-September. The five months it took me to seek out help is a good indicator of how stubborn I was about not changing my diet. “There is no such thing as a bad food or food group”, I kept telling myself, “moderation is healthier”!

For some people, perhaps. But not for someone who has an autoimmune condition and the gut issues that typically accompany them. I felt like I was at a real fork-in-the-road. Either I wanted to train and race again, or I didn’t. Either I wanted to continue carrying the extra 20-25 lbs I’ve had the last three years, or I didn’t. Either I wanted to repair my relationship with food, damaged by years of being sick, or I didn’t. Finally in mid-September I was tired of my own bullshit. I reached out to Claire, committed to her program – a significant time and financial commitment, and got down to the hard work of fixing what was broken.

I wrote about my first few weeks in the program and the early wins I had here. Good stuff continues to happen. I’ve been at this long enough now that following a paleo diet is not hard. I can quickly discern what I can eat at a restaurant, avoid cookies in the break room at work, find compliant ways to satisfy food boredom. Being able to run again, especially outdoors, is a tremendous reward. I’ve lost enough weight that I’ve had to take a few pairs of pants to the tailor to be altered. I don’t feel like food has a mental hold on me anymore, and even when I’m busy and distracted, I’m still able to make good decisions for myself.

About two weeks ago, I discovered that coffee was the culprit of the digestive issues that lingered, so I cut that out too. I’ve delayed reintroduction a few weeks to let the inflammation from the coffee resolve itself fully before tossing anything new into the mix. And when I do get to reintroduction, there is a lot I won’t reintroduce. There are things I know I shouldn’t be eating and foods I already know I don’t tolerate well, so those foods automatically go into the “rarely consume” category. Foods such as milk, yogurt, and gluten-containing grains. Foods I’m curious about include cheese, peanut butter (peanuts are legumes so not considered paleo), chocolate and gluten-free alcoholic beverages such as wine and margaritas. My beloved sour beers will likely remain a “rarely” food thanks to the gluten they contain.

During the six weeks in this program, I’ve thought a lot about the “there is no such thing as a bad food” movement. I’ve decided it should read “there’s no such thing as a bad food if you have a normal, well-functioning digestive system”. I believe people who promote these food-inclusive messages mean well, but seriously do not appreciate the problems that arise when you live with an irritable or malfunctioning digestive system. And how sometimes healing requires drastic measures. The more my gut heals, the more foods I will be able to healthfully tolerate. But the healing must come first. A healing diet in my case is a restrictive diet, and I am grateful that it’s a tool available to me. I refuse to feel shame because I am not eating certain foods. While I am jealous of those who can eat grains and dairy without any issues, I finally realize am not one of those people. Many of us who follow a restrictive diet do so for health reasons. Whether it be weight management, insomnia, digestive issues, acne, gallbladder attacks, diabetes, irritable bowel syndrome, Crohn’s, celiac, heart disease – or any other inflammation-related condition, many, many people are able to heal themselves through diet. Recovery for each of us looks different, especially for those of us living with chronic health conditions, but food is one of the tools at our disposal and we shouldn’t be shamed for using it. I’m getting more comfortable pushing back when I see the no-such-thing-as-a-bad-food-group messages, even though I hate to be contrary. I literally would not be running at all right now if it weren’t for switching to a paleo diet. The foods we eat is such an individual act, and there is room for all of us at the table. If women such as Kristen Boehmer and Sarah Ballentyne, Ph.D. hadn’t shared their own journeys and shown the way, I wouldn’t have known how a healing diet could help me. I wouldn’t have known that Claire’s program was the right one for me, as I could see where I needed to go thanks to Kristin and Sarah’s blogs/social media, but had no idea how to make it happen for myself. Claire provided the road map.

Six weeks remain in the Nutritional Freedom program, and once I start reintroduction, I will be getting into the “freedom” part of the show. Patience will be required, as foods that I don’t tolerate now, might be agreeable with another month or two of healing. I’m so encouraged by the progress that I’ve made so far that I can give my body the space to heal on its own timeline. I don’t need to rush it or force anything. I’m signed up for a trail race outside San Francisco in February with some girlfriends, and just want to make it to the start line fit and healthy. Without Nutritional Freedom, I would’ve been spectating. Again. Optimism has been on short supply the last four years, but this really does feel like the last climb out. Life will be different on the other side, and I’m ok with that. I’ve been deeply changed by what’s happened the last few years and my priorities are much different. But my love of running and desire to share races with my friends is one thing that’s remained. I’ve held onto it more tightly than is probably healthy, and I think a lot of people would’ve given up by now. But I’m extremely stubborn. Running that race with my friends in February would be a nice bookend to the last few years, a way of putting it behind me. And it would make 42 days (and counting) without sandwiches totally and completely worth it.