If you’ve run into me in the last few weeks (or if you perhaps see me twice a week for physical therapy) you may have been surprised (disappointed) at my lack of enthusiasm for my recent recovery progress. I’m off the crutches finally and coming back little by little, getting to slowly reintroduce my body to lifting, cycling, and swimming, and regular mobile life things. In the last week I was even cleared to start running on the alter-g (anti-gravity) treadmill. And yet, other people are more excited about this tangible, visible progress than I am. Like every stage of this thing I’m now waging a new mental war, this time against the most devious foe yet: Apathy. 

I had big plans for 2019, but obviously plans change. I’ve been fully off the crutches for four weeks as I write this, and while I’m so happy to put those horrible ten weeks behind me and get some of my life back, in a lot of ways the hard work is just beginning. This part of the journey has more highs than the previous chapter, but the lows are more complicated – physically and yes, mentally. Yeah I’m still a total head-case. (There’s something comforting in consistency!) 

As the mental steeplechase rages on, the biggest of (many) remaining hurdles is simply, what’s the point? What is the end goal here? I’ve heard a lot these last few months about how the best stories are comeback stories, but I’m still not sure I want to come back. 

This “comeback” has been a battle of competing personality flaws: fear and ego. Twin faults feeding off each other, arresting my progress and hijacking even my desire to progress. There is of course the literal fear with each new bit of physical exertion that that the hip won’t be able to take it and I’ll  be back on the crutches or under the knife. And there’s fear that even if the hip technically holds, my old abilities won’t come back. That more insidious fear triggers my ego, which barrels over every other thought and impulse shouting to shut the whole show down before I embarrass myself. Whether swimming, spinning, or lifting, it’s painfully apparent with each workout that I’m woefully out of shape, miles away from the person I was six months ago. I’m embarrassed by who I’ve become, I’m afraid I wont get back the old me, I’m afraid that others will laugh at me and my middling fitness, I’m afraid I won’t know myself or how to be happy with myself if I can’t at least be the mediocre athlete I used to be, and I’m overwhelmed by the work ahead. And it’s a battle not to let those narcissism-born fears overshadow my will to keep going and to keep having goals.

On top of being a scaredy baby, this is a lot of work. It might be years of work, just to get back to where I previously was. Not gonna lie: doing it all over again feels in some (a lot of) way(s) like a waste of time. It took years to get to where I was, who wants to spend years retracing those steps?

I can’t stop comparing myself to where I was and where I am too. I was going to have another go at Boston in a few weeks; I was going to do it right this time and train hard – go for a marathon PR even. My current best time of 3:26:41 has stood for a few years and I was feeling that sub-3:20 I am so sure is in these legs was ready to come out. And other PRs too. Before the fracture my swim times were finally dropping and I was pulling out more sub-7s in my runs and holding steady 20+mph on the bike over more challenging and longer rides. I felt like I was on the verge of a break through and I felt hungry to put in the work to get there. Now I’m not running Boston or even the Cherry Blossom Ten Miler, and my whole season is a question mark: What will I be allowed to do when? What will I even be capable of?  

Since I’m airing my arrogance I’ll just say it: I am terrified to have to go slow. Because who am I if I’m not in the first corral? If I don’t BQ? If I don’t qualify for Nationals? Will it even be enjoyable if I’m not performing the way I can – or used to can? I ran a 10 mile PR in Cherry Blossom last year and in April 2018 I felt like I was just scratching the surface, just finally starting to inch toward my full potential. If and when my body can physically handle ten miles again – I’m not even cleared for the Cherry Blossom 5k this year – how will I mentally handle it if I’m running 30, 60, hell 160 seconds/mile slower than I used to?

After making your mind up to go for big dreams, to prioritize those dreams, to get down and dirty and uncomfortable and sacrifice for those dreams, how do you take, ‘no,’ or ‘not yet,’ or maybe ‘not ever’ as an answer? How do you scale down your hopes and goals to match your reality? And how do you content yourself with smaller victories?

On the heels of 5 months away from running, ten weeks away from everything – even walking – I am trying to be happy about the baby steps and take nothing for granted. And I’m disappointed to not be the ecstatic person I thought I’d be at this point. Teaching spin again has brought me joy, and I am savoring every bit of walking, so it’s not total doldrums over here. I just expected to be overjoyed at each activity I got back in my life. I thought for sure the first minute running on the alter-g treadmill would bring happy tears and euphoria – I craved and looked forward to that overjoyed feeling. Instead I felt and feel mostly numb, which is at least an improvement on actively miserable. 

Add to that indifference the fact that I’m completely terrified to return to my previous hustle and demanding routine. While I never became comfortable in my sedentary crutchlife, getting back to twoaday workouts, strenuous Capitol Hill job, and my normal, physically-demanding up-early-home-late life is intimidating. How do I resume the old routine that took years to establish? I resorted to my natural night owl sleep-late tendencies while on the crutches which was probably a mistake. It took a lot of time and effort to reset my internal clock to go off early and I’ve undone all that time and effort in a few months. I was proud of who I’d become before this injury but it took the better part of a decade to go from wanting to make certain changes and pursue certain goals to actually living the life I was living a few months ago. How hard will it be to reestablish that routine?

Perhaps none of this would seem so insurmountable if I could reclaim the fire I had back in October to do this season and this sport right. But I don’t feel as much as a spark. On that first crazy night I wrote here that I wanted to give it all up and walk (limp) away for good. Ellen and others assured me it was normal to feel that way at first, but that I’d soon be chomping at the bit to come back. I believed them; even in that most fatalistic hour I myself expected I’d eventually regain the will to tri. Since then I’ve been waiting for the fire in my belly to reignite, and it just hasn’t. Maybe race season will do the trick; maybe seeing people get out there and get after their (our?) dreams will reawaken something. The few races I’ve watched from the sidelines so far though have only left me sad, not motivated. Worse, they’ve made me feel even further behind and unable to catch up. 

I’m thinking very seriously about pulling the plug on Iromans Lake Placid and Arizona now, while I still can. I’m not excited about them at all. I can’t imagine that Placid in July is a physical possibility let alone look forward to training for it. And I don’t think half-assing an Ironman (or two) is a great idea. So…I’m leaning toward not even trying. Who knows, maybe the desire to give it all up is that ego-fear combo getting the best of me. 

