Got Inked...

Well after a hellish 4 days at work I spent yesterday getting all the negative stuff out of me. Out of respect for the families and other privacy issue/ethical stuff I am not going to go into any details on here. But just trust me when I say it was an extremely hard weekend. I think this was the 2nd time in almost 5 years that I have cried at work. Anywho...got a very much needed massage yesterday morning and then had an awesome hour run in Umstead Park. Yesterday was the first time I have exercised since the Ironman and I felt really great. The weather was gorgeous and all the leaves have turned all their fall colors. I ran along with my IPod just kinda zoning out to the music enjoying the scenery. There are alot of hills in Umstead and the route that I usually run is uphill for over a mile. As I got to the last half of my run I spent some time thinking about this woman named Dorothy.

Dorothy was an athlete at IM FL. She was near the back of the swim pack and was tiring out. One of the kayakers told her to take a break and hang onto the kayak so she could rest. As I understand she got dizzy, passed out, and slipped underwater. The kayaker was able to grab her and she was quickly brought to shore by the rescue boat. Ty's family saw that they were doing CPR on her. She unfortunately never regained full consciousness and suffered massive brain damage (it is not clear what the cause was) It was posted online that she passed away on the 8th. Dorothy was racing with her 2nd husband to raise money for a certain charity. Her first husband had been killed in a traffic accident and she had used IM training as a way to cope with his death. Dorothy had 3 children. Talk about tragedy. This is the 2nd year in a row that someone died during IMFL. Last year a man drowned during the swim and was taken off life support a few days later. I didn't know these 2 people, but in someway I do feel like I know them. They were out their racing with the rest of us. As I ran up that last mile long hill yesterday I ran knowing that I was not alone. I ran with Dorothy, I ran with both my patients who lost their lives this weekend, and I ran with their grieving families.

After my run yesterday I went to Blue Flame and get my M-Dot tattoo touched up. I got that tattoo 3 years ago in Boston after I had done my first IM. It never healed that well and it was missing a bit of ink. So I had it touched up and then I also had the IM distance 140.6 added underneath it. Then on the outside of my left ankle I had the saying "Anything Is Possible" tattooed. I love them! Maybe with the next IM I will have a little swimmer, biker, and runner added.....:)