Question:
Around 3am today my 4 1/2 year old daughter was admitted to hospital with a
105 fever and what turned out to be double pneumonia. A very sick little
girl, with parents who were having heart attacks every 9 seconds. She has
responded very well to treatment and will hopefully be released tomorrow.
Faced with emotional pain, anxiety, stress, and sleep depravation, my
former life's response would have been to hide, drink, eat, and abuse
myself.
Today, after being relieved by my wife at the hospital, I ran. It wasn't
easy slugging out 8 miles after the last 24 hours, but at the end I felt
wonderful and energized to face day 2 of this family ordeal. Running is
supposed to be fun & healthy; a diversion; but I still wonder how it is
that I missed out for 35 years on the other life benefits that can be
derived from this simple act.
Does any one else have stories of running being a welcome respite from
personal stress?
Answer:
Wow, I hope your daughter is okay - that's a big scare to
go through. I have no children but I would lose it I think,
if one got sick, if I did.
As far as your question, I started running only about 9
months ago, but I had just quit smoking, and so running
became a stress reliever to me immediately. It had to.
I have no story of running through any specific stressful
epidsode of life...yet. These days I am finding running very
zen-like. Even speedwork can give me a really serene
feeling, even though I am riding the threshold we all
know of.
Happy to hear that your daughter will be well.
Nowadays after running, I always feel better. Running helps ease the little
negative stress in my life. The only huge negative stress in my life was my
father's death and running/training for the LA Marathon after his death and
running my best time there (for him) helped eased it. The feeling after running
is SO different from the feeling after playing tennis, hiking, dancing, or
other activities. I can't explain it.
After running, I just feel like a load of burden has been lifted from me and
I'm renewed again and can tackle anything coming my way in life. I just feel
lighter and happier. Of course, God has lots to do with that too.
My father died of cancer 1½ years ago. During the last month of his life, I ran
a lot more, both alone and with my brother. We got to talk, scream, cry and get
the frustration and anger out on those runs. Now that my brother is home in
Florida, we still email each other training logs, schedules, etc. He's now
training for his first marathon. (I'd be training virtually for my fifth, but
posterior tibial tendinitis is having its way with me)
i am going through a stressfull time myself and i am very sorry to find out
that running cannot help me. No matter how fast i run, the stress is
following me wherever i go. i would like to get some advice because it is
driving me crazy.
I'm sure she will recover very fast. I've 2 kids for myself, which are
now 16 and 14 years old. My son was really ill with some kind of
infection at an age of 1 1/2 years. I know this feeling, parents have
in such situations. So again, good luck and well recovery to your
daugther.
After this meeting at June 1999 I had this strong feeling either to
hit someone seriously or starting to run. I'd never run before. For my
goodness, I decided to start running and did 10 km at the first time
in 1h10min and was totally messed up after this, but felt much
better. This was the beginning of my running. Beside the better
bodyfeeling, I gain from it, it gives a lot of meditation to
me. This is the reason, why I prefer to run alone mostly. But I can
also enjoy doing my Sunday long run with a group of friends.
Nowadays I do about 55 km average every week.
Running can be a great stress reliever on the one hand. On
the other hand it can sometimes add stress to an already frazzled
existence. In the case you find that running adds stress to your life
it's a sign you need to cut back somewhere and slow down with
somethin
Sorry to hear about your daughter being so sick. I've been
through a couple of those 105 degree fevers and they're no fun. I
hope by now she's doing much better. Yes, running can be a great
stress reducer. It's also a great way to redirect negative energy in
a positive direction.
