Pee S. (a running milestone)

Here's something I left out of that last triumphant post:

I hit another running milestone during that 3-mile tempo run, aside from setting a PR.

I peed my pants at the end.

Not just a trickle. I full-on peed my pants.

Nothing approaching that has ever happened to me before, even after birthing two kids. I'm still not sure why it happened, but I'm guessing it was because I was pushing myself so hard and stopped so abruptly -- when I slowed to a walk, everything let go (including my bladder).

I was aware during the third mile that I needed to pee but it didn't feel like an emergency or anything. It was very peripheral in my thoughts -- probably because I was doing everything I could just to keep moving quickly without dying.

When I saw the magic "3.00" appear on my GPS-enabled watch, I immediately slowed to a walk. And that's when the torrent began. Actually, it wasn't a torrent at first; I'd say it was a stream. Realizing what was going on, I started jogging again, thinking that would halt the flow. No dice. Then I bent over double and kegel-ed for all my might. If anything, that made it worse.

At that point, there was nothing left to do but let it go. There, in the parking lot outside Stone Gardens in my own cozy neighborhood, I peed like a racehorse. SuperAthlete J, who was just a bit behind me, came up to see me laughing and walking around in circles. She asked what was going on, and I proudly announced that I'd just taken a whiz in my sweats.

I stopped laughing soon enough when I remembered that our workout wasn't over -- we were scheduled to jog back to the gym and lift weights together. I started pissing and moaning, ha ha, about how I was going to miss out on our weight session because I didn't have any spare clothes with me and I'd have to go home and change.

Now here's something that will make anyone who belongs to my gym shudder -- and anyone who doesn't breathe a sigh of relief: SAJ simply said, "Oh come on and do weights. You've got at least an hour before you start stinking." When I pointed out the big wet spot on my (thankfully black) sweats, she said, "You're sweaty up top; no one will guess that's pee down below." It's true: my tank top had a big fat sweat stain down the middle from my quick 3 miler. And fortunately, my sweats are quite absorbent -- I'd never put them to a test like that before! -- and they did an admirable job of catching my pee. None of it ran down my legs and into my socks, so I began to seriously consider SAJ's idea.

Such was my desire to lift weights with SAJ that I followed her advice and went to the gym in my stinky britches. (Or supposedly not stinky yet, according to SAJ.) Not only did I do a complete weight session with her -- sitting on a towel whenever sitting was required, thank you very much -- I also wrapped up with half an hour on an elliptical trainer. I will say that I thought I was getting a little smelly toward the end -- but really, not until the last 10 minutes or so. And happily, my sweet husband happened to be at the gym at the same time so he could confirm my lack of stench.

And that is the postscript (or Pee S.) to my story.