Training, Training, Training

I continue to train.  And train.  And train some more.  My body has been telling me how unhappy it is with me at times.  I am learning to listen to my body.  The Horseman Training is much harder than I anticipated.  So I have modified it a bit.  And I have a confession, anything to do with cleans, squats, press or basically anything with a bar, scare the shit out of me.  I am afraid to do those things by myself.  And unfortunately, a lot of the Horseman training is based on using the bar...A LOT.  I wish I had a workout partner for the hours I work out.  I may have to modify my training times to see if I can have friends work out with me...somewhere.  More thought will have to go into this.

Nutrition.  Holy balls nutrition.  I truly suck at this.  A LOT.  I have gotten to the point that I avoid eating in order to avoid messing with my insulin and working out.  Instead, I need to learn to understand my body better.  Understand its needs and how it can synthesize and break down products.  With my increased activity, I need to cut back on my insulin intake.  Instead, I take too much and hours later my blood sugar crashes...while I am in the middle of a workout.

I am thankful that one of my coworkers is also a T1D and he is equally as active as me, if not more so.  He and I have talked and bounced ideas off of one another.  He advised eating at least 4h before I plan to work out so that my bolus insulin is not peaking while I am exercising.  He also recommended I read Think like a Pancreas by Gary Schneider (https://www.amazon.com/Think-Like-Pancreas-Practical-Insulin-Completely/dp/0738215147

Think Like a Pancreas: A Practical Guide to Managing ... www.amazon.com DiabetesMine.com, 2/21/12 “Think Like a Pancreas covers essentially anything and everything you’d need to know about living with diabetes.” About.com, 3/1/12

).  I will definitely look up this book and read it.  I told him of my frustrations in not finding an endocrinologist who understands a diabetic that exercises regularly and participates in back country, distance, endurance activities.  We both lamented on the fact that doctors we have interacted with have not shared their vast knowledge with us on diabetes, its effects on the body, current studies and products in the planning stages, with us.  Very frustrating.  So I shall take it upon myself to learn these things.

I was telling my coworker of my interest in the Continuous Blood Glucose Monitoring System.  He stated the FDA is working on a closed loop system with an insulin pump and a CGM that communicate with one another to adjust basal and bolus insulins as needed.  He stated they are programmed with a specific algorithm in order to act like a synthetic pancreas.  How awesome is that?!  I did learn that a CGM does not measure blood glucose in real time as I had previously thought.  Coworker advised it still has about a 20min lag and that it must be supplemented by our regular finger pricking systems to make sure the CGM is properly calibrated.

My blood sugars are embarrassingly abysmal.  WTF.  I had such good control for so long and then bam!  I kind of stopped caring as much.  And I can link it directly to all the issues I had earlier this year with my insurance refusing to renew any of my prescriptions and basically telling me they did not care about my health.  They cared about saving money.  And something in me switched.  If the people and companies that are supposed to care to keep me healthy don't, why should I?  I need to flip that switch back.  I need to have better control.  This is ridiculous.  There is a Facebook group for T1D GRTs.  One of the members mentioned the Fit with Diabetes Challenge.  Upon further investigation, I came across Dr. Sheri Colberg and her work with T1D athletes.  I shall definitely look into her works, especially, The Diabetic Athlete's Handbook (2009). 

After my Team RWB GORUCK Leadership Camp, I became truly inspired and wanted to become more involved in the leadership level of my local RWB Chapter.  I have been a member for almost 2 years now, but basically attended events and gave the leadership feedback, but had not been involved in the decision making, advertising process.  Well, you are now looking at the new Communications Director/Captain for Team RWB in the Treasure Valley.  Woooo!  I have so many ideas all the time.  Sometimes I cannot write them all down before I think of new or different ideas.  I am so excited!  My current project is assisting the Boise VA with their Veteran Stand Down event (http://www.va.gov/homeless/events.asp) later this month.  I got permission from my work place to ask for clothing donations for homeless veterans.  So far, after only a week of having the donation boxes in place, my coworkers have donated so many things!  I am so proud of my work place.  They truly are a great group of people.  And I helped spread the word of Team RWB to them as well.  Win!!

On Friday I tried one-arm push-ups for the first time in basically...ever.  Man, not easy stuff.  I admit that I started out merely doing the shoulder shrug.  Just moving my body and shoulder up and down rather than bracing my body weight totally on my one arm and bending it.  Eventually I did manage to bend my elbow a bit.  Progress!  Hey, progress is progress, no matter how incremental.  I'll take it.  Gives me a goal for the next time I do them.

