In my Jan 14th post I shared how my failure to achieve a workout goal on the treadmill makes me worry I don't have what it takes to survive a stem-cell transplant (sct). A long-time subscriber commented, "[This] does not sound like you...If you stop after one mile, it probably means that you just don't have it that day...."
It does sound like me: That is exactly what I sometimes think and feel for a moment or two while at the gym.
A hallmark of Healthy Survivorship is the flexibility to embrace the ups and downs of your outlook, mood and will power. You don't have to be optimistic -- or hopeful or strong or cheerful -- 100% of the time to be a Healthy Survivor.
In The Human Side of Cancer, Jimmie Holland, M.D. coined the phrase "tyranny of positive thinking." [The link takes you to a nice excerpt.]
Healthy Survivors know it matters less what you think (or feel) than what you do with what you think (or feel). So I'm going to explore why I quit on the treadmill before reaching my intended goal.
Finding effective ways to build my mental stamina when jogging will increase my confidence in handling future physical challenges. And it will help me stay fit, too!
Even athletes training for an event know that sometimes they're not going to finish as many miles or achieve the per-mile pace that they'd planned for that day. The important thing, as you said, is to look at what's stopping you, and address that. Did you sleep poorly the night before? Does something hurt? Does today's run feel so much harder than usual that you're afraid you'll be worse off if you finish? Do you feel that finishing the second mile is not really helping you achieve your goal of staying fit? Are you forgetting what an achievement it is for you to run at all? (I had a friend who berated herself for having to rest during a 5K walk when her blood counts were so low that I was impressed that she even started.) Or are you stopping just because you don't feel like continuing?
Only the last one has anything to do with will power. In any case, if you're looking for signs that you have the will power to withstand the rigors of possible future treatment, isn't your extensive history of having withstood the rigors of so many previous treatments far more predictive than whether you finish a planned run on any given day?
Posted by: Finn | January 20, 2011 at 12:49 PM
Needed to read this today. Thank you!
Posted by: Jonnie Hickman | January 27, 2011 at 12:07 PM