Learning to Run with Asthma

Today on My American Life (Will you read this Ira Glass?)

Running with Asthma

Disclaimer: This post isn’t a study on runners with asthma or some science of running with asthma. This post is just my experience.

Upon being diagnosed with asthma in November 2013, I was under the impression I would only experience exercise induced asthma, specifically for my long runs. But my doctor cleared me up, telling me to use albuterol (the rescue inhaler) before every run and as needed. I also was put on a corticosteroid to help prevent asthma attacks.  After a couple weeks of use, I felt an improvement; I thought I was on the fast road to being normal. I’d wake up some days thinking I was cured, but it was more akin to falling asleep with your glasses/contacts on and thinking you no longer need vision assistance. Not so fast there slugger. How quickly I was reminded that I was human.

Running outside in the arctic temperatures is a challenge of will and want, but now also poses a health risk for me.  Typically, covering your mouth to keep the air warm as you run is more of an effort of comfort rather than necessity. I learned that when I’m told I now need to cover up… to do it. I had one run where the weather was around 0, and I uncovered my mouth for about 45 minutes due to feeling nauseous on my run and the cool air helped me feel better. Result? A few days of asthma kicking my ass, using my rescue inhaler as often as permitted, and calling my doctor to see if I should be worried. I was banned from running outside for a few days and was allowed to kick up my medicine temporarily… and reminded to keep my mouth covered in this rabidly cold winter.

In my efforts to keep my mouth covered during my runs for warmer air, I have had many times where I was challenged in getting enough air to feel comfortable at a faster pace through my balaclava. It becomes annoying; trying to constantly adjust the balaclava for your mouth, trying to loosen up my jacket, thinking it is too tight around my neck. In the end, I give up and just push through the run. Oddly enough this is not constant, I’ll go on to have a longer and faster run a few days later with my balaclava on and no issues at all with my breathing.  

Sometimes, I can take it off

I have done a few runs with my face uncovered for a few miles just to free up my body in a sense and gain a little speed and have felt fine. I don’t know what my temperature danger zone is yet, which is frustrating as it produces some anxiety whenever I breathe the freezing naked air.  

I have also learned that feeling normal in a respiratory sense will take a lot longer than I imagined. I’ll be on a high level of the corticosteroid until my symptoms calm the hell down, even when I am not exercising. At the workplace, people with intense and/or very chemically smelling perfume now cause me distress as well as gag. And sometimes stress can make it flare up as well.

Now you may be thinking, so your fitness sounds like it is crashing right? Well, not so much.

While I am not on a training plan for a race, I am trying to maintain a loose structure to my week.  A speed day, a day at my goal marathon pace, and a long run or two.  I’m trying to be as flexible and relaxed as possible with my running. Change my run to later in the day so it is a little warmer? Done. Run on the treadmill because it is a rough asthma day? Done.  And like right now, take a longer break due to a winter cold to avoid a combined attack of being sick and cold air on my lungs, done. 

I’m learning to be a little more patient. Some days I have to focus more on the effort I had to muster to do my run than just the raw stats. In the end, I have been able produce even stronger runs that I have in the last 6 months.

I’m running my intervals at a 6 minute mile pace and have yet to get hurt (last year I was doing them more around 6:05-6:10, and have lightly hurt myself doing them twice last year). I have been doing my long runs by feel, which has led to multiple runs from 14-16 miles in the pace of 6:58- 7:11 (and one near 8 minute mile, since I am human).

I feel happy with my progress. I’m getting back to how I felt before I got injured last July, just faster. Looking back at August to October training last year, the difference is night and day.  Maybe it is the reduction of pressure? Maybe asthma makes me better…

Next Episode:  Taking in the big city

Have a great one!

 

Invariably Human - Run Commute Update

I had trouble putting this post together, as my first few versions were pretty boring. Boring as in, I didn't even want to read what I just wrote.

Pretty photo running to work

Initially I wanted to get a week's worth of run commutes in to give my early review. I initially tried doing a review of my runs, but snoooozesville. If you want to follow my runs, jump on over to Daily Mile.

I decided to cut it down to the most valuable lessons you should learn if you ever consider a run commute.

• Be organized and have an inventory of your food and cloths you keep at work. On Wednesdays at work, I check what I have left for clothes, how many of each, and write it down. I then write out all the clothes I'll need for the next four business days. I then bring the list home and go shopping in my closet or do a lot of laundry to bring it all in on Thursday, my mandatory rest day from running. Thursday I also check what food I have left and make another list of all the breakfast, lunch, and snack food I'll need for the next four business days. I use my lunch break to go to the grocery store up the street from work and get only what I need (hello limited desk space).
  