I signed up for a 10K in February and a half marathon in March.  I would really like to participate in the Bataan Memorial Death March on March 19 at White Sands Missile Range, NM.   Who wants to be on my 5-person heavy-rated (i.e. wearing a 35lb ruck) civilian team for the 26 mile trek through sand dunes?  Anyone?  Anyone?  This would be perfect training for my GORUCK Heavy in May!  I need to continue mountain biking for as long as possible to keep it as a good form of cross training.  It saved me when I did the Race to Robie Creek earlier this year.  Fuck that was a hard half marathon.

I also tried on some shoes since a pair of mine are utterly thrashed.  I am usually a fan of Nike's because they tend to be more narrow in the ankle and have a higher arch.  But I have been wanting to try the Solomon Trail Crosses.  Glad I tried them on.  Hell no.  Shit rubs horribly against my right ankle.  My left ankle was fine.  I tried on the shoes after doing a 7mi ruck hike in the foothills.  So my feet were nice and swollen and I had 2 pairs of socks.  The shoe that I really liked was the Brooks Cascadia, size 9, WB.  Yes!!  Now I know what I need to save up for.

I feel like I am slacking as of late.  I am doing more weights than cardio.  I have never done this before and have measured my physical fitness levels based on cardio endurance and less on weight lifting abilities.  I am still searching for a healthy balance.  I will find it.  But it will take time.  I know that in addition to need to correct my nutrition issues, I need to address my sleep habits.  I need to go to bed earlier and sleep more to give my body more rest time.  All things I know I suck at currently.  And needed to get down on (proverbial) paper to remind myself of them.

Still handling Dad stuff.  Still alive.  Barely.  What a horrible situation.  And made worse by the family resorting to strife.  Yeesh.  Dying should bring families together.  Not tear them apart.  For my peace of mind, I do not think about it.  I have compartmentalised and distanced myself.  And it works for me.  I will be returning in Nov to see my parents.  But it will mostly be there for my mother.  My father is past needing me at this point.

And, just for shits and giggles because I find this gif hilarious...and do enjoy watching Game of Thrones- here you go.  Enjoy!

Team RWB GORUCK Leadership Camp: Complete!

This weekend I was lucky enough to be chosen to attend the Team RWB GORUCK Leadership Camp here in Boise, ID.  Members of RWB came from all over: North Dakota, Washington, Montana, California, Utah, Colorado, etc.  Some RWB members were in positions of leadership within their RWB communities and others were in the process of starting their own local area chapters.  And then there were members like me who are not titled in leadership positions, but take an active role in their RWB community.

I applied to attend the camp months ago and got notification of my acceptance while I was in MN attending to my dying father.  Receiving that email meant so much to me.  A lovely glimmer of happiness in a world of smothering sadness and darkness.  I remember being in the "Family" room at the hospital, crying by myself looking out the window overlooking the sluggishly flowing Mississippi River.  I looked at my email on my phone.  I read the email and the first lines were:

"Congratulations!

You’ve been selected to attend the RWB GORUCK Camp from Friday, Sept. 30th – Sunday, Oct 2nd! Time to strap up that ruck and move out with some Eagle Fire! No one rucks alone!  This camp is going to provide an unparalleled leadership experience and training, along with challenging your body mentally and physically. Your job is to enjoy the experience. Learn from the experience. Take your newfound knowledge and to be a leader in Team RWB. "

YESSSS! I smiled (pretty sure I squeed, too). Wiped my tears and headed to my father's hospital room and told everyone. I had been looking forward to camp for weeks. I read the Facebook group homework assignments. Did them. Watched the videos that were posted (one is in my previous blog post):

I took the character strengths test.  Apparently I am a creative, curious, hopeful person. :-)

The topic modules we went over and discussed were:
1 - What is an Eagle Leader
2 - Authentic Leadership
3 - Empathetic Leadership
4 - Genuine Leadership

For me, the word empathy has often been confused with sympathy.  It is important for me to separate the two and think of them differently.  And for both of them, I often dislike the terms.  I think of them as emotion-driven.  And I tend to dislike most things that are driven by emotion rather than logic.

We also discussed various leadership strategies.  Some of which foster distrust and others that foster trust.  There is a great Forbes Magazine article that touches on this topic.  On how to foster trust as a leader through some key components.  This quote from the article really rang true for me:

"Trust can’t be built overnight. It requires time, effort, diligence, and character. Inspiring trust is not slick or easy to fake. Trust is like a forest. It takes a long time to grow and can burn down with a just touch of carelessness."

As for authentic leadership.  Someone used the analogy of using our values like a lantern.  They are our guiding light in the darkness.  When we hold true to our values, we are being true to ourselves, and as an extension, to others.  And that is what makes someone authentic.

Camp started Friday evening and concluded Sunday afternoon.  We gathered at a local RWB member's farm to have a meet and greet and do our introductions.  I arrived late and extremely harried from work.  I found myself having a hard time concentrating or caring for much of the evening's activities.  I wanted to mingle more.  But I was still bothered by my work day.  I wrote on my "permission slip" that I gave myself permission not to think about work for the duration of camp.  I failed.  No matter how hard I tried to pay attention, my work day kept intruding in to my thoughts.

