Fighting my body

My body is majorly fighting getting back into running.

Its been fighting the running, and largely succeeding, but for the past couple of weeks I've been determined not to let it win and my body, more specifically the MS, is not happy. Last week, I fought and struggled to make it through one mile, which was hard because once upon a time one mile felt like cake. This week, I'm pushing farther and the MS is pushing back. On Monday, I got up to run and my calves were already beginning to cramp up. I'm stretching and I can tell I'm going to be in for a 'fun time' when I hit the pavement.

True to its word, once I started running, my body threw a full fledged MS style hissy fit. Not only did my legs cramp up painfully but my arms as well. Coming up on the one mile mark, my body really started complaining and it wasn't happy at all when I pushed it for another quarter mile before I switched to walking. This morning's run was a little better, despite adamantly not wanting to get out of bed... it was 31˚ outside. It accepted the mile somewhat graciously, it was okay with the extra quarter all though it started its usual complaining right before I reached the end of that stretch, but when I pushed it an extra quarter to make my total a grand mile and a half... the conniption fit started and my legs seized up excruciatingly.

I have to say I'd forgotten just how much of a fit the MS can raise when it doesn't like what I'm doing. The first time I started working out after my diagnosis, the left side of my body went numb for a month. This time it's not neuropathy, which is pretty easy to ignore once you get used to it, but painful muscle cramps and spasms which are less easy to ignore. It is really difficult to work up the motivation to engage in an activity when you know it's going to hurt... a lot.

So while the fatigue has lifted and it is now possible for me to get up at 5 in the morning, it takes a lot of will to drag myself out of bed and into my running gear. I know this will pass if I stay consistent, but it's going to be a long month of miserable runs before my body and the MS starts to accept that I'm the one in charge and I say I'm going to run.