Ready for this!

[FeelingFocused]

Hi all,

Today I received some news regarding my health and it was a huge eye opener. I can say it wasn't news I wanted to hear but was news I needed to hear. Tomorrow will be the first day for me to get back into running after almost 10 yrs and man am I nervous but I will push through this. I'm open for any helpful advice....

[djplong]

Start slow.  Don't worry about speed.  Talk to people who know about things like posture, gait and nutrition.  Get some running shoes.  You don't have to spend hundreds of dollars but the difference between my 'regular' leisure shoes and the New Balance shoes I bought was VERY noticeable and has probably already prevented a few injuries.

 

Make a plan and stick to it.  Understand that, as you go along, there are going to be some sessions you can't finish.  Don't worry about those.  Take a day of rest and then try it again.  On a few, it took me 4 tries to get past a particular hurdle.

 

I don't know what kind of person you are, but one thing that helped me was getting a fitness tracking app for my phone (I use the MapMyFitness programs - MapMyRun, MapMyWalk, MapMyHike, etc on my iPhone).  using them, I was able to see statistical improvements even when I failed to finish a particular session.  Maybe I lasted longer, ran further or was a little faster - but having those statistics showing SOME improvement really helped me when I started doubting myself.

 

Most of all - understand that you CAN do this.  Keep telling yourself that to reinforce it.  Tell friends what you're doing - heck I even post my workouts to Facebook (optional feature of MapMyFitness) so that it's public knowledge and it's one more thing that keeps me going (don't want to seem like a quitter in public).