Sun set and we had a small fire.  It was dark.  I took this time to separate myself from the group and hang out on the outskirts with the volunteers (whom I knew and are friends with).  One of them, who has a much greater understanding of my job told me she would listen whenever I wanted to talk about it.  I thanked her.  And moved away and cried while the rest of the group mingled.  I wanted to erase those images and words from my mind of my work day.  But they stayed front and center for much of that evening.  And kept me awake for a while at night.

My roommate is a wonderful woman.  And she was not put off by my crass and piratey way of speaking.  We got along swell!  She trains triathletes in Colorado.  Makes up training plans for them and helps them accomplish their fitness goals.  Badass!  We talked about the importance of pooping and lubing up.  Insta-bonding of friendship right there. :-)

Roomies for life!  This is how roomie and I bonded.

The next morning we trekked to a local fitness center where we had classroom discussion on leadership and RWB values.  I was still distracted from work the day before and at times on the verge of tears.  I have taught myself that crying is a form of weakness.  Even though I know this to be incorrect, I get caught in that old way of thinking often.  There were many times I wanted to share my struggles, but I was also ashamed of myself for having those struggles.  Work rarely bothers me.  I keep it nice and compartmentalised and move on.  I discuss things with fellow coworkers, often times in a manner the public may view as crass or distant or inappropriate.  But that is how we release the stress of our job.  How we do not go crazy after time.  It is also how we bond and cement ourselves as a sort of family.  We understand what one other goes through much better than a general person off the street.  And it is this reason that I tend to prefer the company of veterans.  They often have a better understanding of this mindset.  And respect it.

And then we got to talking about rucking.  A GORUCK Cadre was at the camp and presented information on rucking, health and nutrition and proper packing and prep work for a GORUCK event.  I learned important key factors in hydration and nutrition:

• Pre-event: consume ~16oz water the night before an event.  And 15min before the event, consume 6-8oz of water.  Avoid carbonated and caffeinated beverages, and fruit juice.  Approx 3-4h before the event, consume a meal that contains ~60% carbs, 25% protein and 15% fat.  It should look like a rainbow.
• Event: consume 4-8oz of water every 15min or so.  When you feel thirst, quench it.  That is your body telling you it needs hydration.  Consume foods higher in salt (beef jerky, nuts).  There are also nutrition supplements such as gels, bars and tablets.
• Post-event: consume 24oz of water for every lb of body weight lost during the event for the next 12h.  Consume foods high in protein to promote muscle recover and boost the immune system.

Using electrolytes (such as Nuun tablets or ORS tablets) and carbohydrate replacements are important to consume during a longer event to help the body sustain itself and keep energy levels up.  Try to keep the water/tablet ratio correct, otherwise it may be not as effective.  Dehydration is often correlated to heat exhaustion/stroke.  

And then, it was time!  GORUCK Light time!  I was stoked.  I could not wait to share my passion of rucking with the members of our group.  Many of whom have never attended an event before and were nervous to do it.  Clarity set in for me.  I was in my element.  Exercise is my happy place.  The thoughts and images from work the day before vanished.  I now had a purpose.  And it was to ruck.  It was to help my fellow Eagles on the ruck.

We lined up and started out.  Those of use who were GRT veterans were there to help, participate and at times, observe the discussion more than chime in.  It was to give those that have never done an event, a chance to lead, speak up and recognise times when action and discussion was needed.  The GRT vets corralled and corrected to help the new ones understand better.  Rather than a standard PT Welcome Party, we did a 30-min AMRAP broken into five groups of five different stations.  Then we got in the Boise River (my favorite!!) and plunged our faces under water.  Then it was time to move on.

This past weekend was the anniversary of the Battle of Mogadishu.  GORUCK commemorates this event and its importance with an event called the Mog Mile.  So our Cadre also incorporated learnings from Mogadishu into our GORUCK event.  This meant that we practiced our buddy carries.  And, as a result, got to have a casualty carry for over half of our event.

I buddy carried my fellow Boise Eagles.  Both of which weighed neigh of much and were easy to carry around the park we were practicing in.  I felt bad for them when they had to carry me, who weighed much more than them.  I learned that it is no fun when your buddy carrying you decides to double time it and skip along.  Fuck me.  That shit hurts with bony shoulders bouncing against your inner thigh.  You also feel like you're going to fall at any moment.  Balance and trust.  Great exercise in both.