Am I a quitter? I think I might be. I quit acting, and I quit music, and while I think I had good reasons to do so and I don’t exactly regret it, I’ve long considered myself someone who gives up since I never gave those things a real go. I’ve been blown away by friends who’ve reached out and told me, so confidently, that they know I’m the type of person who doesn’t quit and fights her way back. It has warmed my heart to hear that people see me in that light, but I think they might be wrong. I fear I’m an impostor and that these  kind, faithful friends have given me too much credit. I want to be worthy of their faith in me, I want to be the person they think I am, but I don’t really feel like her. 

Maybe I’m just too far removed from anything resembling race-ready or real training. Maybe one day I’ll be cleared to run for real and I’ll rediscover my love for it. But right now it feels pretty far-fetched. I look at old training and race day pics and stats and wonder, ‘was that really me?’ I admire that girl but I don’t identify with her in any way. I want to see myself in her. I want to care. Is wanting to want it enough right now? Am I putting too much pressure on myself to feel a certain way? Do any of these questions have real answers?

In anticlimactic conclusion, if we do happen to cross paths in the not too distant future – online, in person, wherever – and you are surprised or disappointed to find that I’m not as enthusiastic about my progress as you expected, if my ambivalence seems out of place, now you know why. I thought I’d be all elation now, I’d counted on it, and while I’m less unhappy, I’m still just treading water. (But now, at least literally treading it?) I want to be as excited for me as some of you are, so please keep the good feelings coming. Maybe some of your happiness for and faith in me will rub off.

 

 

I’m just gonna keep saying the ugly parts outloud here until I get all the ugly out. (Ugly crying on the side likely included.) I hope I won’t permanently alienate any of you by bloodletting here. (Mom, you’re legally bound to me and Kim you’ve sworn partnership for life so you’re both stuck.) 

This week I had my first follow up with the orthopedist since the diagnosis (compression side femoral neck stress fracture) and it went in some ways better than expected (feared) and in other ways worse. I may or may not have spent a good (bad?) chunk of the week leading up to my appointment stalking old blogs and message boards about FNSF trying to get a bead on what to expect as next steps, wanting to feel prepared for whatever news I might get. The unexpected sentence of eight weeks on crutches had stunned me and left me a sobby puddle and I wasn’t looking to repeat that meltdown.

The day of my follow up marked seven weeks and two days (but who’s counting) since the diagnosis and the internet had me scared I might be looking at another four to six weeks on crutches. But my message board friends also had me optimistic that at least I’d be allowed to start swimming and cycling and even ellipticaling. (You know this whole experience has fundamentally altered me as the latter is not something Liz of 5 months ago would have looked forward to.) Lots of online hip fracturers reported being allowed to do those things within four to six weeks of their diagnosis and here I was at 7.285714 weeks – surely some exercise was in my immediate future!

I limped in with all this internet “knowledge” rattling around my oft-concussed skull, optimistically dreading my appointment and here’s where I am now: I can start walking a bit on my own but I have two more weeks on the crutches for most of my getting around needs. And still no training until PT starts mid-February. No real swimming, no bike, no elliptical, no nada. 

I was relieved to get to try walking unaided, but so let down at the same time. I wanted a workout more than a stroll. The news from my doctor was the exact opposite of what I’d prepared myself to hear. After my appointment I recruited some coworkers and elatedly walked (awkwardly shuffled because I can’t actually remember how to walk) a block to lunch and back; then got back to my office and felt immediately depressed again that I still can’t even sit on a bike or kick a few hundred meters in the pool. (I honestly cannot believe how strongly this has made me feel about swimming.) It’s hard to weather more disappointment – even when tempered by good news. 

With the doctor’s tentative blessing I got briefly in the water (no kicking and did a total of 4 minutes of actual swimming!) to feel things out over the weekend and continued practicing “walking” a few minutes at a time. And now, after heeding her words to be very conservative and put minimal stress on the hip, it’s aching. And I’m back to mental spiraling.

It doesn’t hurt to put weight on it; and I didn’t feel anything in the pool. It’s not a bad pain (I don’t even know if I would call it pain or more an awareness of my hip) but I’ve had some evening achiness Saturday and Sunday as I just sit, dinner, Netflix, and put myself to sleep. I know some achiness is to be expected as muscles and bones that have gone untaxed for months are asked to pick up a little bit of slack, but I’m terrified that I’m backsliding and that this is just the beginning and I’ll actually never heal all the way. I’ve experienced every emotion on the spectrum three or four times over between Thursday and Sunday and I’m exhausted. 

As I (think? guess? I) am healing physically, I can’t escape the thought that, damn, mentally this thing gets worse and worse. I thought the first day would be the lowest of this journey’s lows, and I guess it probably was the most acutely terrible I’ve felt. After my diagnosis and tearful first day on crutches my mood did improve, marginally. I’ve noted that the waterworks mercifully ran dry by day two for instance. But I mentally plateaued by the halfway point and have regressed into gloom a little more each day since.

How I hate this “healing” process. So let me count the ways. 

This will be my last blog-in-list-form for a while, I promise. (I think.) (I know) I’ve quite exhausted the format and need to move on. (I also know that people love lists [you simpletons] so just think of this as the buzzfeed [buzzkill] of sports blogs.)

Today’s self-loathing list inventories the myriad ways in which things get worse before they get better. Assuming they ever do. (I warned you I was purging the ugly, right?) Hopefully my bones are indeed regrowing under my thin skin, (only still-thin thing about me) but I can’t actually see that physical progress. What I can observe is my mental/emotional state and things on that front(al lobe) have deteriorated consistently since that negligible serotonin spike after day one. 

Oof. Ok here goes. 

I’m getting slower while everyone else gets faster.

I’m falling further and further behind in my fitness and getting it back seems more and more impossible. Several encounters with stairwells and attempted one-legged push-ups have broadcast to me how very out of shape I am. And not like offseason out of shape, but actual get a stern word from your primary care physician out of shape. Sure there are different points in the race cycle where we’re more or less fit, but I generally always maintain a baseline, and it took years to develop that fitness floor. A race cycle may be a few months of dedicated workouts in support of a specific goal but it took years to get to a place where I could always swimbikerun x number of miles at x pace. And now two sedentary months (not to mention the two months prior to the crutches without running) seem to have wiped that slate clean.

In the eight years since I started really running and the seven since I started triathlon-ing I’ve consistently improved year after year. Every season that I get a little faster is the accumulation of every season that came before it. I’ve never taken months off. Is this going to set me back to a 2016, 2014, or even 2011 version of me? Approaching my recovery and getting back to some sort of training plan doesn’t feel like a matter of weeks or even months, it feels like I have years to make up, and that’s hard to wrap my mind around. 

