2019 has not been the best of years. January started with an exploding washing machine. In February I was diagnosed with Alopecia after the hairdresser noticed lots of hair patches. This ended up with some very stressful and uncertain months ahead. We experienced lots of other things breaking, some of which we still cannot afford to put right. My son didn’t get a place at the nursery, which is a short walk away and this put a lot of strain on us having to travel to another. June was the worst of all months when we unexpectedly lost J. Our hearts were broken and I don’t think we will ever fully come to terms with what happened. September we had lots of stress as we tried to rebook our holiday after Thomas Cook went under. It was a very stressful period indeed. October I fractured my ankle and am still waiting on testing to see when I can run again.
2019 also brought with it some fantastic achievements for my children. Little Man grew confident with his swimming and has finished the year waiting for a place to move up to the next stage. They have had to approve this due to his age as he shouldn’t move until he is 4 but he is competent enough to do so. My eldest daughter was selected to train for her gymnastics club so we now spend most evenings with her training. My youngest daughter has finally found her passion. She takes part in a musical drama club and watching her face lit up as she performs on stage was certainly one of my highlights this year.
With running I completed my furthest distance to date of 65 miles. Finished in 4th place at a 24hour race with my ultra hubby. Finally received my first trophy for finishing second lady in a local ultra race and surprised myself with running from Manchester to Liverpool in blazing heat! I knocked a huge chunk of time off my marathon PB and broke the 4.30 barrier. I really feel I could have run under 4 hours had my ankle have not been broken. My parkrun time was also smashed finishing the year on 25.03. I will get under 25 minutes when I get my fitness back.
My hair grew back during the last half of 2019 which I am so incredibly grateful for, although I am also on edge wondering if it will fall out again. We also welcomed 4 new additions to our house. A fish which my eldest daughter got as a birthday present. Joey the Guinea Pig who is the sweetest thing ever and very talkative. Finally our two boys A and B, our labrador puppies who next year I hope to start running with.
2019 has been a tough year and one I am glad to see the end of but I am also a little sad as it will be the last year that we had J. I have no idea what 2020 will bring, we are hoping for a low key one with as little drama as possible but with two labrador puppies running around who knows if that is likely!
