Last season I trained pretty hard. I completed multiple 5Ks, half marathon, marathon, short distance tri, and a half ironman. On November 19th, 2006 after running in the Route 66 Marathon in Tulsa my training came to an end. Between mile sixteen and eighteen I had a tremendous amount of back pain. I thought my kidney was failing me. I did not give up on the race. I slowly trotted my way to the finish line to complete in less than four hours.
After returning home I began testing to see what was wrong with me. The doctors had found a hole in my diaphragm. Basically, a mass about the size of a softball had moved from my abdominal cavity up into my chest cavity. Well, after many appointments and preparations I finally had surgery on February 1, 2007.
The experience of the surgery was tough. They had tried to go through my abdomen to repair the hole. However, due to the location of the hole in the rear of the diaphragm by my spinal cord they could not get to it. This left me with six holes in my abdomen. They then flipped my over and fitted me with a chest tube and went through my rib cage. This left me with four entries though my rib cage.
I woke up in the ICU a little scared and confused. I was in the ICU for four days. On the fourth day I had a little set back. After the chest tube was pulled out I went over to have an x-ray to see if my lungs were in good shape. What they found was my left lung was partially collapsed. I got out of the hospital after the seventh day.
The surgery really left me in a lot of pain and the month of February has been a blur. I was on multiple narcotics to ease the pain. By direction of the doctors I needed to get my breathing back up to get my lung in shape. So, I spent time walking and doing some easy stationary bike work.
I am still in some pain without the narcotics, but I am ready to start my road back to recovery. I am signed up for Mooseman Half Iron and Lake Placid Ironman, but I don’t think I will make it this year. I have not done any fitness training since the Route 66 Marathon in November.
Pre surgery weight was 190.
My weight today was 203.5.
Goals for the week: Have a solid week on the stationary bike. Work up to one hour at 90-95 RPMs. This weekend I am going to try to walk/jog 1 mile. I need to get back on to a health diet this week. I ate too much comfort food.
This morning I rode the stationary for 50 minutes at 90-95 RPMs.
Cheers