And all the while, everyone around me is getting faster. I’m losing weeks or months or maybe years of hard work and the people I race with (and against) are logging the miles and the workouts that are making them better. Better than they were, better than I was, better than I’ll be. I said before I don’t know if I can do this sport if I’m not competitive at it, and from where I sit (and sit and sit and sit) I’m looking at a season (if I even get a season) at the back of the pack.

And there is nothing wrong with the back of the pack! But when you get to know yourself as one kind of competitor how do you get to know yourself another way? For better or worse our identities get wrapped up in how we perform. Will I recognize myself or like myself if I go from chasing Boston and Kona and Team USA to, well to not doing those things? 

I’m getting fatter and softer.

As I said on the ‘gram I’m not fishing here so please don’t respond that I look fine and oh you didn’t notice. That’s not the point. The point is that I notice. I’m the one who can’t zip my pants. (Colleagues, please don’t look too closely or you’ll realize I’m recycling the same two work bottoms that still kind of fit day after day.) I’m the one who knows what I look like naked and I can’t stand it.  

 I didn’t get into this sport for the aesthetics (please reference my Hudson mustache and weird brown sweat stains if you don’t believe me) but I have gotten used to my body looking and feeling a certain way and I’ve unabashedly enjoyed my body looking and feeling that way. (I’ve also tailored my wardrobe to fit that body’s dimensions, hence the work wardrobe woes.) Now I don’t fit into a lot of my clothes and I’ve got flesh hanging over the sides of my pants in unwelcome, uncomfortable ways. (I’m literally sitting and typing with my pants unzipped right now for comfort.)

If you’re skeptical that I could have put on that much weight in two months I’ll remind you that it has been four since I’ve run so I was already not my slimmest when the crutches happened. Then let me be clear: I have been sitting for almost eight weeks. I’ve worked from home when I can or where the weather has forced me (crutches plus snow is a bad combination) and I have gone days at a time transitioning from bed to couch and back to bed without ever seeing the outside or more than a hundred “steps”. All in the service of putting as little strain on my hip as possible, giving it every opportunity to recover. While I sat though, my appetite remained triathlete-voracious. I went from incinerating thousands of calories a day to maybe 1200, but no one told my belly to stop being hungry all the time and so I sat, and I ate, and I expanded. 

When I’ve expressed this particular frustration to friends many have been dismissive or made me feel like a vain shitty person. It’s not crazy that I care about this. It doesn’t make me a bad person; it makes me an average 21st century American woman. So I don’t know who I am as an athlete any more, and I don’t know who I am as a corporeal human being taking up (too much) space. 

The crutches hurt.

They rub my ribs, my left leg is tired, and my right glute is screaming tight. The worst has unexpectedly been the palms of my hands. If I have to crutch a lot for work (or to satisfy a sheer stubborn need to be out and about,) the next day I can barely stand to wrap my hands around the sticks. Insult to injury: I got pads to ease the pain under my arms, but because I have pediatric crutches (no joke, my set is tiny for people under 5′) they don’t fit perfectly so my choice is between chafed ribs or wobbly under-arms. (I’ve opted for the latter.)

I  get more, not less, bored.

Doing nothing is boring. The first week of doing nothing is boring, but kind of nice. The second week of doing nothing is more boring, but you assume you’ll find a way to manage and entertain yourself. The eighth week of doing nothing is a type boring that becomes a physical sensation. It’s how I imagine it would feel to be possessed, but without the fun head spinning poltergeisty side effects.  

The migraines. They came back.

It took a few weeks for them to reemerge – the first month I thought, ‘hey! I worried for no reason!’ But the last couple weeks I’ve started to get the familiar shooting pains traversing the right side of my back up through my skull and into my right eye socket. And the nausea and light sensitivity. And the vertigo. And days in a row of pain that just sits behind my eyebrows with apparently nowhere to be and no remedy. They’re not full force yet, but if this torpid existence doesn’t change soon I know they will be. I’ll be back to crying in a dark room 4-5 nights a week. The fix is so simple: to move, every day. To be active and exert myself physically. Such a simple toll, such a hefty price if I don’t pay it. THIS NEEDS TO END. 

Digestion!

Return readers of this blog may not believe that I’m really quite regular! Even as I torture my tummy with daily doses of hot sauce and have indulged in home cooking and street meat from questionable purveyors on every corner of the earth. It turns out my easygoing digestive system (race mornings excluded) relies on lots of moving to keep things moving. I’m gonna break with oversharing tradition here and skip the details but despite efforts to eat well, including lots of fiber, I have been uncomfortable these last months. You would think my increasingly constricting waistbands could squeeze things along but apparently I’m just destined to discomfort around and through my middle section for the time being. 

That bitch irony.

This whole predicament has been marked by hillaaaaarious bouts of irony and the universe being a downright (but sooooo funny) bitch. Here’s a noncomprehensive list within a list of hysterical coincidences and catches 22 that have added a spicy dash of vindictive to this experience. 

First and foremost, 60 to zero: About a week before my diagnosis I had lunch with Coach Josh, during which we had a come-to-yeezus talk about my 2019. I explained that I wasn’t fucking around anymore. I’ve felt like I was training and performing at around 75% the past couple seasons and I was ready to get down to business and make serious progress on my Kona dreams. He agreed to the two full Ironmans I’d registered for (Lake Placid and Arizona) and was ready to push me hard. We agreed my goal was a top ten finish at one or both, and depending how things were looking in the spring, maybe even a podium. I was ready to fight, to make the sacrifices required. And a few days later I was sidelined for the foreseeable future, and maybe forever. 

In service of rededicating myself to my tri-goals right after my heart-to-heart with Josh I invested in a (pricey) pack of classes at Swimbox. My first few classes there had been really helpful and I was finally ready to, ahem, dive in and see real swim gains. I laid down some dollars to keep myself honest and committed through the winter doldrums, scheduled several months of classes, and basically immediately thereafter was told no nothing, not even swimming. 

The very day I was diagnosed I received an email with exciting participant information for the 2019 Boston Marathon, a race I knew was no longer in the cards the instant the doc said the words “stress fracture.” (Fortunately a few days after that I also got an email with instructions on how and when to cancel my hotel reservation to avoid fees.)