We started out as an 8-person litter carry of our casualty.  We rucked it up to Castle Rock near Table Rock.  Which meant a steep rocky, dusty single track trail with crumbling edges and scraggly itchy sharp dried out plants on either side.  Eventually common sense took over and we realised it would be easier to Fireman carry our casualty on the trail.  It put less strain on the body of everyone, made the group to carry smaller and was more efficient overall.  So rather than 8 carriers, we now had 3 who could be rotated out more easily when needed.

We rucked it up that damn incline and made it to a very scenic vista.  Time to rest.  Talk about Mogadishu and the sacrifice the soldiers made that day to help each other out.  And take photos.  Then it was time to ruck off the promontory and back down...while carrying our casualty.  I volunteered to carry for much of that time.  I wanted the additional challenge of carrying him to push me harder and work myself more.  I do not like simply rucking without carrying an additional load.  I feel that I am not working hard and could be doing more.

We picked up a fallen tree along the way.  It was very light weight and easy to handle compared to previous fallen trees I've had to carry in past events.  But I had to keep reminding myself that this event is not a standard GORUCK.  It is to build leaders and push people who do not know rucking past their level of comfort and introduce them to something that builds team and leaders.

When we got to Endex, we got to do the oh-so-lovely Tunnel of Love and then the inch worm push up.  At the very end, we had to hold the push up ready position for the duration of the Ballad of the Green Berets.  Yup.  I was going great throughout the event until that point.  Man.  How disappointing.  I rested much more than I would have liked.  I definitely need to work on my should/wrist endurance before my next event.

Unbeknownst to us listening to the song, the volunteers were placing our GORUCK Light patches on our rucks.  Then we lined up and got our RWB GORUCK Camp patches.  Fuck yeah!  We all did it together!  And everyone did it with such a good attitude.  What a great group of people.  Some learned some important lessons, like battle buddies.  You never go anywhere alone.  Always have your battle buddy with you.  And mentioning if something was not so bad.  Yup.  Cadre is gonna make it harder later for that comment.

It was dark by the time we finished.  And the local (my) RWB chapter had spent the past few hours preparing our post-ruck dinner.  Mmmmm, so much protein.  Meat of all varieties.  And so fucking delicious!  Fuck yes!  We enjoyed eating by the light of our headlamps at the Municipal Park near Zoo Boise and the Greenbelt.  Good on the RWB camp organisers for that meal.  It was stupendous.  Then we walked back to the hotel.  Cleaned up.  Bonded and went to bed.

Sunday morning we got up early for yoga.  It felt more like Zumba Yoga, which was quite interesting.  I definitely got a bit of a workout in.  It was not something I had ever done before in that manner.  I was amused by watching and hearing my fellow camp mates attempt some of the poses.  I by no means was successful at them either.

We did some more discussions on leadership.  Reflecting on the differences between genuine and authentic leadership.  And discussing empathetic leadership.  We had a fantastic discussion.  People interpreted things differently.  And we did Devil's advocate on other statements.  People listened actively and participated in a mature and eager manner.  It was such a relief to be in such an open-minded communicative learning atmosphere.  Where people want to be there.  They want to learn and share and express and debate.  I wish we had more of that in our lives.  Rather than attack and deride.

Then it was time to go our separate ways.  I was a bit bummed for the weekend events to be ending.  I was having such a good time with the people I met and interacted with.  I am so proud of my local RWB Chapter for getting involved and helping out and making the camp be as effective and organised as possible.  And I am so thankful for the camp organisers who put it all together.  Who spent the time, resources and money to make it flow seamlessly.  It was a very professionally done event.  One that I recommend to anyone involved in the RWB community and feels a passion to be more involved and wanting to make a bigger difference in their community, both for RWB and their every day lives.

The GORUCK event helped clear my head.  I do not mull on the events of work.  I had my meditative Zen moments and reached peace within myself.  And I got to share it with others.  I certainly hope some of them get what I do out of challenging your body.  Pushing it to work harder and the amazing rewards of accomplishing something you were not sure you could do.  This is one of the main reasons I do GORUCK.  I feel like I am a better person both personally and as a part of a community after I participate in an event.  The bonding you can do with others at an event is a wonderful thing.  I have made many friends through my rucking experiences.  And now that I have gained more insight how to be a better leader, I hope to share my passion for exercise and rucking to others and help them reach mindful clarity and hopefully peace and happiness as well.

And then, of course after we left the hotel, my Eagle friend and I had to go out and continue to better ourselves and help me prepare for my GORUCK Heavy next year.  So we, along with another friend, went for a 9mi hike in the foothills.  It was actually quite nice.  It kept me from getting stiff during the day.  Well..  That is, until we finished hiking and I could hardly move, hahaha!  Oh well.  I gotta get my rucking miles in and might as well start now.  The Cadre for the event this weekend advising me to concentrate on my 12-mile ruck march to make sure I keep it under the 3h30m time cut off and monitor my foot care  before and after I practice those marches.  Good to know.  Foot care.  Yus!