Getting Answers! By Kellie Gibson

Getting Answers!

I feel like I am starting 2016 just how I had hoped I would start 2014 and 2015 - with some answers!

In previous blogs I have talked about how things really fell apart for me at the end of 2013 and since then I have really struggled to find the answers as to why my health and love of running have continued to decline. Getting some answers from recent tests has been pivotal in my journey and means that even though there is so much work to be done, I can finally start a fresh year with a vision and plan and most of all a sense that I can find myself and my health again. As part of moving forward I feel the need to look back and figure out just how I got to this point so that I don’t fall back into this trap again. I am also starting to see how common these issues are especially with the pace of todays world, I have been able to connect with so many others with similar issues and I think its is really important to create awareness.

So how did I get to this point?  How did I go from being fit and healthy with an abundance of energy to someone who could barely get out of bed and function? Was it all about the running? No… the amount of running I was doing certainly didn’t help but it was a number of factors that contributed to where I found myself and my state of health. Looking back, 2013 was a very big year for me, it was the year I really started to get into running, I loved it and it was such an outlet! In the same year I was in a very stressful work environment, I was in a situation where I felt bullied in the workplace which ripped away at my self confidence and my emotional health. Being in this position was hard, good jobs were hard to come by locally and I needed the job because like everyone else I had a mortgage, kids and so many other financial commitments… so I set a lot of my feelings aside and basically shoved the issue in the corner because if I acknowledged it enough it became more of a reality which I felt made things harder (I now realise that refusing to acknowledge these things doesn’t make them go away, it makes them worse, you can put anything in the corner but the reality is that its still there for another day). I worked long days and finished at 7pm 3 nights a week which made me feel guilty that I was missing valuable time with my family, all to be somewhere I didn’t even want to be. I would come home and the kids would be already bathed, fed and ready for bed and my dinner was cooked and on the table, even though the hard work was all done I really missed being a part of all those simple things with my family and it was putting so much pressure on Wes who had to do everything after also being at work all day. Every day I showed up to work, sucked it up and just did what I had to because I felt there was no other choice. Running was one of the big ways I dealt with the situation and I always felt good after going out for a run and pushing myself hard, I was running out my frustration which I now realise was not a sustainable way to deal with the situation, I was probably running too many of my runs too hard as a coping mechanism.

I had so many commitments in 2013 on top of all of this and keeping busy was the perfect distraction at the time, I was running 6 days a week, playing summer comp hockey, playing touch football, we got a new puppy who was a lot of work at the time, I was attending so many races (too many!) trying to be the best mum I could be to my two boys and so much more, I was just trying to pack way too much in!  I can clearly remember being so rushed so much of the time and trying to fit so many commitments into such a small space of time, I literally remember the feeling of adrenaline pumping through my blood and the rush it gave me, it felt so good at the time, I felt like I was achieving so much and it made me feel on top of the world… until I was literally stopped in my tracks as my body simply could not sustain this. I now realise just how dangerous all of this was to my health… our stress hormones aren’t meant to be switched ON all of the time!  I always had trouble falling asleep back then and I used to put it down to the fact that I was finishing work at 7pm which was later than I was used to and that I needed more time to wind down after work, I now see it was a vital clue that my cortisol was high at the time from my stress hormones being switched on too much.  My perception of what stress was back then is very different to how I view it now, I had no idea that our bodies cannot differentiate between different kinds of stress, I didn’t realise that all of this rushing was such a stress on my body, I didn’t even realise that running is a stress to our body (how could something that feels so good be stressful to our bodies?!). If you go for a run and recover adequately it can be a positive thing and adaptations are made, if we recover adequately our bodies actually convert cortisol to cortisone which has profound benefits but if cortisol and stress hormones are always high and never catch a break it can have dire effects on health.  My biggest problem is that I didn’t see most of the stress in my life as stress, that’s just how life was, one big rush but I never perceived it as stressful, it just became my normal. Failing to acknowledge just how much my work situation was affecting me emotionally also caught up with me and took its toll, it didn’t go away just because I didn’t acknowledge it, I now realise it was still a major stress whether I saw it that way or not. And that is exactly how I believe my road to Adrenal fatigue started. It starts with cortisol being too high and the body cannot keep up with the demands so in the next stage it falls low and results in an unrelenting fatigue which is unrivaled by sleep. The onset of Adrenal Fatigue usually involves a range of physical and emotional factors and I was ticking both or those boxes! Back then I never acknowledged that running could be placing such a burden on me, I always had one rest day a week to make sure I was recovering adequately, I was averaging 70km weeks which didn’t seem like much compared to what some others were doing, I had never ran further than Marathon distance, even though I was training for an Ultra Marathon I never quite got there, it just didn’t make sense to me that what I was doing could be too much. The thing is that each person is so individual and what one person can handle is so different to another.  My load may have been much less compared to many of those around me but it is not just about the numbers… combining all of the above factors and a poor stress response on top of the running was enough to push me over the edge. Failing to acknowledge all of this and get the answers I needed for so long bought me unstuck further and further as I kept trying to battle on.  Looking back I also felt a certain pressure that I was unaware of at the time. I entered the sport performing reasonably well from the get go and was constantly being told by well meaning people that I had so much potential. This definitely played on my mind and bought more stress to my running as I felt a need to perform to a certain level all of the time and to constantly improve and run PB’s, narrowly missing a couple of podiums and in one race missing a win where I had led for 33km of a 34km race only to be overtaken in the last km made me want it more and more. I don’t even know how I got so caught up in this, performance was definitely not why I started to run in the first place. As I became unwell and my performances fell away more and more this was an extra factor that really played on my mind. I don’t even care about any of that anymore all I want is to run free and happy again, just to participate and to run with a smile on my face like I used to.