Two days later the new Speed Sherpa Betty Designs kits I’d been waiting so excitedly for finally arrived. Just in time to have no reason to wear them.

The following week I received great news from Wahoo that they would be replacing my defective smart trainer for free so that I could get after my winter workouts. They’ve pressed pause on that reorder since I have no use for an expensive piece of workout equipment right now. 

I’ve tried to cut down on things I know cause bone density problems, like my inhaler (breathing is overrated) and antacids (despite all the hot sauce and tummy troubles) and now caffeine! But caffeine is one of the few things that helps with the migraines. I cut diet coke cold turkey years ago to help prevent more stress fractures, but now to survive this stress fracture I’ve had to take it back up.   

My misanthropy grows.

I perversely feel less empathetic towards others. Not all others, I swear I haven’t lost perspective that many people have it far worse. But for those who don’t, and who complain, I can’t roll my eyes hard enough. People who moan about a few days sickness, or a week they have to take off running for a strained muscle, or even a few weeks off running or biking but they can still swim or lift; to all of it I think, ‘oh shut the fuck up!’ It recently took all the restraint I had left – not in high supply even when healthy – to not lay into a guy who complained on a triathlon FB group that the flu had kept him from training almost a week and oh he was so worried about the fitness he’d lost in those seven days away. Another martyr responded that he too had been sidelined sick for four days earlier and had then taken another few days really easy – only 45-60 minutes of training each – and he’d bounced right back! I think I guffawed out loud at that. Not laughed – guffawed. These jags were losing it from a couple days away. Hell they probably lost weight having the flu! LUCKY!  

Maybe this is giving me a healthy dose of added perspective to carry back into tri-life if ever I get back to it. A few months ago I might have stressed about a couple days or a week away too. (Eh maybe not.) Staring down the barrel of a yearlong recovery, stressing about a day or a week here and there now seems like an absurd luxury. 

If I can impart anything useful at all to my readers, please take this as permission to CALM DOWN. Take a step back from whatever has you rounding third to crazytown and be grateful for the fleeting nature of your malady. Conversely, next time you need inspiration to heed your 5am wakeup or to drag yourself to the pool when it’s cold or dark out, remember your own temporary frustration and remember me somewhere probably still just sitting, expanding. 

I hate sounding so negative and mean towards others pursuing the sport we all love. Friends, I am still cheering you on, I swear. I see people I care about making progress, having great races, running their first marathons, making big gains, and I am genuinely happy for them. I’m angry about my situation and loss, but I don’t begrudge others their successes or wish this on anyone else.

Just as I won’t begrudge my friends their wins, I hope you (mom, Kim, anyone else who read this far) will stay patient with me while I continue to navigate this slow, punishing road back. As I get to inch towards some degree of physical normalcy again, I’m already struck that the mental game hasn’t gotten any easier. Two painful unstable steps forward  seem to precede one to four leaps back every time. 

Obviously I’m daydreaming about 6 minute miles and century rides and the kind of long brutal training days that leave you just a puddle on the couch blindly searching for calories to shove back in. (I paint a pretty, enticing picture of the sport, no?) I have been fantasizing about the kinds of weekends I hope I’ll get back to this summer, where I’m in the saddle by 6, ride till my legs are just about fully cooked, only to dismount and take off running, so that many hours and miles later I drag myself home zombified (undead smell included) just in time to eat and sleep and do it all over again Sunday. (Huh, swimming hasn’t factored into those fantasies…but I actually miss that too.)

I’m yearning for all of the above, and for jittery race mornings, and triumphant finish lines, and hell yes podiums; but having my mobility totally upended by crutches has scaled back my fantasies to some very run of the mill activities. And since I’m in the recent habit of list-making here, I thought I’d enumerate some of those formerly unremarkable, beautiful things I can’t wait to do again:

Walk my dogs

Usually Scott and I divide dog duties pretty evenly but with hudreds of pounds of furbaby to care for – both of whom were my idea – I’m of very little help in the canine department right now. Scott is handling morning, afternoon, and late night walks and park time all by himself and it’s so much work. I hate that he has to do it on his own and while he brushes it off I know it’s asking a lot and even impacting his hours at work. I let the dogs out in the front yard to bathroom some but it’s a small city yard and they need walks and park time every day to be happy healthy hounds and I’m of no use there.

That’s a lot of stress on Scott, but it’s also making me crazy because I love spending time with my dogs – that’s why I convinced Scott we needed them! Sometimes being the one who handles morning walks is stressful, and they always drag out their evening pee to much aggravation, but I hate that I can’t take care of my puppups. I have some friends who have been helping us out by taking them to the park, and I tag along with them and sometimes with Scott, but I end up needing as much help as Birkin and Daenerys so it’s no picnic for anyone involved. (I am however so grateful to Ralph, Chandler, and Andrew for their help. [And thankful to Birkin and Daenerys for being lovable enough to attract all these helpers!])

Walk to work again (listening to my books)

I live in downtown DC because I am a city girl (snob) who hates cars and loves the District. Between traffic and the Metro’s shortcomings, it’s practically as fast to walk to work as to drive, bus, or train, and so, I walk. Whether to my office – about a 40 minute stroll – or Capitol Hill – 25 minutes to the Senate and 40 to the House – I walk. And I use that time to be alone with my Audible books and podcasts and this very pretty city. I love that time to myself in the morning and evening. My job is all about networking and always being “on” (and that’s true too of my side hustle teaching) so walking everywhere allows me to decompress – to either get my head right for the day, or shake the day out of my head. And I get through so many books walk-commuting!

Now I’m taking Lyft to and from work. It’s expensive, it’s environmentally wasteful, and it gives me anxiety. I don’t want to be in a car with a stranger that many times a day. (Mostly men, a number of whom have been creepy and one was downright threatening meriting a formal complaint.) It’s harder to listen to my books over the noise of whatever talk radio drivel or top 40 banger the driver has blasting and these rides in no way afford the recharge/discharge alone time I so treasure. Every time I hit “request Lyft” on my app I feel immensely nostalgic for my previous commute – even for all the times I’ve had to do it in DC humidity, or rain, or wind or snow. I’d take just about any weather walking over the back of someone’s car trying to ignore the dulcet, misogynist tones of Steve Harvey and Howard Stern.

