The Amazing Race October 21, 2009

TEAM TREVOR!!!!!!

Angela and Bob the day before the race at the Nike Expo

Chris pointing to his name on the wall of runners outside of Nike

Chris’s ultra organized almost to the point of anal, stuff

he needed for the marathon the next day

Team Trevor marathoners before the race began. Bob

is wearing the King outfit Angela got him because he received

his triple crown after this race.

Ed looking so strong he turned around and ran back toward us

for a picture

Chris and Kathy

Bob looking good at mile 10

The cheering squad Chris at mile 15

Chris coming across the finish line. The announcers always

announced when Team Trevor was coming across so I was able to get

pictures

Chris and Bob at the finish line

Chris giving Peck a hug of gratitude after the finish

Angela giving an emotional Chris a squeeze at the end of the race

Bob, Chris and Ed just after Chris finished the race

Almost a week later I am finally taking at moment at naptime on Friday to write our experiences from the San Francisco Nike Women’s Marathon.

I will begin by explaining what Chris and I got out of the marathon: I received a beautiful Tiffany necklace that finishers of the marathon received (assuming most of them are women, the necklace is a fitting finishing gift), while Chris got Rhabdomyolysis.

I am enjoying my necklace right now, wearing it proudly as a person who has never and will never run a marathon, but did a fantastic job as a spectator on Sunday. Chris is slowly recovery from his condition. Rhabdomyolysis is the breakdown of muscle tissue. When this happens there is a release of toxins in the bloodstream caused by muscle trauma or strenuous exercise, such as a marathon. In healthy people, the kidneys filter out the toxins and with tons of hydration the body just heals itself. In unhealthy people, Rhabdomyolysis can cause kidney damage. Luckily Chris falls into the healthy person category.

Chris is insisting that I mention that other than the Rhabdomyolysis, he also got a tremendous sense of accomplishment and a real emotional connection to those people fighting blood cancer, or who have lost someone they love to blood cancer.

So, I will condense a very interesting experience for me, with many stories to tell, into an abbreviated tale with just the most important points covered.

We woke up at 5:30am Sunday morning and Chris geared up like he was someone going out for battle. We realized late how accurate this analogy actually is. He had layers of clothes, gu galore (the energy gu runners consume during the race), iPod, electrolyte supplements, racing bib, Garmin GPS watch, and his belt ‘o waters. We got out there in the dark and the energy was amazing. Tens of thousands of people filled the streets and lined the sidewalks waiting for the race to begin. There were so many people in the race that it took Chris, Bob and Ed 10 minutes to cross the start line after the starting gun was fired . After they passed us at the starting line Angela, Heidi and I got ourselves a Starbucks and headed out for a morning of spectating and cheering.

I didn’t realize ahead of time that I was on this journey with the “super spectator” or I like to cal her the “spectator nazi”, my dear friend Angela. I was the driver and Angela and Heidi led us to the next place to get out and cheer the boys on. Angela had her map that outlined at which mile they would be at approximately what time and we would drive like maniacs around the city, find a park and run to the spot and watch for them to come by. We had our Team Trevor banner that we held up at each spot and I quickly realized how important this must be and how much it means to Bob and Angela to be at these races. Runners and walkers would come by and yell “go Team Trevor” at us and kiss Trevor’s face on the poster, which made me realize that these races really keep Trevor’s memory alive and well.

By the end of the race, we made it to the finish line and watched as each of the guys, who had gotten separated during the race, came across the finish line. Chris was in tears at the sheer difficulty and emotional achievement of the 26.2 mile run. There were difficult hills and times when Chris wasn’t sure he could go on but he had so much support along the way. Our neighbor and friend Kathy stuck with him up until the last 10 miles supporting him. Then another friend Peck stepped in the last 10 miles and kept him going all the way through to the finish line. Chris says he may not have finished the race without Peck supporting him that last ten miles. When Chris was having one of his lowest moments of the race, when he hit “the wall,” a woman ran by him and yelled “Team Trevor – woo hoo!” then turned around and ran back when she realized Chris was having a difficult time. She said “I want to tell you how much this means to me what you are doing. You are the real honoree of this race. Because I am a cancer survivor they always want me to speak at these events but I never do because I always feel like the real heroes are the people who are fighting for the cure and raising money and doing all they can to cure cancer. “ Chris was running along feeling like he was barely alive when this woman came along. Her name was Kelly and her boyfriend’s name was Op. They ran with Chris the rest of the six miles to the finish line. Ten minutes before crossing Chris said to Op, “tell me about your name Op” and he said, it is short for Optimism. Chris finished in 5 hours.

It was a very amazing weekend with lots of new experiences for Chris and I. I would like to thank Angela, the spectator nazi, for making this last weekend amazing for everyone, especially our running husbands. Thanks for the cool hats and all of the organization on race day. Trevor is proud of his parents for sure. I am proud of Chris for raising more than $6,000 for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and for persevering through the pain and finishing the race.

Until next time, the mothership is signing off.

Marathon October 17, 2009

We are in San Francisco preparing to go out to the big pasta feed Team and Training puts on before the big Nike Women’s Marathon tomorrow. We have dispersed our kids among the grandparents and I do miss them already. I need a break but I don’t want to be away from them at the same time. We drove down to the city bright and early with Bob and Angela and then cruised over to the Marathon Expo at Union Square donning our very cool purple hats with the “Get Swabbed” pins all over them that Angela put a lot of hard work into making last night. It has never crossed my mind to run a marathon and I am quite sure it won’t ever cross my mind, but I have enjoyed being a spectator and feeling the energy of the participants all around for the few hours I have been here. Tomorrow Angela, Heidi (also a neighbor and friend) and I will be marathon chasers, trying to find our husbands as they make their way through San Francisco.

