Child's Play

A week from today -- right now -- I hope to be celebrating with my teammates the completion of our first Tough Mudder.



I've been honest about my fears: fear of failing my team, fear of not finishing, and -- if you've watched the video -- fear of just about every obstacle that is bound to inflict mental and physical pain. The last few days I've divided the obstacles in my mind into 2 categories: ones that require skill (like the monkey bars) and ones that just plain suck for everyone (like the live wires). I can't do anything about the live wires other than gut my way through them just like everyone else will have to. But the ones that require skill -- those are the ones I know are on me to do or not do, as Yoda would say.

I went to Xfit today and we had a good WOD. A 20-minute AMRAP of 400 meter run, a rope climb, and handstand pushups to failure. We've had lots of running this week which is good prep for the mudder. Today we also had rope climbs which I was glad to do because that will definitely help with some of the obstacles. I got 3.5 climbs in today and I was happy with that because it was a confidence boost for next week.

After the WOD we were all talking about the mudder and we decided to go to a playground and practice monkey bars. I was not an active kid so I can honestly say I never made my way across monkey bars as a child so to do it as an adult is even harder. But we had a lot of fun! I made it across with just my arms and then the girls tried crawling underneath them using both our hands and feet. That's the way to go, for me anyway, but I was glad to see that I have *some* upper body strength.

I feel really good about the mudder now. I feel like I've trained the best I could for this and that I am on a team with amazing athletes who are going into this for the camaraderie and the team spirit. I don't feel like I am going to fail them, just as I know they aren't going to let me fail.

It's amazing how 30 minutes at a playground with some teammates has changed my mindset about this. I'm excited now! I'm looking forward to it! It's going to be hard and it's going to be a huge challenge but I'm going to do this!! I really believe I can!