Saying Goodbye

So I wasn't entirely sure I was going to run the full marathon until the day before the race. I had some hip pain as I had mentioned, but the biggest difficulty for me was saying goodbye to a pet of mine. I had Hobbes for his entire life, a third of mine and lost him quite unexpectedly. He showed no signs of sickness, I actually took him into the vet for litter box issues and it was determined that he had really aggressive cancer that really couldn't be fought.

I had no idea how to deal with this because this little guy had become one of my best friends. I had formed this attachment to him that I couldn't quite explain to anyone. I don't have kids so essentially Hobbes was one of my kids. I loved this guy to death. Losing him with no notice really shook me to my core. I had no time to brace myself and no idea how to cope with his loss. I found myself still saying his name and found our other cat walking around looking for him. It seemed like we all needed some time.

I was really quite upset about the whole situation and wasn't sure if I was in the right mindset to run a marathon, and run it completely alone. Something came over me the day before the race, though. I found myself packing a cooler and race bag before I even realized what was happening. I told my husband that I was doing this race for our buddy. Hobbes had this funny habit of running up on the bed or couch and laying directly on my legs after every race. I always joked that he thought he was the secret to my recovery. He was like a nice 18 lb heating pad. When I got to that race I knew I was going to be fine running it and finishing it after I met up with a pacer. I honestly didn't even question my ability to finish and that was one of my happiest races.