By the end of 2013 I was no longer in the same job and set my sights on starting up my own business, I went back to Graphic Design which is what I truly love doing. While this was very exciting to start up my own business, the prospect of not being paid a set amount every week and having to build clientele was daunting and stressful at times while I got myself up and running, the type of stress changed but the cycle continued... My business is now going really well but with my declining health over the last two years and the guilt of having to slow down everything because my body literally couldn’t take it anymore has really kept that stress cycle going especially when there were no concrete answers as to why I felt the way I did (and it wasn’t through a lack of trying, I had countless Doctors visits and spent the best part of 2 years using what energy I had trying to find the answers… I am sure my Doctor thought I was a hypochondriac!). I kept pushing on and hoping it would pass because as the Doctors kept telling me I was fine! But I wasn’t fine and was running myself further and further into the ground trying to keep up and the more I struggled the more I really started to doubt myself. It became a really perpetuating cycle!

In December an Adrenal and Baseline Hormone Saliva test confirmed what I felt I had known for some time now that I was in Stage 2 of Adrenal Fatigue and on top of this, my other hormones had become very unbalanced as well. The test revealed that my morning cortisol was relatively normal but by Midday it had bottomed out to where it is supposed to be at 10pm at night and stayed at that level all day, no wonder I felt so tired! The normal pattern that cortisol should follow throughout the day is that it is high first thing in the morning (which helps us get out of bed with energy) and then it gradually declines throughout the day and reaches its lowest point by 10pm which is what allows us to fall asleep easily. Many other hormone imbalances were also picked up, because my cortisol was so low my other hormones stepped in to help out, the problem is that this creates further imbalance which causes further issues.  My DHEA was almost twice the high end of the normal range, testosterone was almost 4 times the high end of the normal range and E1 (a form of Oestrogen) was also high. Its crazy to think that only 9 months ago my testosterone was below the normal range and now it has swung completely the other way (when I was on the contraceptive pill it completely bottomed out and now upon stopping it, it has skyrocketed… what an upheaval for my body! And it didn’t matter which end of the scale it was on, I felt horrible the whole time because it was out of balance along with many other things).  These results also bought to light that there were issues with my liver and Phase 2 Liver Detoxification, the liver is responsible for processing and excreting excess hormones from the body but when the load is too high it starts to recycle hormones back into the body as it simply cannot keep up, the problem is that these hormones are not intended to be recycled back into the body and they create havoc.  Since I have started to work on this issue I have noticed some improvement with my bloating which is great, it seems to have been caused by the liver.

