Oh my, not in my wildest dreams could I ever do an Ironman. I used to do a quarter of one. For the uninitiated, they come in sprint, olympic, half ironman and ironman distances. I used to do the mini or sprint one. I wanted to do an olympic distance one, but my body would not take that run....too long a time of being upright under stress, and my cardiovascular system, dumps on me. My blood vessels dilate, BP sinks and pulse drops...just like on the stress test.

Now I would relish finishing last in a sprint tri....just want to finish one again...don't know if that is possible, as I know my disease is progressive, and training, can only do so much. It is like swimming upstream a raging river....if you can stay in one place you are doing well....but not to swim at all is to get washed out to sea. Right? I have family members who have volunteered to do it with me, we will see.

Once a triathlete, regardless of the distance, always a triathlete.

It is good that some one IS doing things for Neuropathy Awareness....but it also shows the divergent types of PN, and her PN, will resolve, eventually get better and possibly disappear. For her sake, I hope. Never the less, doing an Ironman with ANY medical condition is the hardest thing to do.

I remember one man, who pulled his profoundly handicapped son thru the race. He did it for decades, from when his son was young to when his son was an adult. He swam 2 miles pulling his son on a raft like contraption, biked with him attached and ran with him in a specially designed wheelchair. He pulled an entire whole other human being thru that race. I am not sure if he is still doing it, as the son, was totally handicapped and the man did age up into his 50's.

There comes a point when you hang up the towel....and you look back and say, 'this is what I did...and it is OK, that I don't do it anymore'. I wish I could remember his name, but I can only remember him by his deeds. That is fine. I remember his courage and determination, which is what he wanted me to remember. And I remember the picture of his son grinning ear to ear. I think they were going to stop him from doing it, last I heard, a it was just too much.

To be honest, I think that the full Ironman is such a huge feat that, I don't think it is good for many folks to undertake. It takes a very, very special and determined person to do this kind of feat, and I hope it does not affect her health negatively, because there is a price to be paid for doing these kinds of endeavors. I am sure she had good advice and training and lots of support. I give her lots of credit and am thankful that she brought awareness to the cause of PN.

You can see tho, that, PN can come in many varieties, and that often we must live with and surmount the pain that the condition brings to our lives.

Interestingly, I have days when I am utterly inacapacitated, usually due to autonomic symptoms, as pain, usually, (not always) I push thru. You can't push thru hypotension very easily....and for some reason today, that is my issue. Dizziness and graying out. I just took a fludrocoritsone. Hypotension downs you, literally. Most people don't think of that being PN. It is. I could train up for a tri, and be incappacitated that day due to hypotension...and you don't get your race fee refunded, and they are pricey.

Well, I am not exactly holding my place in the raging river....I am still being washed downstream, and there will be no athletic events until I can hold my own in the river, and not go downstream.