It's been roughly 3 months since I was diagnosed with sky-high blood pressure and renal artery stenosis. I also spent a night in the ICU after a false alarm for a stroke. (I was on a super strong blood pressure med for the night and it required continuous supervision.)
Since then, I started taking walks. At first it was a quarter of a mile, then gradually pushed up to 5-6 miles, every day. Sometimes even up to 8-10 miles if time allowed.
Jogging started slow, as I could only handle about 1/8 mile at a time. [Insert knee strain injury here]. I worked up to 1/4 mile run + 1/4 mile walk for as many reps as I could handle for my daily routine.
Rucking once or twice a week was added and am almost at 40lbs of weight. (It hurts, but has taught me pain management.)
Sprints once a week for 10 seconds for about 5-8 reps somehow worked itself in to the routine. (Dunno where that came from.)
Finally this evening, I ran a full continuous mile and celebrated with a round of sprints after that.
I am 46 and hadn't ran a full mile in over 20 years. 3 months ago I thought I was going to die walking up a hill. Walking one solid mile was a huge milestone for me not so long ago.
I guess the point of this post is just a checkpoint and a reminder to myself that things are actually getting better and there are more milestones to reach.
Cheers.
Hell yeah! That’s fantastic, and I’m really proud of you! It echoes my own journey a bit.
Covid fucked my heart really hard, and my regular exercise turned into an agonising slog overnight more or less. Eventually the healthcare system did a proper checkup, gave me blood pressure meds and my life changed.
I’d never tried running before, it seemed horrible to me, but I was envious of how excited runners would make my dog, so out of spite I started sprinting in small intervals. This was in like March this year.
I still remember how rough it was. Moving from one minute sprints to 90 seconds, to two minutes. Now I run five miles continuously three days a week. My legs are looking hella good too.
Soak in this achievement, friend! Be proud!