046 🎄 That time of the year..

..and why the second part of the year was not a loss runningwise.

Welcome to my email newsletter 'Never not [thinking about] running' - a weekly newsletter about running and mental health. If you haven't subscribed yet and you're not sure whether you really want to receive an e-mail from me on every Thursday, have a look at the archive. Today's newsletter is about the absence of running in my life lately.

It's that time of the year again. As parents, it's time to create a cozy feeling at home, craft advent calendars for three children (does this exist outside of Germany - a calendar where children can open a small package every day?), spend Sundays with the grandparents, consider whether to buy a real tree or a plastic tree for Christmas, and what to put under said tree.

That's 72 packages, you couldn't possibly have managed that alone. Maybe there really is an elf who helps!? (Kid2 wonders)

Additionally, surprisingly, work piles up just before the turn of the year, and here and there, conferences or Christmas-parties for the department of 150 people, need to be organized quickly. What can you do? Take a vacation. I had so much remaining vacation time that taking a week off was more than justified, and I used the time well to order presents and mainly lounge in bed during the mornings.

There was a good reason for that, as the second half of the year was marked by various ailments and minor illnesses, including last week. Feeling fit rarely happened between July and December. For whatever reason, but as described in previous newsletters, I'm relatively relaxed, which is mostly because my relationship with running is much more relaxed. When I'm sick, I just stay at home.

Actually, I would have liked to buy a sauna at the end of the year, but somehow we felt that it would make our garden look terribly cluttered. It was just an idea to prevent the usual colds because we rarely make it to the sauna.

And so in the second half of the year, maybe 500-550 kilometers of running came together. The plan was around 1000-1200k. That's how it goes. And I don’t know in this moment what I feel when I look at these numbers. At times, I was afraid that I might lose interest in running. However, that feeling is now gone because I'm also looking forward to running more again soon.

In the end, I think what prevails is the joy of knowing that my life no longer falls apart when I don't complete my targeted weekly mileage, though on the other hand, I recently haven't had any real goals to work towards. At the beginning of the year, it was the UTMB, then a fast half-marathon time (with a successful PB in summer), and I wanted to end the year with some fast 5K races, but that's when the illness misery began.

Besides, I had already achieved quite a bit in this area last year, so I was satisfied with that. So that was it for this year. And for next year, I only know that I'll focus more on shorter distances again. The long stuff still doesn't align with time and body. Maybe when the kids are older, but right now it doesn't fit.

Mental health update

Next therapy session is next year. Looking forward to that. Made some progress this year, which I really appreciate, but there is still work to do.

Running Update

No running at the moment. Looking forward to new running projects next year.

The end:

📸 If you want to see and read more of my work, find my LinkedIn-page here and my Instagram account here. If you are interested in my running, have a look at my Strava.

👨🏽‍❤️‍👨🏼 If you liked to receive this piece of writing, please consider to share it with others who might enjoy it as well.

💛 If you like what you read you can always support me by using this Amazon Affiliate Link. Your support is greatly appreciated!

🗄 Here is an archive of previous posts.

🖋 You are dearly invited to reply to this email to open up a conversation.

💡 If you didn’t subscribe yet, feel free to do it in the form below.