After seeing a dietician in Sydney who specialises in issues such as Adrenal Fatigue late last month, further testing was done on my Thyroid as I appeared to have many symptoms of Hypothyroidism on top of my Adrenal Fatigue symptoms. All of my Thyroid results came back normal but we were still waiting on the Reverse T3 (RT3) results to come back. When these tests came back last week it revealed that my Reverse T3 was very high.  What does this mean? Reverse T3 has the same molecular structure as the Thyroid hormone T3 except that it is upside down.  The issue is that RT3 binds to the same cell receptors as T3 but it is inactive and as a result blocks T3 from binding to the receptors and becoming active. T3 along with T4 is responsible for regulating cell metabolism in every cell in our bodies. They promote optimal growth, development, function and maintenance of all body tissues. They are also critical for nervous, skeletal and reproductive tissue as well as regulating body temperature, heart rate, body weight and cholesterol. When RT3 is high and T3 is being blocked symptoms of Hypothyroidism are present but it is different to typical hypothyroidism where T3 is usually not being produced efficiently, my T3 is being produced but it is being blocked by the RT3. This certainly explains a lot of my symptoms further.

Looking back now I feel that at the end of 2013 I was very much on the road to Adrenal Fatigue, all the signs were there in hindsight I just had no idea what I was dealing with and what impact stress was having on my life back then.  The acne which appeared for the first time in my life at 31 makes sense to me now, when our adrenals become taxed from producing too much or too little cortisol, all of our other hormones can also become off kilter which I believe caused the acne along with all of my injuries and other symptoms from back then. Unfortunately I feel that I went down the wrong path initially by accepting prescriptions for the pill and antibiotics, they worked for a while with the acne but I felt even worse when taking them. As soon as I stopped taking them the acne came back because the problem was still there, the medication merely managed the symptoms without solving the problem and caused me a whole new set of issues which I am still also trying to overcome.  Long term antibiotic use is very dangerous and can cause major health issues in the gut and to our immune system, if only I knew this before I took them. I am still yet to have the tests done to find out exactly what I am dealing with in terms of my gut. Gut issues and a low immune system also place a great deal of stress on the body which certainly has not helped with my Adrenal Fatigue.

It’s been 3 months now since I have ran and I honestly still don’t feel I have the strength or energy to run. Body Balance classes at Cityfit, Yoga and walking my dog have kept me sane while I have taken a break from running. I am feeling really positive now in knowing what I am dealing with and the fact that it is totally fixable. Once I work through the process of getting my health back, I will run again and will take a much more balanced approach to my running… I just need to be patient as the process is going to take some time to work through. I need to look at all the reasons why I started running and why I found it so enjoyable and go back to the basics. However, there is a big part of me that is terrified to start running again, I don’t want to start too soon and compromise any progress I am making but at the same time I am keen to refuel that love of running that I once had. I guess my body will tell me when its time to return. I was lucky enough to chat with Katee from Holistic Endurance and Author of Healing The Grumpy Athlete a couple of months back who has been through a similar journey to mine and works with athletes in this position, she gave me some great advice which has helped me find more answers and I will be seeking some coaching from her when I am ready to return, not for performance reasons but just to get me back into the game in a safe manner so that I can find balance and enjoy running again without falling apart like I did.  I love the principles of Holistic Endurance and the fact that they look at so many other factors outside of running and triathlon, because as I have learned there is so much more that affects our running than just running, I don’t just want to run, I want to live as well and run a bit for enjoyment and I need to be healthy and maintain the right balance to do that. I am not too sure exactly when I will return, I feel like I will know when its time, lets see what the year brings… One thing I do know is that for the first time in 2 years things are really starting to look up, finally having answers changes my whole outlook and I now have a total new respect for my body. Our bodies truly are amazing, they pretty much tell us when things aren’t right, we just need to be able to listen.  I feel like I have had to fight so hard to get these answers, 2 years of being pushed out of Dr’s doors again and again being told I was fine when I knew that I wasn’t was like torture. I am glad I never gave up and stuck with it and kept searching and digging for answers and practitioners who would listen and who would run the tests I was seeking. I was never scared of a diagnosis, I wanted it so badly so that I could work towards getting better… I couldn’t be happier to finally have that… because health is everything, its hard to enjoy anything else without it and I look forward to finally getting mine back this year!

some of my favourite photos from 2013 when I was running healthy and happy

Product Review - Endurolytes Fizz

With Summer approaching it’s time to rethink those hydration and nutrition strategies as with the increase in heat and humidity the risk of a poor races or training sessions is greater. I am going to overview my thoughts on a Hammer Nutrition product that I use as a part of my training and racing. And yes, I am a Hammer Nutrition sponsored runner.

