Just me

Today is one week from the Marathon. I'm feeling nervous and excited. I'm anxious to just get there and get to the starting line. I have been tapering on my running and have a few very short runs this week before we get on the plane to NYC on Friday. My training is behind me. Not often, but at times, I feel as if my confidence is hanging on by a thread. Will my training get me to the finish line? I've never done this before. When I get those feelings I have to remind myself that I WILL get there. I put in the time, the training, I'm healthy, loved and supported...and I have to believe that when it comes to "go time", I'll be in the right frame of mind to carry my body and push my legs through the five boroughs of NYC.

Forty seven thousand people will run the NYC Marathon on November 4. All of them have their own reasons and wishes for their race. I am running with Team Ritter. Fifteen of us will put on the shirt with "Team Ritter" in large, purple block letters on the front and put in the 26.2. miles for ourselves and for the John Ritter Foundation. These wonderful, motivated people on Team Ritter are running because they have been touched in some way by aortic disease. My teammates motivate me so much and I do not want to let them down. And I do not want to let the Foundation, or Amy Yasbeck down! All of them have been so friendly and supportive.

But when it comes to that morning, Nov 4, putting in the miles and getting to the finish line, it will come down to just me. I'm the one who has to do it. I'm the one who is going to feel the pain in my legs, hips and knees and wrestle with all the mental tug-of-war during the marathon!! Nobody is going to take over for me when I hit the wall in the Bronx or carry me over the finish line in Central Park.
It's just me.

I am also feeling emotional about what I'm about to do. (Feeling it right now as I type.) I get choked up visualizing myself crossing the finish line. I will be thinking about what I've been through, my kids and my husband. I will be thinking about my family and friends in Michigan, Colorado, Winnipeg and many other places across North America. I will be thinking about everyone who supported me since that day of diagnosis over three years ago. I had so much love, prayers and kindness directed at me and my family during those scary weeks in 2009. And I am still feeling it as the marathon draws near. I'm running for them as much as for myself and I'm running for people I don't know who are facing aortic disease or have lost loved ones to this disease.

My wish for myself is to just breathe and take it all in. This is probably the only time I will run the NYC Marathon...I need to actually enjoy it! I have to remind myself how special and how personal this is for me. I get to do something I only dreamed of doing and I get to do it for the right reasons. I'm not trying to win the thing and I don't have a personal best to beat. I have to tell myself to put away the "numbers" and not focus as much time (although, honestly, I will feel just slightly disappointed if I do not finish in 4:30 or less...ok, putting that out of my mind!!) In my heart I know that I will finish and will feel so overwhelmingly proud and high! And I will remind myself after I finish that I survived aortic disease and open heart surgery and I was able RUN A MARATHON to raise money and awareness for the Ritter Foundation. Life is good, very, very good! Smiling now.

My 41st birthday is Nov 3, the day before the race. Crossing the finish line will be the best birthday gift ever!