Chris and I had a nice café lunch with our old pals Nicola and Paul in Union Square and then we hooked up with our other college friend Michele who happened to be in the city with a girlfriend. It was a mini-reunion and a great way to start off our marathon weekend.

On the kid front, Ava has found a new passion for soccer. She won all ten team sprints to the ball in a row at her last practice, going undefeated. In addition to blossoming in soccer, Ava has decided that she is going to start trying to read and write on her own. We will be driving in the car and she will say, “S-T-O-P spells stop and I didn’t even see a stop sign.” Last night she handed me a fire safety poster that was supposed to be colored and instead she had spelled words written all over it such as “my emergency” which was random and spelled phonetically. Then she filled the entire paper up with different phrases and words that she had done by herself. The mothership was proud.

The babies are blossoming in their own ways. Preston hits his sisters over the head with plastic pots and pans. Yesterday he chose the big plastic singing Elmo to bash atop Violet’s head and she was not happy. Elsa walks around all day trying to find jewelry and shoes to put on. She is a girl through and through; very sweet and capable of manipulating people with her adorable face and friendly personality. Violet is very independent and easy to take care of. She eats the food she is given, she plays by herself or with Ava and she has a wonderful sense of humor. Violet is always ready for a good time with her brother and sister’s and her laugh is infectious.

Although their clinginess is overwhelming and irritating sometimes, I miss those little monkeys when I am not with them.

I will update after Chris, Bob and Ed run their race. Run boys run! And yeah to Team Trevor for raising close to $23,000 for the Leukemia and Lymphoma society.

Ava-ism:

Ava says to Chris as he is putting her to bed “daddy are you running in the half marathon tomorrow?” Chris told her that he was running in the half marathon but that he was nervous because his knee hurt. Ava said, “why don’t you try running differently?” Chris asked Ava what she meant. Ava said, “try running on the front of your feet, you know, like on your toes more.” During the half marathon Chris says that he saw a lot of good runners running on the front of their feet. . . on their toes.

A word Ava made up, “that car is hunormous“.

Until next time, the mothership is signing off.

Triplet Cling-Ons October 8, 2009

Gigi and Elsie hanging out

The little men sitting and watching a little Baby Einstein together

Ava and all her siblings

. . . adoring Ava and everything she has to show them

Little Vee Vee enjoying her morning cuppa milk

Poser Preston

Elsa is kicked back in her special chair for her morning milk

Elsa climbed up into Ava’s lap for a snuggle and Ava was so happy

Look at these red heads on the field. They both look so enthusiastic

about the game

Ava dribbling. We are always happy when she isn’t

playing with grass or twiddling her hair during a game

It is Thursday night at 8:30pm and I am steaming a 16 oz. box of spinach batch by batch in order to make tofu nuggets for my kids for lunches over the next month. I make huge amounts and freeze some of them for later. I have to wonder what my life has come to as I am making tofu nuggets on a Thursday night. I am not impressed with myself but I do feel like at least I will be providing some healthy snacks for my kids which makes me feel somewhat satisfied.

Well, 19 months is not, I repeat, is not my favorite age. This stage with triplets is much harder than the infant stage for sure. My kids doctor told me today that 19 months — the slide into the big “terrible twos” stage can be the worst of them all. The tantrums, the slamming doors repeatedly now that they learned how to do so, the slamming the toilet lids (yes, I know I need to do some additional childproofing), the refusing my dinners rudely by screaming crying and throwing their food across the room. The worst part of it all is that they have become unbearably clingy to me. Today when I got home I wanted so badly to just sit in the car and stare at the windshield, or maybe read the mail on the floor of my car; anything but go into my house where I would surely be attacked by triplets. The urge to be a good mom always wins over my urge to run away, thankfully for my kids.

Preston has always been a momma’s boy, which I have felt was sweet and endearing up until now. Now he whines and cries and clings to my leg and has me walk around the house with his whole self attached to my leg. If I am holding him and another baby approaches he thrashes his body around and cries out and tries to hit his sisters to keep them away from me. I told my doctor today that I don’t think Preston wanted to be a triplet. Preston would have been very happy and good as a single baby boy.

Elsa tends to act like a cling-on like her brother, while Violet is very independent and likes to sit herself down at a task and work it out. Violet sees the other two going crazy all over me and it is like she decides she isn’t even going to bother. For that, I love her even more. Plus, Violet has her special relationship with Ava and they hang out and play a lot of the time. It is very sweet.

So, in light of my very hectic and complicated life, I have decided to take measures to make things more convenient at least. I have decided NOT to drive the 30 minutes each way to take Violet to speech therapy, but instead pay the out of network cost to have a very nice speech therapist in my area drive to my house and do her visits with Violet. And instead of driving 25 minutes to My Gym with the babies I stopped my membership there and we just started going to Tumble Time Gymnastics about 5 minutes away from my house.

The kids dropped their morning nap so we have one nap a day now which has also been a big adjustment for us all. It does give us the freedom to go out and play each morning but it also is a lot more work with half the naps during the day now – lots more entertaining.

Ava got her first Progress Report home and she exceeded all of the standards of what she needed to know at her stage in Kindergarten. It kind of makes up for all the grief she has given us over the years. The good report card: we have that going for us, which is nice.

Chris ran the Cowtown Half Marathon last weekend and Ava, Violet and I surprised him at the finish line. He did fantastic, running it in 2 hours! We are off to San Francisco for the full marathon on October 18th, which should be very exciting.

I am finding it very hard to muster up the energy to write this blog during this busy time in my life but I am determined to carry on. It makes me feel like I am actually doing something for myself and it will also be a great gift to my kids one day, even though they may not appreciate everything I have to say about them.

Until next time, the mothership is signing off.