Endurolytes Fizz is a product that I use regularly in my training and racing, especially in the hotter summer months or when I race in unfamiliar weather conditions. I find the Fizz is faster acting than the Endurolytes Capsules and during sessions longer than an hour I will often take some water with a Fizz added. The aim is to remain hydrated while balancing my electrolyte levels, using simply water does not allow this and the risk of hydration related complications rises.

Each tablet contains a full spectrum of electrolytes that you lose during exercise thus ensuring not only are you hydrating correctly (and avoiding dehydration) but also allowing your electrolyte balance to remain normal. This maximizes the uptake of energy from the stomach (osmosis) and can assist with prevention or management of cramps, therefore improved performance.

I generally use Fizz as my main fluid source in events/sessions up to 3 hours and in addition to this will consume Fizz on heavy training days in my water. I will make sure that I have some available to ensure when consuming any energy (like a gel) my body is capable of utilizing those kilojoules while being under stress. As your body is diverting blood away from the stomach and to the muscles it is key to making sure it is efficient at breaking down the small amount of energy it needs while running. I feel Fizz assists with this process and I try to practice this in my training to not have any issues in my racing.

Normally I will go with either Grape or Lemon-Lime flavor and I have used the Grapefruit and Mango flavours as well. I will normally use one tablet to 300ml of water and often vary my flavours depending on my energy sources. In races like Sydney Trail Series I will rely on 350ml Fizz and a Gel for the 90 – 100min race at Manly and find the additional humidity (I’m from Bathurst!!!) doesn’t affect me as much if I’m hydrating properly.

Give Me A Break!

Handing my blog over to Kel again for the next chapter in her story, take it away Kel...

Give Me A Break! by Kellie Gibson

This is a follow up of the blog I wrote back in April ("Finding Me Again").  I had envisaged by now I would be writing about how I had sorted all of my health issues, was feeling great with an abundance of energy and was enjoying my running again.  Unfortunately the road has been pretty rocky and although I have experienced some valuable steps forward in my journey, I have taken some backwards as well. The positive in all of this is that I am learning so much in the process.

Not long after I wrote the last blog I started seeing a Naturopath, I wrote out a long timeline for her listing all of the symptoms and events dating back to November 2013 when the wheels slowly started to fall off.  Seeing it all written out was a massive reality for me and reinforced how hard it had all hit me. Starting with a DNF in my first Ultra, a sudden break out of cystic acne for the first time in my life at the age of 31 and a host of injuries including foot, ankle and ITB that left me sidelined on and off for over 6 months. The alarm bells now scream to me that these were major signs of hormone imbalance, a topic which is largely unspoken about in the running world (however I found it quite assuring that so many people had contacted me after my last blog that were able to relate to the issue of hormone imbalance). 

As I spoke about in my last blog I had taken antibiotics long term that my Dr had prescribed for the acne (Minocycline and Doxycycline) as well as an Oral Contraceptive Pill (OCP)(Zoely). My performance was really up and down through this period but with the addition of a coach I felt I would build up to running well again which I did for a little while but then around the same time my antibiotic was changed to Doxycycline in November last year my health took a massive turn. Even after taking myself off Doxycycline due to the awful side effects after a month I saw a bit of improvement but not much.

Fatigue started to set in more and more in early 2015, my legs would constantly ache even with a week of rest and cutting my running in half. I was constantly having to ask my coach for extra days off, for extra easy runs to the point where all I could manage was slow easy runs, I could no longer follow a program. My easy pace continued to get slower and slower and my training heart rate was always really high and would often be really erratic shooting up and down. During this same time though my resting heart rate was quite low which to me was a good sign I was fit.  I had well meaning people telling me not to wear my HR monitor because it was probably messing with my head too much and that it may be a good thing just to not worry about it.  My intuition told me otherwise, this had to be a sign that something was wrong particularly as it came with feelings of extreme heavy legs while running, the only way I could describe it was as though someone had filled my legs full of sand or lead, lifting my leg each step I took was a huge effort and my body did not feel like my own. In addition to this I always crashed hard after each run even at easy pace but then again easy pace was just not easy pace anymore, it was hard to even run at that pace! I ended up postponing my coaching until I could sort out what was going on. I think intuition is such an important thing as a runner, no one truly knows your body like you know your own and I felt like no matter how I described it no one got it.  I guess the most frustrating part was that so many tests kept coming back clear and in the normal ranges so I had no answers and just kept battling on hoping it would all pass.

