Taking the news as best I can...

Well, you can officially call me cyborg-MJ now. I'm currently sitting here hooked up to electrodes on my upper body, part of a holter monitor, as they send info into the little box clipped to my jeans. If I start to feel any symptoms I'm to push a little button on the box and also write down the symptom & time it occured.

 Why am I doing this strange experiment?
For the last 3 weeks I've been feeling pretty odd. Dizziness, lightheaded,  nausea, etc. I've continued my running as planned, since I don't really get the symptoms while training (except on my long runs, then I get a little light headed past 6 miles). I finally had enough when over the weekend in Ohio I had several bouts of nausea that were so strong I though I was really going to throw up.

I went to see my doctor today (he's my super-awesome-also-a-runner-FNP-but-I-still-call-him-doctor guy) and he did some blood work to rule out any level issues, an EKG, and a CT scan to rule out anything wrong with my head (ha!).  The only thing that came back abnormal was the EKG, so that's the direction he went. After looking at the read-out and listening with his stethoscope, he determined I have a cardiac arrhythmia.  At this time he believes my ventricles (the lower chambers that pump oxygenated blood back in to the body) aren't pumping at regular intervals and also aren't pumping together. This is causing my body to not receive the highest levels of oxygenated blood. It's not incredibly serious or life threatening, but it does give reason for all of the symptoms I've been having, and could have some effect....wait for it....

on my running.  :(

As of right now I'm just on restriction until a few more tests are run and the results from the holter are reviewed. (I have to wear it until 12noon tomorrow) He wants to do an ultrasound on my carotid artery & heart to make sure there is no narrowing or blockage. If everything looks clear, and all that is wrong is the arrhythmia, then I am free to resume my running. However, I will always have a little more trouble with stamina due to the lower levels of oxygen in my blood. So it will always be a struggle for me, but I still want to be out there on the road!!

It's been pretty hard staying positive today. As most of you know I was supposed to run my first 10-mile training run this morning. I was super pumped about hitting double digits. But it didn't happen, and won't happen this weekend either. I'm out for at least a week. But I've re-arranged my training schedule, it just means one less week of tapering before the 1/2 mary on October 2nd. I kindly explained to my doctor that he MUST be a miracle worker and have me back up and running by next weekend or I'd trip him at the next 5k we ran together lol. 

FYI - His second concern, once he finds out exactly what's going on, is to figure out why it became so bad suddenly in the last few weeks. I've had most of these symptoms on and off for a few years, but they just started occurring more frequently this month.

So please keep me in your thoughts, and keep your fingers crossed. I have a lot of running left in me, I want to be able to get out there and show the road what I've got.