MY JOB

I live in the city because I love this city and I do my job because I love my job. I’m an attorney and lobbyist (making me everyone’s favorite person) and my work on average consists of 2-3 days a week on the Hill meeting with Members of Congress and their staff on different health policy issues. My days on Capitol Hill often call for hours of walking between offices, frequently hoofing it back and forth between the House and Senate (about a half mile each way) and then followed by receptions and fundraisers in the evenings. There are days I’m on my feet for upwards of 12 hours and easily cover five or six miles.

You better believe that is not happening on the crutches.

I’ve tried to make do best as I can with calls instead of sit-downs where possible – but my work requires relationship-building and that happens face-to-face, not over the phone. A few times I’ve crutched to one of the Congressional cafeterias and posted up for an afternoon and asked staffers to come to me. This isn’t a great solution though because staffers’ schedules are tight so they don’t want to leave their offices, and a lot of the issues I work on require more privacy than a busy lunchroom affords.

And evening receptions are out of the question as the only thing more uncomfortable than crutching long distances, is standing on one leg for an extended period of time. Sure it’s been nice to have my evenings back but the FOMO is real and I fear the opportunities I’m losing to get to know the Freshman class of lawmakers. Plus DC is still an old boys’ club so I never stop feeling the pressure to go the extra mile. (Not usually a problem by me!)

This predicament has been particularly cruel as the new Congress gets sworn in. Swearing in, or open house day as we call it, is a lot of fun – especially when the most women and most diverse Congress in our country’s history are being inducted. If my normal day is miles on my feet office-to-office and capped with evening events, open house day is that on steroids; double or triple the miles covered and fetes attended. And it’s awesome. (And the last one was less than awesome.) And I could not do it the way I’d looked forward to doing when my party won back the House.  (And the last two years have been hard.) Of all the times to not be able to do the job I love  this feels particularly vindictive.

Walk  around my neighborhood 

I don’t have to say much here, I said most of it above. My city girl love of walking extends to strolls around the neighborhood. Ok my neighborhood is a little shooty, but it’s also historical rowhome-y and beautiful. (And if you can make it just a few blocks west it gets much less bangbang-y.) I love walking in DC; it’s pretty, it’s healthy, it’s environmentally and fiscally economical.  I love that I can walk most of the places I want to go. Granted I define “can walk” more liberally than most of my friends – if I have the time I’ll walk up to an hour to wherever it is I need to go just to be outside in my city. Now my “walkable” radius has been reduced to about three or four blocks from my house. (Not nearly enough blocks to get out of shooty range!)

TEACH

I’m still teaching my Thursday morning bootcamp (or “bootcrutch” as one of my students named it) but I gave up all my spin classes, and I have to ask my bootcamp regulars  for a lot of help during class as I can’t demo moves or even set up my own bench or space. In my normal, non-injured life routine I get pretty worn down teaching 4-5 classes a week, waking up early to train other people, and I often find myself dreading the 5am alarm and wishing for more mornings off. Now I can’t wait till Thursdays when I have a reason to get up and out before the sun comes up. It’s absolutely been my favorite morning of the week through this recovery. It’s like an hour-long return to my old life before limping back home to this sedentary, lonely existence.

Open doors

Doors are my nemesis. Especially heavy doors, that open away from me. They fill me with anxiety. Sometimes I literally cannot open them and I embarrass myself trying and those are the moments I really feel helpless and like an angry broken animal. (And for the record, women have been much more courteous about opening them. I’ve had several groups of men just stare at me from the opposite sides of doors to restaurants and offices that I clearly could not manage. Chivalry’s not dead, it’s just female.)

Enjoy a snowday

We got actual snow in DC! Not one of our usual over-hyped underwhelming dustings. No, we  got ten inches of fluffy powder, and a proper snow day with school and office closures all around. (In addition to the less-than-great shutdown. #snurlough) People were so excited, posting fun videos from their snowy runs, playtime with happy snowdogs, snowball fights on the Mall, the Capitol in full winter mode, while I was at home sitting and eating my feelings, growing increasingly bored and round. (Hey I may at least resemble a snowman at the end of all this!)

Eventually I had to get out of the house so I insisted on joining Scott at the dog park, but the streets were bad so I also insisted we walk. (Crutch.) It’s only three blocks and I wanted at least that much activity. It was slow-going though and in no time my arms were screaming, because it turns out crutching through a foot of snow is tantamount to shoveling it. The powder weighs down the crutches every step and within a block – a very slow block holding up a very patient man and two less patient hounds – I regretted my hubris. But by then it was too late to turn back and I don’t know when to admit defeat anyway so I stubbornly persisted.

In the end I was happy I got outside and got to see Birkin and Daenerys loving the snow with a big group of their four-legged friends, but I won’t call crutching through it and feeling like my arms were going to fall off the same as “enjoying” a snowday. And as difficult as that was, it was leaps and bounds better than the next few days when the powder melted to slush and then froze over rendering leaving my house actually impossible.

Sleep

I know I said in my attempt to itemize every possible silverish lining that I was finally sleeping and oh how wonderful it was, but that’s over now.  I think I was just catching up on a long-accumulated sleep deficit for the first couple weeks, but now that I’m back in the black I’m also back to hours of insomnia. I don’t get enough sleep during my regular unimpaired life – about 5 hours a night at least during the week – but all of the training means when I do lay my head down I’m tired and I find sleep. The past two weeks my head hits the pillow and…nothing. I stare at the ceiling for hours. If (when) I wake up (several times) in the middle of the night, where I used to fall back asleep quickly, I’m back to wide awake contemplation of the ceiling. Several times I’ve given up and ended up just reading for an hour or two at 3am. (At least I’m making an early dent in my 2019 book list. [Everyone should read Where the Dead Sit Talking!])

My routine life

It’s really simple: I like my life. I like my job. (My day job and my teaching jobs.) I like my city. I like to train. Hell, I love all of the above. And I love how I make it all fit together day in and day out.

My routine is totally exhausting, with too little sleep and too many obligations. There are plenty of mornings I that I don’t want to get up before dawn to teach, and many days that I don’t want to have backtobacktobacktoback meetings in various far away corners of Congress. I’m frequently tempted to skip evening training sessions, or to run screaming from nightly work events* in favor of sweats and Netflix and a sensible bed time.

But I love the little life I’ve built, my career, my sport, my city, and I haven’t been able to live even one single part of that life these past six weeks. The luster of having my evenings back, obligation-free, wore off almost immediately. Maybe in a few months I’ll be longing for that free time again, but right now I can’t wait to feel worn down and depleted. I can’t wait to do so many normal, small, simple, taken-for granted things again.