After I received some test results in early April it was revealed that my testosterone level was reduced by 75% from a previous test I had, the issue of hormone imbalance was now becoming very clear.  My Dr assured me that while it was alarming, it was quite normal for testosterone to lower while on the OCP.  This did not sit right with me nor did the fact that I had been told that it was ok that my monthly cycle had been missing for the last 8 months while on this OCP and that it was also normal for women taking that pill, so I took myself off it.  Unbelievably my cycle returned within 3 days after I stopped taking it and it has been regular every month since. I had never had problems with my cycle until I was prescribed Zoely even in the earlier days when I was able to train at a much higher load it was always normal.

The major catalyst for me was finding the e-book “Healing The Grumpy Athlete” by Katee Pedicini.  I was on Facebook one day and it came up in my newsfeed as a suggested post.  I clicked on it immediately as the following words resonated with me:   “If you’ve ever; • Experienced burn out • Suffered adrenal or chronic fatigue • Hormonal imbalance or loss of menstural cycle • Suffer terrible PMS that interferes with your training and life • Lost of love of triathlon due to lack of progress or performance. Even though it was Triathlon focused I knew there would be some valuable information in there for me and there was!

I had toyed with the idea of seeing a Naturopath for some time now but this book really inspired me to do so. Even though progress has been slow I am so glad I did. I felt so positive after my first visit to my Naturopath Jolene, we sat down and looked at the timeline that I had written out and her first response was that she believed that the acne had been a sign of hormone imbalance and that the medication I had been put on had masked those symptoms rather than addressed them and had caused a whole other set of issues for me as well.

It seemed that the antibiotics had caused a range of gut issues.  First of all long term antibiotic use disrupts the balance of good and bad bacteria in the gut and the ‘bad guys’ take over.  In addition to this a gut which has become inflamed becomes very porous and as a result will allow large food proteins, bacteria, metals and toxic substances straight into our blood stream that should not be there rather than allowing them to pass through the digestive tract as they normally would causing widespread inflammation throughout the body. This is the basis of "Leaky Gut Syndrome" and the OCP as well as other medications can also contribute to this.

So I started a program which consisted of basically killing off the bacteria in my gut. And then after my second visit I started the process of rebuilding the good bacteria in my gut and healing the lining of the gut. There is a lot of information out there now about what a massive role out gut health plays in our overall health.  I was also given herbs for adrenal support as my adrenal glands were suffering as a result of the stress placed on my body with everything that was going on with my health.  The problem with stress is that the body doesn’t differentiate different forms of stress so whether it be that you are stressed because you are being chased by a tiger or whether it is digestive stress or any other kind of stress you body reacts in exactly the same manner. To our body, stress is stress and it deals with all of it in exactly the same way. Adrenaline and cortisol are stress hormones released by our adrenal glands and when cortisol is high for a long period of time it can cause our adrenals to become fatigued and our stress hormones do not work like they should resulting in unrelenting fatigue and imbalance of other hormones. Six weeks into my program I was starting to feel fantastic in addressing these issues, I was still struggling with my running performance but I knew that if I kept moving forward it would all start improving and that I just needed to be patient. Part of having leaky gut means that your body also has trouble assimilating nutrients from foods and once I was able to absorb my nutrients more effectively Jolene was sure that my performance would start to pick up.

During a family holiday in July my digestion took a really bad turn, even though I was so conscious about continuing to eat good quality and healing foods while I was away. I was becoming severely bloated throughout the day, not only was it embarrassing but by the end of the day none of the pants I had taken would do up and it was very painful and uncomfortable.  My energy also took another nosedive around that time. I did very little running while I was away and focused on family time and more gentle activity with my boys as I felt I needed some recovery time. When I came back I saw my Naturopath who thought my symptoms sounded very much like SIBO which is when bacteria moves down the digestive tract into the small intestine that causes bloating, this is often secondary to Leaky Gut, can be very hard to treat and can take some time.

