Last Friday I was visiting my Mom as she recuperated from surgery.  She was anxious to get up and to walk around… stretch her legs and feel her body in motion.  My Mom has always been a swirl of energy!

My Mom was attached to about a million or so tubes of various lengths and needed a nurse for assistance whenever she wanted to get out of bed, even if to simply get to a chair a couple of feet away.

All of the nurses were wonderful… some all business wonderful, some warm & fuzzy wonderful, some clinical wonderful, some fun & funny wonderful and some a combination of the above.

During one shift, my Mom had a young, combination of the above nurse who helped my Mom out out of bed, rearranged her room to make it more comfortable, got her all ready for a walk and teased her about the IV pole was wheeling around… and that’s when my Mom felt compelled to mention that I took pole dancing lessons.

(Not on an IV pole, by the way.)

The pole dancing lessons revelation led to sky-diving… which both this nurse and I have done.  That led to conversation of other endeavors, and my Mom just had to mention my Ironman 70.3 in particular.

(My Mom is one of my biggest cheerleaders, by the way.)

And that conversation led to me offering all of my training plans, notes & information to this wonderful nurse who took such wonderful care of my Mom as the 3 of us chatted about fitness.

Over the weekend, Barry, my incredible husband, photocopied my entire folder of plans, notes & information, 3-hole punched the entire packet and put this stack o’ paper of information in a binder.  What a guy!

I will be delivering this binder to this wonderful nurse today.

And the whole conversation and re-reading my notes and looking at the awesome photo gift from my son & daughter-in-law (who participated in the same 70.3 with me, as well as my daughter Jane) made me feel so happy…

I learned more about myself during the training for those 70.3 miles of swimming, biking, running than I ever thought possible.

Fears vanished.  Possibilities blossomed.  Trust in self.  Overcoming defeats.  Determination.  Confidence.  Accepting the unknown head-on.

Training for a distance event requires lots of time alone with your own thoughts.  I found this time, particularly while swimming and biking, a time to sort, organize, prioritize, THINK.  I found my life/goals/decisions more productive in the balance I required to get my training in.

And I had FUN.

I made a promise to myself that no matter how I crossed that FINISH LINE after accomplishing those 70.3 miles in July 2010… I would be smiling.

That was my main goal.

That goal came true.

I discovered the joy of trying something so outside the proverbial box that sometimes I still can’t believe I did it.

I wish this discovery, this joy, this FUN and a great big smile to the wonderful nurse who will be getting this binder today… and to anyone else who embarks on a journey of self-discovery of any kind!