Hello.  This is still Marie.  Nora continues to be super busy with work and the final weeks of training for the Baystate Marathon. But you will hear from her soon!

Meanwhile a little update from me.  By this time next week, I am hoping to have run for the first time in 3 years. I’m excited but also a little scared. I know I am starting this process again from the very bottom rung.  Even lower, I guess because I do not have that 40 year old body I had at the beginning of my running journey.

When I started running, I would run a mile from my house and then walk the mile back.  For a while, I was pretty happy with this. Then one day, after the mile run, I said to myself, “I’m a healthy 40 year old woman, there’s no reason I shouldn’t be able to run 2 miles…” So I did. I worked my way up slowly, but some of the milestones are still very vivid. Like the day I ran my first 8 miles, doing this run on the Battle Road in Minuteman Park. I finished at the visitors center overlooking the beautiful garden and the Old North Bridge. For me, that day it felt like I had finished a marathon and I texted my husband, “you are married to a freakin’ Amazon Queen!”

It was soon after that that Nora expressed an interest in running longer distances – possibly even a half-marathon. And thus began our crazy love affair with running – and this blog.

So we will see how things go as I try to get back to something which had become a pretty big part of my life. In the meanwhile, I am still playing around with the ten or so programs my Boston Scientific rep made up for me. I am trying to see which ones get me through the night, (still some issues with this) and which ones are good for sitting for extended periods of time. I am trying to get used to the sensations, and even though it feels weird at times, there are also periods where I completely forget about it.

So the journey begins: I will keep meeting with Boston Scientific rep to tweak the programs, and I will keep in touch with their patient ambassadors for info and encouragement. And I will try to stay positive and I will be sure to celebrate all the milestones – even the little ones. Because I am still an Amazon Queen…

My friend and artist Eileen F. painted this picture of me walking on our trip to Cuba last fall… so I am on the road…