After chatting to colleagues about my case Jolene asked me if I had heard of Overtraining Syndrome. This was a term that had recently come up a fair bit in the running networks I was associated with. I could certainly relate to some of the symptoms, but I could never get my head around it as a diagnosis as I really did not feel that the training I had been doing was enough to warrant Overtraining Syndrome.  When we chatted about it Jolene pointed out that the name was probably a little misleading in my case, however with the medication I was taking it had put my body into a very compromised state where trying to keep up my normal training load whilst being so compromised had placed a great deal of stress on my body.  Add to that being a busy mum, running my own business and having very little down time and it could certainly be an answer. I was also told that based on my level of antibiotic use and my set of symptoms that my gut issues would take at least a year to heal.

Taking this into account I decided to keep running to a minimum I have only been running once or twice a week, some weeks I haven’t ran at all because I haven’t felt up to it. One big positive for me has been starting Body Balance classes at Cityfit, my friend Shan dragged me along to one, I was quite resistant in the beginning but I loved it! I have been doing 3 classes a week for the last few months and I am noticing some improvements the more I do. I really enjoy the classes and I feel that they are going to help me get some strength back as I am feeling quite weak at the moment which is most likely due to hormone imbalance.  Its amazing what role hormones play in our bodies, a role which I never appreciated until things started to go wrong. I had no idea I even had hormones when they were working their magic and were in harmony but since they became unbalanced they have really affected my wellbeing.

The last 4 months have been tough, I have spent most days gradually getting more and more bloated and uncomfortable as the day goes on whilst dealing with my digestive issues, I have developed many food intolerances, my blood pressure has been high (150/100 just last month but thankfully normal again for now), running is still hard and my legs still feel like they are full of lead despite cutting it right back and if I push it too hard when I run I break out in hives, unexplained aches and pain, my hair is falling out and has been for over 6 months and fighting the fatigue is still a daily ritual. The hardest part is that it is hard to escape the symptoms it is always there, feeling tired and crappy and being in pain, its really hard to remove myself from it most days and it is hard for others to understand. After going from being someone who was very fit and healthy to this has hit me so hard, it has been 2 years in November since things started to go pear shaped but it feels like eternity. I have been gaining weight even though I have been eating really well and being as active as I can given my situation, it is frustrating as I have been around the same weight for about 10 years now even after having 2 kids, all the things I am used to doing to maintain my weight are not working but I just have to keep doing what I can to get my hormones back on track so my body can function effectively and so I fit back into my clothes (I really hope no one takes this the wrong way or takes any offence to it, it is just something that has happened that is unusual for me, I am still very much within a healthy weight range but have gained 7kg over the last 2 years and my body composition has changed as well, half of it crept on gradually while the other half has gone on much quicker, to put it in perspective that is just over 12% of my previous body weight gained with no real change in my diet, my weight in no way defines me but I have lots of beautiful clothes that I would love to wear again). With all of the above going on it can be really hard not to get caught up the whole cycle of stress. I am finding that my Body Balance classes really help with this, I always look forward to that 10 minutes of meditation/relaxation at the end!

I had an experience of going to a new Doctor a couple of months ago to see if I could have some of my hormone levels and thyroid retested to see where they were at after being off the OCP for 6 months… only to be told off by her and accused of only wanting testosterone tested so that she would prescribe me some! I couldn’t believe it… I basically ran out of there in tears! In the end I went back to my original Doctor as he knew my history, he ordered some of the tests but not others so there were pieces of the puzzle missing. It is hard living in a regional area as we do not have access to a lot of the functional testing I was after and many Doctors are not supportive of it and will not order the tests. My Doctor Requested a scan on my ovaries to rule out Polycystic Ovaries being the cause of my bloating, during the scan I was told by the Ultrasonographer that my ovaries were polycystic, I spent 3 whole days getting my head around this before the report that came back from the specialist revealed that I did not have polycystic ovaries. So much frustration and still no real answers! All of the tests my Doctor ordered all came back in the normal ranges too.  One interesting point was though that my iron and ferritin were in the Doctors normal ranges however when my Naturopath saw the figures she was concerned abut how low my iron and ferritin was for a female my age despite it being in the normal ranges (which are very broad figures) so we have begun the process of trying to boost this. I was a bit surprised about this as my previous values had always been high and so high that they were always just outside the normal range.