 

I’m sort of afraid to go back and reread my mental spiraling from a few weeks ago. From what I recall of the emotional and wine-heightened blur in which it was written and published I was not in a good place. That night I was a ball of white hot (wet) rage, crying every few minutes and thisclose to selling every piece of tri gear I own on Craigslist. Fortunately I don’t think there’s much of a market for child-sized tribikes and spandex and so Koopa Troop and Warrio and my wardrobe were spared.

I’m not going try and hold myself out as a measured adult in control of her emotions here, you know me too well for that and it’d be a lie, but I am faring marginally better. I don’t think I’ve cried since that soggy Wednesday night. (I mean I don’t think I’ve cried about this; I’ve cried plenty about other things like every Subaru commercial I’ve seen this holiday season and every time I’ve played the newest Hamildrop. [Keep reading for more on my musical theatre past…and future?])

I’ve also become moderately proficient on my temporary prostheses. Actually after 8 days at my parents very much non-ADA-compliant home in the very much non-ADA-compliant country of Mexico I’ve gotten pretty good. I’ve traversed sand, and dirt, gravel, and cobblestone, my parents’ second story kitchen and pool, and faced all of that several margaritas in.

Drunken levity aside, a week into the crutches I received some unwelcome additional clarity from my orthopedist about my recovery and in short this is going to be a very long, slow road back and she is not enthusiastic about an Ironman in July. She doesn’t know the race (IM Lake Placid) is the very last Sunday in July and didn’t rule it out so I haven’t pulled the plug yet but I had been trying to haul my wallowing ass out of the depths of self-pity and that cynical message was tantamount to her swatting me several rungs back down the mental health ladder. The small light at the end of the tunnel that had been expanding narrowed again to a barely visible pinprick of light. But like I said, I didn’t cry this time; the small part of (small) me that retained some measure of hope for 2019 must be calcifying. Hopefully my bones follow suit.

She expanded on the no-swimming-no-nothing orders in response to my request to swim sooner than 6 weeks out if I stick with a pull buoy and avoid pushing off the wall explaining that some doctors would allow that but she’s seen people with this sort of fracture end up with chronic, life-long pain and improper healing so she tends to be more conservative. Hearing that I first entertained thoughts of second and third more permissive (reckless?) opinions but I quickly abandoned that fantasy. I need to accept this situation rather than seek out someone who will tell me what I want to hear. I’m just going to do what she says. I do think she’s being overly-cautious given that the hip was already improving and there is no pain when I swim. (Or cycle or anything but run for that matter.)

See I’m trying to be a grown up and accept and not fight lest I ruin myself for good. My doctor did put it well saying, “time off now pays it forward for later.” She sees a later in my future, so long as I don’t asshole it up now. So I’m following her orders and I’m trying to stop being a whiny baby about it.

To that end I’ve been compiling a list of positive things that have happened or anything that has cheered me even a tiny bit since this diagnosis. When someone says something that gives me even the smallest boost in spirits, that grows the far away end-of-the-tunnel light just a little more, I’m trying to take note of it. So in no particular order, another, less snarky, non-comprehensive list of things that made me feel less shitty in the last three weeks:

• Damn do I have a huge community of support. This is number one and the only item in a particular order. Members of the three different tri teams on which I race, fellow trainers and clients at the several gyms and studios at which I teach, work colleagues who know how crazy I am in my non-working hours, friends from now and from every part of my life, strangers online who have found my blog and feed, have all reached out to send well-wishes and share their stories. I feel bad for myself but I do not feel alone.

• This low point in my health may get other people to commit more to their own health: A number of friends and strangers alike have messaged me that they’ve decided to see their doctors about niggling pains, vitamin d testing, and to address things they’ve put off addressing.
• Even more people have reached out and thanked me for being so honest and raw [read: ugly] in my last post. Whether injured now or previously they identified with all of the doldrums and less charitable sentiments, and unless they’re just lying to me no one seems to be holding my unpretty selfishness against me long-term.
• I’ve been able to speak to a few people who have been through this very injury. They agree, it’s a pretty miserable one, but they (mostly [eventually]) recovered fully and they came back.
• Speaking of people with hip stress fractures -though his was in a different spot – Jan Frodeno! He was forced to withdraw from Kona after winning 70.3 Worlds in an epic race in South Africa. I’ve been seriously creeping on his feed lately. He’s back to training, and perhaps he is still tilting at the the mental windmills from it but he’s putting his best face forward and I will try to emulate, after all this is more his whole life than it is mine and he has slightly more to lose.
• People are sending me so many puppy pics. (People get me. [Or I’m simple?]) My first peg-leg Saturday I even organized the whole day around going to meet a friend’s 5 week old Bull Terrier puppy. I’ve always had a thing for bullies and I’d never held a dog that young. It was pretty magical.

• Revisiting new passions! I’m taking a musical theatre class starting in January. I’m terrified. I have the same butterflies when I think about it that send me running barefoot into the nearest portapotty on race mornings. (I’ll try to get that under control though as I don’t remember actors being equally easygoing as triathletes about anxiety-related BMs.)
• Another one of those passions is that I’m writing more! Two blogs within a few weeks of each other?! (My mom and Kim must be so proud! [The rest of you may be horrified.])
• I’m sleeping, and holy moly have you all tried this? It’s great!
• People saying one day down helps put the time in perspective. (Whereas proclamations that ‘I’ll come back stronger’ just make me want to cry and punch something.) After getting the crutches on a Wednesday afternoon, blogging like a maniac Wednesday evening, I received several texts Thursday morning declaring “one day down!” So simple, so mollifying. (Then I did the math and died a little inside when I considered there were 55 more to go, but one day at a time works.)
• I have reason to skip early mornings and late nights during this darkest, coldest part of the year – when I get back to it the days will be getting longer and lighter. Someone said this a few days into my crutches-sentence and it was like the clouds parted.
• My bone density is okay. My Vitamin D is not, and there are further complications there that I’ll expound on another time, but I’m within a normal density range for my age. That. Is. HUGE.

• Great suggestions like using Calm or Headspace app. I have Calm, I used it once, and I will try to use it more, especially to get more of this sleep thing I’d been missing out on!
• I’m seeing my friends (and husband!) more. I’ve been doing dinner and drinks and at regular hours not smelling like my usual post-gym/pool half-assed application of old spice.

