Now that there are just two weeks remaining till official D-Day, my thoughts are turning more and more towards labor and delivery.
Entering this 'big unknown' I have started to prepare myself in the only way I know how. To draw upon the most physically and mentally demanding events I have endured in the past. That being of course - marathon running.
I recently finished a series of childbirth education classes. At the start of every session, the nurse held aloft a diagram depicting the stages of labor. Beside the description of the earliest stage glowed a smiley, relaxed woman's cartoon face, and under her lay the more concentrated, serious face of a woman nearing transition. Lastly, the decidedly unhappy, grimacing face of a woman in the transition and pushing phase, glowered intimidatingly at me.
The similarity to the stages of running a marathon struck me immediately. Ever noticed how in a marathon, runners often chat and laugh during the first few miles, then fall silent and more focused in the middle stages, and in the final stretch are entirely self absorbed, miserable looking, and like they may bite the head off anyone who attempts to engage them in a high-five or casual banter?
How far can I take this marathon running/labor analogy?
In a different class on breast feeding, the teacher was herself a 14-time, 50+ year old, 3:04 PR marathoner. Part way through the class it became obvious that not only was she a strong proponent of the practice of breast feeding (as you'd expect) but also of 'natural childbirth.' She said that her proudest marathon was not because of a PR, but because of a victory over pain. After crossing the finish line, she discovered that her last 10 miles were run on a broken knee. If one can do this, she unsubtley suggested, and reap such a fine reward, then surely an epidural in labor is unnecessary! You can be more proud of yourself and your childbirth 'event,' she proposed, if you do it medication-free.
I think her argument falls down on two counts:
1) running and racing are inherently competitive, and competitive exercise produces endorphins which are purposefully designed to mask pain. I know from experience during a bad bout of ITBS which could be excruciatingly painful in training, yet vanish the moment I crossed over a race starting mat. Labor, while definitely 'exercise,' I'm thinking, is not the endorphin producing, competitive activity of racing. There is nothing else there, but pain.
2) More importantly, this woman has never actually given birth herself. And when it comes down to it - how much credence can be leant to somebody passing judgment on the necessity or otherwise of pain medication during an ordeal of which they have no first hand experience?
A good friend of mine underwent a terribly hard labor, toiling for over 20 hours right through to the pushing stage, only to be subjected in the end to the invasive, major surgery of a c-section. In spite of this, she said recently to me
"honestly, I think the idea of running a marathon sounds a lot harder."I think where
her argument falls down is that she has never trained for or run a marathon. And though I'm proud of my marathon achievements, I believe she has an inflated idea of how tough they actually are - assuming you're properly trained, of course.
Yes, for the last 4 miles of Boston '05, I recall my quads felt like they were actually trying to kill me, and
yes, pushing myself in the last 6.2 miles of New York '04, to achieve that BQ without a minute to spare was mentally one of the toughest things I've ever done. But - looking back with the rose-tinted rear view mirror, how
hard was it all really? The pain was never overwhelming, nor of a type that I hadn't experienced at least partially before. And there was no fear involved.
A big problem I have with the concept of labor is that, unlike a marathon, you can't train for it. And, unless you've done it once before, you have absolutely no idea what you're in for. You can't go out and do the equivalent of multiple 20+ mile training runs to simulate
conditions. You can only read and listen endlessly to the theory.
I for one, am keeping an open mind, and will not consider myself 'cheating' or a 'failure' if and when I turn to drugs.
Readers who are both marathon finishers
and mothers have probably snorted their way through this entire post. How immensely naive of me to assume (hope!) that
any parallels at all can be drawn between marathon running and childbirth. I'd like to hear your views on it.
And of course, one day very soon, I will be qualified to write a follow up, from an insider's perspective.
You know that feeling when you've studied feverishly for a long time for an exam, or you've practiced an upcoming work presentation repeatedly for weeks, or you've been training hard for months physically and mentally for a big race, and there comes that time where you absolutely cannot do anything further to prepare? When you get to that saturation point; you cannot face another page of a textbook, or run another step. Not one iota more of information will enter your brain, when nothing at all you can do could possibly make a difference to the outcome of the impending event?