A couple of weeks ago I decided to still run the Hounslow 23km SkyRace that I had registered for a long time ago even though I had not really been able to train. I knew it was a tough course and that I would have to hike a lot of it anyway and I knew with everything had been going through I was mentally tough enough to get through it. I got through it and it was tough, I switched between running and walking for the first 8km and after that it became apparent that if I wanted to finish this then I would have to hike it as I didn’t have it in my legs to run. I even had to hike down stairs and on flats that were completely runnable, I just couldn’t run! I managed to finish in 5 hours which is a long day out for 23km.  The course was tough, very rugged with around 2000m elevation gain and loss.  As tough as it was I absolutely loved every minute of it as I love being out on the trails and these were among the most beautiful trails I have seen, I was just so happy to be there! I was really proud to finish this one… BUT I fell into a massive heap the day after, similar to the way I did in the days after I ran the Sky26er at the Buffalo Stampede earlier in the year but worse.  I was a mess more so emotionally than physically (although the physical signs were definitely there too). It left me questioning why am I doing this to myself? It’s a tough thing because I love it but it used to be so much easier!  Someone said to me a couple of days after this race, “good on you, you must be so strong to be able to do that considering what you have been through”. Even though it was intended as a compliment it really got me thinking… Yeah it took a lot of strength both physically and mentally, BUT is strong really a positive thing when it comes to this? Is it worth it to fall into a complete emotional heap for a week all because I chose to do a race that was well beyond my means for where I am at with my health?... NO its not! However, it IS ok not to be strong, it IS ok to miss out on something you love if it is at the sacrifice of your wellbeing. It has come with a massive realisation to me that this kind of thing is placing further stress on my body at the moment as I am trying to heal and it is working against everything I am working so hard for with my health.

Almost there... nearing the end of the big climb to finish the Hounslow Classic 23km SkyRace

The last 2 weeks have bought about some massive revelations for me. Some of my reading has led me to a book by Dr Philip Maffetone called “The Big Book of Endurance Training and Racing” a book which myself and Wes have taken a bit of interest in of late.  Chapter 8 has changed a lot for me just in this last week.  The Chapter titled “Overtraining Syndrome” caught my attention particularly after my Naturopath Jolene’s thoughts.  The points in this chapter that really stood out the most for me and that I could relate to are:

• Training = Work + Rest
• The condition can vary considerably from one athlete to another including its signs, symptoms and onset.
• The big picture is not just the more obvious components.
• The negative consequences are often gradual. The body is quite good at masking the earliest symptoms.
• Early signs can be poor athletic performance, regression, structural injuries particularly foot, ankle and lower back, muscle imbalance, metabolic problems such at fatigue.
• The signs and symptoms go beyond training and competition problems, they can even affect a person’s quality of life, sometimes for many years.
• In the earliest stage the problems are somewhat vague and indistinct. While we think of it as being only sports related, other lifestyle factors may contribute to the cause. Increased work, family or job stress, social obligations, raising children, lack of sleep and other factors can significantly and indirectly contribute to overtraining.
• Pain whether mild or severe may have no positive findings on X-Ray or MRI. Significant fatigue or diminishing performance may exist despite normal values in all blood, urine and other tests. This contributes to serious frustration in the athlete who goes from one health care professional to another looking for a diagnosis
• Interestingly the first stage of overtraining can be accompanied by a short-lived improvement in performance which may convince one that training is progressing well.
• Overreaching is an important part of becoming a better athlete but without backing off, many athletes continue pushing down the road to overtraining.
• Heart Rate Variability reflects autonomic imbalance.
• The first stage of overtraining is usually accompanied by two other functional problems. The first is adrenal dysfunction and aerobic deficiency. Fatigue, physical injury, sleeping irregularities, abnormal hunger or cravings. Some athletes may be unable to lose body fat, get sleepy after meals and have an uncanny craving for caffeine.
• Amenorrhea in women
• Emotional stress
• High cortisol can increase insulin levels which reduce fat burning and increase fat storage. In addition high cortisol lowers testosterone and DHEA which are both important for muscle recovery. Those who frequently wake in the middle of the night and don’t easily fall back to sleep typically have high cortisol levels which is another sign of overtraining.
• Eventually the body becomes exhausted and many hormones are significantly reduced.
• Performance may diminish considerably and many athletes in this state consider themselves sidelined or even retire. They are chronically fatigued and cannot keep up their normal training or race paces.
• Training heart rate is high even though there is an abnormally low resting heart rate.
• Recovery and return to previous optimal levels of performance is a very difficult task.
• Important elements of recovery are to decrease training, immediately cease all anaerobic training and competition. A helpful remedy is walking which can gently stimulate circulation and aerobic muscles and offers mental benefits much like those of meditation as well as redeveloping the aerobic system.
• Athletes will require six months or more and sometimes a year or two before resuming effective competition. 

