Drive (long and verbose)

(I really didn't think this post was going to grow into an recounting of my life story, but it did. My apologies. My life story is boring, and verbose.)

Bummed - because I'm skipping my race tomorrow to focus on my health, which hasn't been so great all week.

Setbacks, though, have the tendancy of sharpening my focus and determination. "Setbacks". To be fair, my versions of life's speedbumps are pretty small. Mostly it's just a sniffle here and there, struggles with inclimate weather, flat tires, etc.

When I injured my knee in August at a MTB race I had about 2 weeks off the bike, some infected stitches, but then it seemed to be over. Fast forward to October, when I had an infected blister on my heel, and a weird boil thing on my hip. Antibiotics - check. Ready to rock and roll again. Fast forward again to New Years Eve, when another of the boil things popped up on the back of my left calf. Ouch. And, since I was in Massachusetts, I couldn't really see a doctor. It's a long story, but Mass has state run health insurance (of which I am a big fan) but if you're from out of state, and uninsured, makes it pretty f'in hard to see a medical professional without a $2000 ER visit. Word. So as weird infection thingies kept popping up on my legs (by the way, I love my legs, I treasure them - they're the tools with which I pursue my passion) I couldn't see a doctor for a couple weeks until we made it back to Reno. Luckily I saw the same physician's assistant I'd seen before, and she put 2 and 2 together and concluded that I developed a systemic infection at the time of my FIRST infection (from those stupid non-dissolving dissolvable stitches) and whenever my immune system was compromised, or I had a small injury, or a little teensie weensie ingrown leg hair (hey, who doesn't?) the little bugs on my system would go crazy on it and I'd get an infection. So she gave me a monster dose of doxycycline (the same antibiotic I'd been taking for each infection - it's cheap, it works) plus another one, in the hopes that it would knock it out of my system. Yay, cured! Right? Wrong.

Two weeks ago I started getting the boils again. Just a little one to start with, and I thought, 'maybe it's just a fluke, right?' Wishful thinking. I got a big one behind my knee a week later. So I went in to see my physician's assistant friend at Urgent Care. And . . . she lanced it. Yeah. Gave me a nice shot of local anesthetic (ow), took a scalpal, sliced my leg open, squeezed, and then stuffed it full of gauze (or something like that). Ow. Oh yeah, and she took a culture and sent it to the lab so we can figure it out once and for all. Went back in to have my gauze stuffing removed, and before I could protest she stuffed some fresh stuff right back in. Anyway, the whole infection thing has left me feeling lousy, kept me off the bike (it's like I have an incredibly painful golf ball behind my right knee), and pretty much made this the most blah week I've had in a little while (fortunately it was a rest week, so resting was on the schedule, though maybe not to the degree I took it).

Okay - so, not to sound like I'm bragging or whatever, but I think I'm pretty good at handling pain. The re-stuffing of the gauze was the single most painful 30 seconds of my life. Good. God. Make it stop. Which it did, pretty quickly.

Fast forward to today. The lab results came back! And, much as suspected, I have MRSA. Which conjures up images of necrotizing bacterial infections, but it's not that bad . . . yet. haha, just kidding (I hope). So I'm going back in for the final gauze removal tomorrow (whilst my teammates kick some Snelling butt), and to get some new, MRSA-spanking antibiotics. I hate being on antibiotics, but I hate having pockets of pus in my legs more.

So, what was the point of this whole long, over-sharing story? Well, I've had a shitty week for training and pursuing my of my goals. I'd lost a little weight prior to this, and I'm pretty sure, with the lack of activity and the drowning of sorrows in chocolate, that I've gained it back. Whatever.

My season started great - with Cantua and Pine Flat. This has been a minor setback. I have 2 weeks until the Madera Stage Race. 2 weeks to get back on track. 2 weeks of solid training.

It's raining out. Like, cold, cold rain. At least it's melting the snow. It's supposed to rain all day tomorrow. Tomorrow, I'm going to go ride for 3 hours in the rain. I'm going to strap on the fenders, the Craft winter riding pants, rain jacket. I'll be grateful that I have the health, that my body does everything I ask of it, day after day. After my ride I'll take a long hot shower (a "thank you" to my cold corporal self), and eat a good meal so my body has everything it needs to recover from the stress I put on it. So I'll be able to go do it again, the next day. When Cody proffers ice cream I'll eat some fruit instead. Because I want to win races. Big races. Lots of them.