• Trust your planning. I spent a good amount of time planning routes, alternate routes, timing out appropriate bus schedules, time needed to get ready, buffer time for delays and so forth. I just have to pick my distance and follow my spreadsheet instructions. I have had a few moments where I have mini panics if I set my alarm for the right time, if I wrote down the wrong bus schedules, but I have to stop myself and trust my previous work.
• Be aware of the variables out of your control that could disrupt your run start time or pace (especially if you are running to work and trying to start work at a specific time).  The biggest variable so far has been the weather. I have had to adjust my run routes  and times a few times due to ice and intense weather in the pre-dawn hours.  I always consider how safe the run will be, not as much to run through, but are the risks of crossing out of control cars too high as I get off the running path. 
  
• Have different run routes ready to switch to in case of weather, reroutes, or over sleeping. Even though I originally set 5 run routes, I have yet to use any of them due to partial path closures in the winter. No biggie, just made a few new ones and found areas to lap around. Also, in the comments of my last post Jennifer commented on wanting to be able to do a run commute, but the lack of showers preventing that from happening.  I started thinking what I would do? I started to think about doing run commutes home. Sounded easy enough. Just whip up some paths that end at home, get into work at 6am, leave at 2:45pm and still get home at a reasonable hour. I quickly liked the idea to throw in my rotation for days that I need to bring emergency cloths to work, weather doesn't permit a run at all in the morning, or I don't feel good in the morning.
• And remember, you are human:  As I'm sure many of you can relate, you can become obsessive and stubborn about your runs. During this winter season, my hardest to deal with human frailty is my new gift of asthma. Upon initial diagnosis, I thought I would just have to deal with exercise induced asthma on my long runs. Reality, I'm not at that point yet. Last Wednesday (22 January) on my run to work, it was moderately cold out. I had on my balaclava, but I started feeling nauseous. I pulled the cover off my mouth to let the cold air help me feel better.  But side result? My asthma flared up hard for days (just feeling more baseline today). I had to call my doctor and was told to run inside and take my medication more often for a few days. Here is where my stubborn comes in, my immediate reaction,  I made this commitment to a run commute, I'm a failure if I run inside! Then the little common sense voice in my head breaks through and says, so emergency room or run inside and listen to your body when you need to. Lesson learned. As a result, I'll be using the treadmill during this polar vortex for a couple days.
  
  
      

I'm hoping once the winter turns into a more... normal Chicago winter, I can get in a good run commute rhythm. For now, just staying as positive as I can and remembering I am a squishy human.

Okay, back to what I was doing:

Cheers mates!

Picking it up for the Holidays

I had the pleasure to experience three very different types of run, each providing me their own challenges, but in the end I love every bit of it.

Friday: Dreadmill. 8 miles. 1.5miles warm up at 8:30 pace, 5 miles between 6:40 - 7:04 pace, 1.5 cool down. I wanted to give myself a small test of my breathing capabilities, how my legs were really doing after a rest day, and a little bit of mental confidence that I am on the right road to redemption and not perdition.

Saturday: First run back on the Lakefront Path! I got out around 5:40am. My plan was to do a slow recovery run after my first push on my legs on Friday. I figured 6-7 miles or an hour at a slow pace would be fine. It was a chilly one, I think the windchill was around -1 and the temperature was somewhere between 8 to 11. I dressed warm... a tad too warm.

I had a pretty pleasant run, I saw some normies I had seen many times before, a total of 8 people, they all said hello. My legs were very tired, but I was in no rush. I looked at my watch to turn around at the 30 minute mark, as I couldn't remember my current mile markers from my new place of resident. Once I got home, I saw that I had messed with my stopwatch and pressed the wrong button. I ended up running about 8 and a half miles, woops.

Saturday evening, I went to the Lincoln Park Zoo with some friends from out of town, it was a very frigid evening! Here are some photos, we had fun!

Sunday: First double digit run, about 10 and a half miles. Mid 20s, windier than Saturday, and snowed for half my run. My legs were not very pleased to be huffing around. I had no push to my run, I was pretty sore and just couldn't pick up my pace to my normal long run pace. The wind was giving me a bit of extra discomfort to my deeper breathing, so at my turn around point, I stopped for a puff of my inhaler to play it safe and returned home on my merry way with snow gracing my face.

Sunday Evening I got to visit a galaxy far far away with some fine friends of mine and some six sided die.

What do runners do when they aren't running?

We role play....

Many of you may be saying:

And rightfully so! It was a fun experience I hope we build upon, we have a filthy crew playing out the adventures we could only hope to do.

Although, my first adventure wasn't very fruitful, as all my "rolls" were pretty much as useful as this:

Fun times! I hope you all had a great weekend! What were you up to? Are you in the holiday spirit yet?