Long Commute and Pepper Spray

I just finished my 2nd week of my pediatric rotation. I am enjoying the clinic, my clinical instructor (CI), my "co-workers",  and the program, but my rotation is about 40 miles away and takes me an hour and a half to get home every day:( It is only for 12 weeks (officially 10 now) and I know I am going to learn a lot at this clinical rotation, so that is more important…right? I am working with children who have neurological insults such as Cerebral Palsy (CP), brain injuries, spinal cord injuries, and Spina Bifida. Most of the kids have CP and are relatively high functioning, but it has been a challenge to find a way to not take home my emotions at the end of the day. I had a long talk with my CI about dealing with the emotions of working with this population and she put it into a nice perspective. There are going to be children that have these aliments and it is our job to make them as happy and comfortable as possible, then I am doing my job and I feel happy about that.

My knees have been hurting me since I ran that trail run (aka my 28th half marathon), so I have taken some long walks instead of running. Last Sunday my knees were feeling better. No pain with walking, squatting or going up stairs, so I decided to knock out 8 miles. I told myself that if my knees started to hurt I would turn around, well my knees did decide to start hurting about 1/2 way through my run. I did turn around, but walking 4 miles sounded miserable, so I decided to run until my knees hurt then stretch out my quads then start running again. My knees would feel good for about a half mile and then I would have to stop :( Urrrr this is so frustrating because I have another half marathon coming up in October and I would like to be decently trained for it. I haven't run since then, but I can tell that my quads are super tight.

On my long run last Sunday, I ran on a (cement) trail. I have become a little more paranoid lately about running alone and especially in a place that does not have a lot of people traffic. So, I brought pepper spray with me. I don't really know how to use it (I don't think it is that hard and I bet I could figure it out), but it still made me feel a little better about running alone.

This is what the trail looks like (Source)

Source

This is what my pepper spray looks like. Yes it is pink and fits in the palm of my hand. What precautions do you take when running or walking by yourself? Or are you not concerned that anything is going to happen? 

I am so happy the weekend is finally here because I am sleep deprived. I am not use to waking up so early, and even though I have been going to bed earlier and earlier every night, I am using a lot of brain power right now so not only am I physically exhausted, I am also completely mentally exhausted. I am going to sleep in as late as I can tomorrow, which might be a challenge because my mom is coming into town! I am excited to see her and I bet we will go to bed relatively early tonight. The plan for the weekend is to be active and eat good food, but I am just excited to get to hang with my mom.

I hope you all have a wonderful Labor Day weekend. Anyone have exciting plans for the long weekend?