My Inspiration!

1/2 Marathon down, 1 Marathon to go!

Well! I finished my first 1/2 Marathon today and what a beautiful day for it! Here are the stats:

There were 60 finishers in the Female 35 to 39 age group and 868 finishers in the 1/2 Marathon division.

My overall finish place was 611, in my age group finish place was 28 and my gender finish place was 235. My time 2:20:23.89 gave me a 10:43 pace per mile.

My 3M time was 31:09.85 for a pace of 10:23 per mile
My 6M time was 1:02:55.03 for a pace of 10:35 per mile
My 10M time was 1:46:23.53 for a pace of 10:52 per mile

I finished and I had such a great time with friends and family that were there to cheer me on! Thanks to those that cheered me in spirit wish all of you could have been there too!

I was introduced at the awards ceremony and had my letter about Johnathon read to the crowd. It was so awesome to be recognized for doing what I have set out to do. I feel like Johnathon has touch so many lives still and he continues to today, I am so happy that he was a part of my life if even for such a short time. He has helped me spread the word about Childhood Cancer even 10 years after he has left he lives on still through stories and spirit.

I feel more motivated than ever and feel so blessed to have the friends that I do that support me so much!

With each race and each time I talk about Johnathon I get that much closer to finding peace within myself and being able to finally find away to put all of this at peace within myself.

Thanks for sharing in my journey and allowing me and Johnathon into your hearts!

Tears and Fears about 1/2 Marathon

So it is soon upon me that I will be running my first 1/2 Marathon. I feel completely unprepared and terrified! I feel like I am no where near ready and I feel sick to my stomach when I think about it.

So much has lead up to this point and I feel so overwhelmed at times. When the workouts are hard and I have a bad day I question whether or not I am going to be able to run a full marathon. I question myself and my courage. I question if I have set my goals too high. I get scared.

Then I remember the courage that my son showed everyday of his very short life. I remember the courageous face I had to put on every time I walked into that hospital. I remember holding back tears so that my son would never see me cry. I remember never showing how scared I was, and I was scared, very scared.

Then I remember why I started all this, to just remember and honor my little boy! I'm scared I will be honest with you there. But I will do it and I will finish and then I will work toward the next race and the next one until I find myself in Chicago with thousands of others running for their own causes and memories. Running for their own healing or soul searching, running to run.

I have so much love and support from all of you that at times that is enough to get me out of bed and on the road. But some days are easier than others, some days I just want to "give up".

But Johnathon never gave up, he fought to the very end, he never gave up, he just had to let go.

On Saturday I will be introduced at the Dismal Swamp Stomp and my story told of why I am running.

Please try to join me there for this big day, and if not please pray for me to have the strength and courage to complete this race.

My story was published on the Dismal Swamp Stomp press page here is the link.

http://www.dismalswampstomp.kalerunning.com/press_releases.html

Wounded Warrior 5k

I finished another race! I did the Wounded Warrior 5k(3.12 miles) on Saturday the 28th. It was really nice and a nice ceremony for the fallen men and women of our armed forces. Very nice running weather. The race was along the boardwalk at the beach. There were a little over 700 people that turned out to run. So it was a little crowded.

In my age group I placed 12th and paced 216th overall. I had a personal best of 28:48. I am feeling the pain today! My knees are killing me!

I have a couple more runs before my first 1/2 marathon on April 18th. I am scared to death, every time I think about running the half, I feel like I'm going to throw up! But for the first time I feel confident that I can actually finish it. So I continue on the road to the marathon in Chicago and continue with the training.

Marathon Training Update!

Hey there! Just a little note to catch everyone up on my training efforts toward the Marathon in Chicago Oct 11, 2009.

As of now I have completed 5 races.

Mud in Your Eye Series:

5k 32:39 minutes placed 9th in my age group
6k 37:31 minutes placed 8th in my age group.
8k 51:11 minutes placed 10th in my age group.

Valentines Day 14k
14k 1:30:52 placed 89th in my age group

Shamrock 8k
8k 48:27 placed 2305th over all 117 in my age group out of 7091 total runners

Now take note I'm not setting any records...just wanting to complete the runs to my fullest potential.

The next scheduled runs are as follows:

Wounded Warrior 5k March 28th
Cerebral Palsy of Virginia 5k April 4th
Dismal Swamp Stomp 1/2 Marathon April 18th (first 1/2 marathon)
St. John the Apostle 5k May 2nd

I am always looking for someone to come and run with me, so let me know if you want to sign up for any one of these events.

Thanks for all the support!
http://www.active.com/donate/rallyathletes/RUNMOMRUN

100 MILES!! Run Mom Run!!

I have logged in over 100 miles since I have started training for my marathon! We have reached $2158 toward my goal of $3200, hopefully we will exceed this goal! My first 1/2 marathon is April 19th!! If you have not donated to the cause, please consider.

If you already made a donation..Thank you! You Rock!!

http://www.active.com/donate/rallyathletes/RUNMOMRUN

Please follow my blog for random thoughts and updates!

Always in a "Forward Motion"

Rally On,
Claresa

Johnathon is now a "RALLY KID"

As you may know by now I am a Rally Athlete running to raise money and awareness for Childhood Cancer Research. Johnathon is now officially a "Rally Kid" his profile and picture will be posted on the Rally website http://www.rallyfoundation.org/

Other people can also chose to run in honor of Johnathon. So again his spirit lives on.

The following is the letter I submitted to the foundation as his bio, I had a hard time getting through the last part of it as I was over come with tears and could no longer see the keyboard.

The letter is as follows:

Well when it comes to talking about Johnathon it isn't hard. He was the light of my life, my sweet little angle. He was really sent into my life to change the direction I was headed. And although his time here was short, he touched so many people and changed lives as well.

He was a beautiful baby boy with the biggest blue eyes that would just melt your heart! He had such a great laugh and a personality that just shined! He spread so much warmth and love to everyone he touched. He was my special "little man".

Johnathon was 17 months old the day I found out that he had been diagnosed with Neuroblastoma stage 4. That was the day that I will never forget!

"your son has cancer!!"

Cancer!? Kids don't get cancer!! And as the days, and weeks and months of in and out of the hospital I had the rough awakening that children really do get cancer.

Neuroblastoma is a rare and aggressive cancer that at the time we were limited treatment options, most of the options that we were given were "trial and research" options.


But as a mother what do you do? You chose to fight! And we fought hard. Johnathon fought his cancer for 6 months, he had surgeries to remove the tumors, chemotherapy, radiation and stem cell rescue. He spent 2 months in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit and fought to get home, even when the prognosis was poor. We walked out of that PICU with the entire staff clapping.

After a short time of being cancer free the cancer returned and this time it was everywhere. In December 1998 the surgeons told us the tumors were inoperable, and sadly told me this would be his last Christmas, I took him home.

I opted to stop treatments. I could no longer see him suffer no longer risk losing him in the hospital hooked to machines, drugged and surrounded by strangers. I chose to let him spend his last few weeks surrounded by family his stuffed animals his pet dog and me. We sat around and watched his favorite movies and I never left his side.

Johnathon became weaker and sicker very quickly, he was dying, he had waited until I had made it back to my mothers house where he knew I would be safe. I held him close and told him " mommy is going to be okay, you will always be my little angel, It is okay to go, the angels are waiting for you, I love you Johnathon, I love you." And as he drew his last breath in he looked at me and touched my face and said "love you mama, love you" Just as he came into the world it was my face he saw and as he left this world it was my face he saw. Johnathon passed away quietly in my arms on 16 January 1999, he was 2 1/2 years old.