C25K COMPLETED!

Well, after 9 (actually 10 because I did one week twice) weeks of going from nothing at all to running 3 miles, I can officially say I've completed the Couch to 5K training course.  And just keeping it real, I have followed every single walk/run time exactly as it describes...until today.  In this week of C25K the schedule is to run 3 miles..no walking, 3 times this week. Shawn and I decided to run the last one together today and the only time we could do it was smack dab in the middle of the afternoon....we thought we could handle it....we were wrong.  About 1 1/2 miles in, I hit a breaking point.  It wasn't that my body couldn't handle the running...it was the heat.  I just couldn't keep going in the heat.  It's oppressive right now because there is quite a bit of humidity in the air.  In keeping it really real, I then starting bawling...uncontrollably.  I am so hard on myself when it comes to things like this...I demand perfection from myself and it's hard to accept that sometimes I just can't no matter how bad I want to.  I cried for about a block and then started walking like the mad white girl that I was...determined.  Although I felt nauseated and had chill bumps, I kept going.  Shawn quietly walked next to me, and it was nice to know that even though I was a cruddy running buddy today, he was there and wasn't leaving my side.  I fought my walk the other 1 1/2 miles back to the house and somehow with all that walking, only added 4 minutes to my previous days times.  After sitting down on the front porch and letting my body cool off, Shawn confessed that he had wanted to stop before I actually did because of the extreme heat, but kept telling himself "You can't stop!  Emma needs you to keep going!"  It made me feel good that the heat was bad enough that he wanted to stop too...made me feel like less of a wuss.  So, I still feel accomplished and now I'm even more determined than before to run 3 miles more smoothly. But I now have more wisdom....running mid-afternoon through the summer is completely out of the question from now on.  And now, my goal is to continue running 3 miles, 3 times a week until we do the Tough Mudder in October.  I will be running my first officially 5K next weekend and it's a mud obstacle course too.  After Tough Mudder, my goal is to drop it down to 2-2.5 miles 3 times a week.  Who'd have thought???  ***Just was looking at the weather from today and the high was 95 with a heat index of 104...no wonder it felt hot!