Relax With What Is

It took me 3 attempts to register. Yesterday I went without my USAT card (duh!). Today I had Luc in his walker and arrived at registration at 11am, for a 2 hour wait. We came back at 2pm and I walked right in.

I weigh myself every single day. Sometimes 2 times per day. I weighed myself at 3am before we left for the airport on Wednesday. You can imagine my shock when the scale at registration read me fifteen pounds heavier than I normally am. To anyone, especially when for half my life I had an eating disorder... this would be a potential disaster. I did panic. My heart rate did race. How is this possible? I couldn't understand. 5 pounds, absolutely. FIFTEEN???? I even weight myself on 2 different scales normally... just in case... and that's better than when I was sick... I had FIVE... just in case.

The poor man who weighed me was visibly upset too. He told me at least 1,000 athletes had stood on this scale. And it was a regular bathroom scale. I knew he was right. I knew it was impossible yet suddenly my entire world became about this brand new number. I almost felt myself slipping into my illness right in front of my own eyes.

When I got out I raced into the hotel and found the fitness room which had a scale. Finally I exhaled. I was only up 4 pounds. Normal with the amount I had drank today. I put my hand on the wall and allowed my head to stop spinning.

Yet for a lot of the rest of the day that number kept creeping in. I know it is false. But like a flashback the old feelings come back. It scared me for so many reasons. That my scale(s) could have been wrong. That the old feelings came back. Thirteen years of recovery and it could take 5 seconds to unravel.

But it didn't. But it didn't. But it didn't.

I spent some time just laying down in the hotel room, alone. With my feet propped against the wall. (In yoga we call that an inversion ;-). I realized that even if that number were true... let's just say that this was the one scale on earth that was right. I still have the data... the powerfiles from cycling and the GPS data from running....

I still have the data.

Even if the impossible were true and I was that number... I still have the data that proves I am capable of hitting those goal wattage's and paces. My nutrition still works. And I will always be able to swim well.

So even if it were true... nothing has changed except the space between my ears.

I realized that I am still sensitive, still fragile, and even at the start of my fourth Ironman recovery is always going to be one day at a time.

And I realized that the longest distance on race day is the distance from ear to ear.

And I realized that you can be 99.9% positive, and one small seed of doubt can blow the whole thing. But only if you allow it.

While I was laying on the bed with my feet propped up against the wall I decided that for at least this day, this race, these 140.6 miles .... I will not allow the seed of doubt to enter. I have my plan, I have practiced wattage, pace, effort, nutrition. I have practiced focus, mantras and visualization. I have raced this race so many times in my head that I am now on autopilot.

For the fourth time I am wearing the silver bracelet. For the fourth time I prepared my Ironman bags. And for the fourth time I stepped back and smiled.

Between now and then there is not much to be done. I have done the work. I feel more prepared than ever. What happens now is up to me.

And I am ready.

:-) Mary