This is Really Happening

"I can taste your summer sweat
It's never been so warm
So can we kick the covers off?
They're always on
It's never been so warm

It's hard to keep a straight face when I just want to smile
If you could see the look that's in your eyes

Like starlight crashing through the room, we'll lose our feathers
Yes, I know it hurts at first but it gets better."

--fun., "It Gets Better."

I am an Ironman.

I crossed the finish line on my first Ironman in 14 hours and 53 minutes.

I'm so bipolar about that. Let's break it down.

I crossed the finish line on my first Ironman (YAHOO!!!!!!!!!!!!! I did it!!!!!!!)...

...in 14 hours and 53 minutes (BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!).

Because I had a stress fracture in my left femur. And I had to walk the marathon.

Seriously, I can't believe I walked the marathon. I walked a MARATHON after swimming 2.4 miles and biking 112. My feet are very unhappy about that fact. Holy blisters. I almost couldn't walk the next day and it wasn't because my leg muscles were wobbly (which they were). Walking on the giant blister on the ball of my right foot was torture. It had been torture for the last 8 or so miles of the "run," even. The blisters were so painful on the very last climb up to the top of the town and the start of the finisher's chute (the only part of the race I "ran"), I actually screamed a little.

About a month before the race I started having a little pain. Nothing too terrible, but just a little tightness in my left bum cheek and IT band and groin muscles. At first I thought it was hip flexor. Or gluteus medius. Or piriformis. I stretched and rolled and got PT and massage. It felt better so I kept running.

And then it was worse. Like, way worse. If I'm being perfectly honest, there was a run I did on July 18 that hurt so much I wanted to stop from the first step. But I didn't. And I regret that very much. After that, no amount of stretching, rolling, PT, Graston, massage, ice, ibuprofen, or anything I could do would make it go away.

And I panicked.

This thing I worked so hard for. This thing my heart wanted so much. I was truly afraid it was slipping through my fingers.

And then I had a pity party the likes of which I hadn't seen in a long time. Every time I got on my bike (which didn't hurt), I would cry. Please God, please don't take this away from me, too. To some people, I might look like I "have it all," but there are things in life that I really, really want that I don't have, just like everyone else. I started to have a giant pity party that this THING that I was working REALLY HARD for was going to disappear, too. And I was MAD.

Thankfully at that time, I was at school in California, and the most that my closest friends heard about it was through a few random texts. Olwen, Pam, Kim, Holli... they don't know how glad they are that I was on the other side of the country, because I would have been hard to handle. Coach Rob got several panicky texts, too.

I prayed for bursitis, which would have been fixable with a cortisone injection. Yeah, bursitis. IT band rubbing on hip bursa... that's got to be it! I could barely walk for a few days there. My classmates in California were worried about me. I'm sure I looked very upset.

When I got home, I went straight to the orthopedist, and he knew right away. Even when the X-ray came up negative, he was sure it was a stress fracture. I prayed that the MRI would prove him wrong, but it didn't. I saw it with my own two eyes, one of the scariest things I've seen in my life: a picture of my own femur with a crack in it. I sobbed on the floor of my doctor's office. He was as kind as he could be. He was so sorry for me. I kept saying, "I've worked so hard, this isn't happening. I've worked so hard..." and he said, "Well, you don't get a stress fracture from NOT working hard."

I asked: what did it really mean? He said, "You cannot run. Look at me. You can't run. For 6 to 8 weeks. You can't do anything that hurts."

Immediately, I said, "Walking doesn't hurt."

And he knew what I meant. And he made me look him in the eyes when he said the rest: "Abby, my fear with putting you out there is that you won't be able to let people run past you. I know you. You worked so hard and your pain threshhold is so high, but I'm telling you, you WILL HEAL and you will get to keep doing this, but you CANNOT RUN."

I knew at that moment I would swim, bike, and walk 140.6 miles, as God is my witness. And it broke my heart.

I fretted about it so much that I lost an entire night of sleep over it. I gave myself a headcold the week before the race as a result. That was helpful. :)

When it came time to race, the only thing in my heart was getting to that finish line in one piece. There were brief moments where I felt twinges in my hip during the race and I had to back off, and my heart broke a little more. When I got to the "run," I had to gulp down my pride each time someone said, "Ne marche pas" (or "don't walk" in French). My heart broke a little more each time. But I smiled every second. I was proud of myself for doing it anyway. I chatted with strangers. I cheered on all of my friends (each of whom I saw many times on the "run"). Courtney and Jason hugged me. Olwen and I cheered for each other. Alejandro slapped me on the ass. Ellen, Pam, Dirk, Jenn, all had high fives and kind words. Mike and Ryan had signs. My parents had cowbells.

I was determined that I was going to get there.

I will write a report on what I did for those 140.6 miles, what I ate (in short: Doritos), what I drank, but let me just tell you about that last kilometer. The one where I finally knew that I was really, really going to get there.

I walked up that last hill with my blisters screaming. I looked around at the scene: dark, almost 10 PM, almost no one around, the muffled voice of Mike Reilly on the loudspeakers, the glow of the finish line bouncing off the mountains. I kept walking. After the climb, I was in the village coming down the hill, and there were more and more people along the course. There was a fence holding them back. People were holding their hands out for high fives, and I took all of them. I looked around through watery eyes at all the strangers cheering, and I couldn't believe it. I saw the finish line a few hundred meters away and I thought, "FUCK IT I'M RUNNING!"

For a split second, I was afraid it was going to hurt, but it didn't. I saw my friends and high-fived them. I saw my parents cheering.

I looked behind me to make sure there was no one else who could steal the thunder of my name being called as I ran to the elevated platform at the finish line, and I heard Mike Reilly say:

"From Washington, D.C., at 37 years old,
Abigail Sanford
You...
Are...
An Ironman!"

I crossed the finish line with my pre-selected "one arm in the air" pose, and then the genuine emotion took over and I was pumping my fists in the air as I walked down the platform.

It wasn't the day I trained for.
It wasn't the race I planned.
But at the end of that very long day, I crossed that line, and I felt like an Ironman.

Can anyone say "unfinished business?"

Even before I got injured, I knew I would do it again.

Stay tuned!!