• And yet, I don’t have to shower every day! In these first few weeks it’s been an every other day affair including while in Mexico. I just told myself I was doing my part for the limited water table in Baja. (Shhhhh. Just let me have this one.)
• Laundry is much easier and much less disgusting. Less, uh, damp.
• I took a real vacation. Scott and I just got back from 8 days visiting my parents in Mexico and I took the opportunity to do absolutely nothing. Usually when we’re there I run on the beach, yoga with my mom, take a day trip to a little city where we snorkel with the whale sharks. Any time I vacation anywhere I try to make it active. But for the first time in I can’t even say how many years I took actual time off. I sat by my parents’ pool the whole damn week and read and snoozed and indulged in mid-day adult beverages.

• My dad was inspired to tell me a pretty crazy story from his own childhood. That man has lived a thousand lives in his 66 years and every time I get a tidbit from his adolescence it’s a treat and a trip. This time around it was the nonchalant revelation that he spent almost two years on crutches as a child. TWO YEARS! After having his leg crushed by a bag of grain 50 gallon drum of kerosene at the age of 8. He endured horrific-sounding surgery following which the chicken mesh holding his glued-together femur in place had to be periodically tightened via screws in his leg. The 1960s weren’t so long ago but medically it’s been a billion years. I never knew this story and thanks to my overwrought angst he felt compelled to share.

• A reminder to never take anything for granted? Did I get complacent and assume my body would hold up no matter what? I don’t think I did, but after two stress fracture-free seasons (a feat I credit in large part to Josh’s guidance) maybe I was getting too comfortable in my own bones. I don’t believe in fate or karma though so I’m not really buying that, but I know that if and when I’m allowed to return to training I will savor every minute of health.

Still, if I’m being honest, and I usually am, I still have a sense of lingering foreboding, or finality. That I won’t get my legs back. Or my confidence, or the will to keep trying. I’m trying to shake this sinking feeling that I’m going to do everything “right” and it’s still going to be this protracted struggle from which I’ll never truly heal. Maybe I’m just chronically disposed to hairpin trigger flights of despair. (I do convince myself every time I get a soar throat that I’ll never sing again and so far my neighbors’ wishes haven’t come true on that. [Although my musical theatre teacher and classmates may argue when I meet them in a few weeks that if I ever had anything in the vocal department, it’s long-gone.])

But singing of that, I’m trying to unstick myself from confused considerations that maybe I’m just emotionally done with triathlon, with this whole unexpected jock phase of my life. Maybe I’ll find my voice, literally, and I can be done with this sports stuff and just be a weird theatre kid again.

I don’t know how to process those thoughts; undeniably a part of me is excited and relieved by them. (Maybe it’s the heavily-and-frequently-concussed part of me.) But sitting with and typing those thoughts here brings me back to the verge of tears too. I just want someone to tell me the right answer. How can I want to be totally done with it all and want so desperately not to be done at the same time?

I suspect this is part of some blahblahblah natural emotional Kübler-Rossian progression. Three weeks ago I wanted to set fire to or sell thousands of dollars worth of bicycles and spandex. Today only half of me wants that.

And I am looking forward. I haven’t dropped out of Lake Placid and knowing I can’t do Boston, and probably can’t do Ironman Virginia 70.3 (the race formerly known as Rev3 Williamsburg) I’m scoping other early-summer options. Plus I’m spending money like a real optimist purchasing a new saddle and shoes on Speed Sherpa’s team day at Conte’s Bike Shop a few weeks ago. I apparently do still plan to 140.6 this year.

Even plans to go through with the fulls I’m registered for don’t feel fully hopeful. The threatre-kid on my shoulder is saying, ‘sure sure, you give it one last go to get it out of your system for good and then I’ll meet you in the green room.’ But then the jock on my other shoulder is giving the theatre kid a wedgie and whispering that this setback is just the very thing to propel me to my Kona-qualification. Nobody is in any agreement in here and I’m tired. (More sleep please!)

I don’t know which of my archetypes will win. I don’t know which I want to win. I don’t know if one needs to win. I just want to keep putting one crutch in front of the other and get through the next five weeks with the small bit of sanity I previously possessed somewhat in tact.

In October adductor and hip pain sidelined me for the Marine Corps Marathon for the THIRD time. (I’m just never signing up for that race again.) Now I finally have a diagnosis: a stress fracture in the compression side of my femoral neck, or in non-MD terms, in my hip.

So it’s non-weight bearing crutches for me for the next 8 weeks. And in case you’re wondering why I look so pretty, this is my face bleary and puffy from crying in the orthopedist’s office. I bet they just love their new patient. (They probably thought by going into sports medicine that they wouldn’t have to deal with as many cryfests in their offices but I sure showed them!) Have to say I’m not sure if I wore a Boston Marathon shirt more to torture them (to guilt-trip my medical team for the diagnosis?) or myself, but it sure seems sadistic looking at it now. And sitting here still wearing it. With a second Boston Marathon sweatshirt over top. (What? My house is cold.)

Doctor’s orders are no training of any kind for at least 6 weeks. Then maybe we can reintroduce swimming back onto the bones. As the hubs joked, it’s kinda cruel that this is what it took to make me want to swim.

Honestly the whole thing feels cruel today. And hopeless. This is the third stress fracture I’ve had in six years of racing. Plus  there was that whole bike crash debacle which is the medical gift that keeps on giving. (As in medical bills. And neurological symptoms.) It feels like a rare year when I’m not on the disabled list. (It feels that way because statistically it is that way.) So right now I just feel like the math is telling me that I’m not meant to be a runner or triathlete.

I’ve never felt this hopeless before. I’ve been disappointed yes but not like this. I’ve definitely never cried (all day) over a stress fracture or injury. (I did cry some during the bike crash ordeal but my brain was broken.) I didn’t even cry when, at the ripe age of 28, I was told I needed heart surgery to repair a birth defect. That was arguably much more serious. (Though with a much shorter, less invasive recovery!) I’ve never cried over a diagnosis or felt so lost.

Sure these crutches are many times worse than the airboots to which I’ve been previously sentenced. And I’m stuck on them longer than I was ever in das boot. But I think it is now the cumulative effect of being benched year after agonizing year that has me spiraling this time and seriously questioning whether I have any future in this sport.