I was shocked to read this and to be able to relate so strongly to so many symptoms. There is no specific test for Overtraining Syndrome as such but with the amount of light bulb moments I had upon reading this chapter one thing is for sure, whether it is specifically this or not, its time for a big rest! Even though I have already cut back so much my body needs a complete break. I have decided to take the next 3 months off running completely, and more if I feel I need it after that point, with a very gradual return when the time is right. It was a very tough choice to have to make but what I believe is a smart one. In this time I plan to go for walks with my dog Reuben (this will keep him very happy!), continue to do my Body Balance classes and some strength work, exercise is still really important to my recovery and I want to be as strong as possible when I am able to return, but I need to drop the intensity and keep my heart rate down. If I am to be completely true to myself, I know this is what I need. The biggest thing I will probably miss is my Saturday morning run with my friend Shan, who has been an awesome support to me while things have been tough, but being the good friend she is I know she will be waiting for me when I am ready to return.

As much as I love running there is so much more to my life than just running.  First and foremost I am a mum and if I am constantly fatigued and not operating at an optimal level then I can’t possibly keep up with the demands of being the mum that I want to be to my two beautiful boys. I have my own business that I am currently finding it hard to keep up with (in reality I am living the dream here, I work from home with hours that suit me around my families commitments as well as my own and I am doing a job that allows me to be creative and that I love).  I have so many positive things in my life and I need to get back to optimal health so I can enjoy these things more. I want running to be a part of my life and there was a time when I enjoyed it and found it to be an outlet, I saw it as time out… the trouble is our body sees running as a stress and with adequate rest and recovery responds positively but without adequate recovery and additional stress our body never truly gets the chance to recover. I will know when its time to get back into it and I look forward to waking up with energy again, to be able to one day run freely again, to be enjoying it again and to be able have that awesome feeling you get when you get a PB again.

What have I learned from all of this? Listen to your body, symptoms are your body’s way of trying to tell you something, we know our own body better than anyone.  If you don’t get the answers and your intuition tells you otherwise then you need to keep digging! Medication was not the answer for me, it was a band-aid solution and it might have masked the symptoms and appeared to make them go away… but when I ripped the band-aid off the problem was still there, and then some… a tough lesson to learn! But in saying this I have learned that I am ultimately responsible for my health and I do not have to take medication just because my Dr prescribes it, most medications don’t come with warning labels unfortunately and it is up to me to do the research before I put anything into my body. I often wonder what effects medications have on runners and athletes, there is no information out there but I would be very interested to know how it directly affects those with higher volumes of training compared to the average person, I feel in my situation that it did have a huge impact. I hope someone does a study on this one day, I can tell you one thing though… I won’t be putting that horrible stuff back into my body to participate in such a study! Another lesson learned is that in running, recovery is key! I need to give recovery the respect it deserves after running and particularly racing, I always thought I did but now I know I can do so much more… as Maffetone says Training = Work + Rest. Overtraining Syndrome is not as clear cut as the name suggests, I like to look at it as Overcommitment Syndrome as I feel many factors outside training can also have an impact on the whole picture. Our limits vary so much from person to person, one person may be able to do twice as much as another before falling into this trap, I need to know MY limit. The most important thing I have learned is that while running is fun, it is not the be all and end all, my family and my health will always come first. I am super lucky to have an amazing husband who supports me through all of this, he sees the lowest of the lows, he sees so much more than the brave face I have put on for everyone else when its really all been just too overwhelming. The reality is that even with a positive outlook, when things go on for a long time sometimes negativity creeps in, I am making a promise to myself to stay positive and to trust the process. We can’t all be superhuman all of the time and I am OK with that, I don’t really want to be… I just want to be healthy and able to live life and enjoy the people and things I love.