When I heard from my doctor this morning I told Josh that I didn’t want to do this anymore. That I want to withdraw from every race I had planned in 2019. I obviously can’t do the Boston Marathon in April now; and probably not the 70.3 I’m registered for in May. (Don’t worry Tiff, I’ll still be there no matter what.) Who knows about Ironman Lake Placid in July. And I’m no longer excited to go watch people whose bodies aren’t such traitors race Kona in October since I feel that dream slipping forever away. Presumably I’ll be healthy in time to train for Ironman Arizona in November, but who wants to train for something so late in the season after everything leading up to it has been a let down. (Plus I could just have another fall injury.) A big part of me wants to just pull out and ask for my refunds now rather than spend the winter and spring agonizing over it all. (Thank goodness for race insurance. Learned that lesson in 2014.)

I also expressed this fatalism to Ellen and she promised it’s natural to feel this way, though I haven’t previously so I met her with skepticism and self-pity. She promised I wouldn’t continue to feel like this, that the hunger would come back stronger than ever. I intellectually kind of know I’m wallowing in the lowest depths right now but in my heart I’m just not sure about the rest of it. I’m thinking about the passions that sustained me in the past and wondering if I need to give up triathlon and return to music or horseback-riding. (A night of karaoke could help with the wallowing; even more costly and concussion-y with the ponies though.)

I just don’t see a future in endurance sports right now. All those races I gleefully threw my name (and credit card) into? I feel like a fool for thinking I would be healthy enough to do them all. Two full Ironmans! My own KQ one day? What on earth was I thinking? That’s not a goal my body seems to be capable of reaching. I don’t think I can or want to do this sport if I can’t be competitive at it, but how can I be competitive if my body can’t take the work and miles it takes to get faster?

And I don’t want to hear advice about mileage or other ways of training right and smart. I do all the things I’m supposed to do.  Case in pedantic point, below is a noncomprehensive list of all the “right”  things I do to train responsibly:

• I run low mileage – three times a week, sometimes four but the fourth is always a mile or two easy transition run off the bike. I know I can’t run five and six times a week or pile on the dozens of miles I see others do and so I don’t.
• I lift weights which increases bone density
• I’m a triathlete so obviously cross training is a way of life
• I take Vitamin D, calcium, and iron. (All for diagnosed deficiencies and at doctor’s orders.)
• I eat a lot and I eat well. I don’t do sodas or artificial sweeteners or much sugary or fried food, but I also learned from a nutritionist years ago that as an endurance athlete I have to embrace the calories so trust me I replace what I spend.
• I go to physical therapy.
• I take rest days. I had to learn how, but I do it.
• I commute in sneakers. A younger me on the subway vowed to myself that I would never do such a thing, but I got over that and lean right the hell into the sneakers and dress clothes look in the mornings and evenings now.
• I stopped wearing heels as much, and not nearly as high or stiletto-y as I used to. I still have to for work at times but when I don’t need them I don’t touch ’em. And in the office I’m usually just walking around in socks. (Sorry colleagues!)
• I roll my legs, use my Normatecs, take BCAAs and other things to aid recovery between workouts.
• Goes without saying but I don’t smoke or use any drugs. My biggest vice is wine most nights a week and that means 1-2 glasses. A binge is 3 drinks. I’m a cheap date. (Oh except for the food part.)

I feel like I’m in an abusive relationship with this sport and the injuries because every time I’m hurt I try to pin it on something I did. There’s a voice in my head that says this is all my own stupid fault, but that voice is liar. I didn’t do this through poor decision-making or irresponsibility.

The reality is that I have issues with Vitamin D (as do most people, especially fellow women with difficult menstrual cycles) and after bloodwork last week I’ll be on a Vitamin D prescription instead of the otc supplements that clearly weren’t working. I’ve also always had low iron (and I’m shamelessly grateful for not being able to donate blood) and am on supplements for that. On top of those deficiencies, the inhaler I need to breathe includes corticosteroids which impact bone density – but my specific inhaler also interferes less with that birth defect in my heart making it the best option for me overall. That breathing vs. bones vs. heart inhaler situation has always felt lose-lose-lose and I do my best to only use the inhaler when I really need it rather than preventatively. (Which is how it was originally prescribed.)

And a (highly combative) side note to those non-endurance athletes reading this who I know are indulging in even the fleetingest fit of schadenfreude: fuck off. Every time I’m injured people are all too eager to “joke” that it’s because tris and marathons are bad for you and I should do less. You’re all transparently guilty about your own unhealthy decisions. Please re-read the above paragraphs and get it through your heads: I’m an anemic asthmatic with a heart condition and I still get off my ass and have a lower BMI, resting heart rate, and blood pressure than you. (Although the latter is admittedly high as I type [vent] this.)*

Back on the health stuff, I’m also scared about these do-nothing weeks because the thing that got me addicted to fitness was the discovery that exercise is the only thing that keeps my migraines at bay. I haven’t been this inactive for this long since my early twenties and I’m terrified the headaches are going to come back. Of course stressing over them coming back is probably not helping to keep them away. (Fuck does this blog make me sound like some sort of sick-prone invalid. I am not.)

I’m going to try not to end this on a total down note and to reintroduce a dose of perspective into this meditation. I do know that in the scheme of things this is not so bad. There are many far more dire diagnoses in the world – I’ve had a few of them. And in this specific case if the fracture were in a slightly different spot on my femoral head I’d be looking at surgery with screws and hardware instead of crutches.

I also have a teammate, Madi, who was recently diagnosed at a very young age with osteoporosis which is devastating. She’s so talented and strong (just qualified for Worlds!) and wonderful and it’s all just genes and none of it is fair. I have a bone scan Friday so who knows, maybe the same diagnosis is in my future, but in any case I’m not handling my sentence as gracefully as she is hers. She told me something earlier that made me hopeful cry instead of angry cry: Paraphrased (and credited to her coach) she said that the best stories are comeback stories and that time taken away from the sport is only agony because we love it so much.

Honestly ending on that note probably suggests to you dear reader(s) (hello mommy, hello Kim) that I’m in a healthier place than I really am. I still just want to scream, or quit, or binge drink (aka 3 drinks); but I don’t want any of you to have me forcibly committed so I’m trying hope on for a paragraph or two. Going to bed despondent (shit, how will I get upstairs to my bed?) but maybe I will feel (a little) better in the morning. (And if I don’t feel better, I’ll just take it out on my able-bodied 6am bootcamp students. See? Silver lining.)

*That may have gotten meaner than I intended. Considered editing but in the interest of open (and ugly) honesty there it is.