Running With Asthma

Hi Anna,
Kudos to you for taking your exercise program seriously by taking interest in Cross Country! Joining a team is a big commitment. Running is running, so if you decide to join, then all the practices and all the races will contribute to building your base. This is fine. HOWEVER, keep in mind that you probably won’t realize your goals until next year’s cross country season, assuming you run consistently all year long to build a strong base. The reason for the base is this: to strengthen your muscles, strengthen your lungs and heart, and to strengthen your mind (we need to get a grip on the mind chatter). Once you have built all of these muscles from a year long building of your base, then when you start cross country for the second time (next year), you can use your new strength to springboard to your goals of running faster and farther. It’s hard to reach the goals of faster and farther before you worked out all the kinks and strengthened all the muscles. It’s fine to join the team now just as long as you know that you will be faster next season. It’s hard to be on a team without a base. You can do it but it will take more work. As long as you know that, then go for it. Good luck!!!

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Hi Starlit,
Thanks for writing in! Glad to hear you are starting a regular exercise routine. Just make sure you start slow to build a solid foundation. There are many things that could contribute to dizziness such as dehydration and not enough oxygen and poor diet. I would say to start by walking first, not running. Walk one mile per day or several times per week. Just walk for a few weeks before you start working your way up to running. If you are dizzy, call it a day and go see your doctor. Regular, consistent, methodical, safe, exercise will make you stronger and will allow you to build a healthy foundation to run upon. Get a subscription to a running magazine, this will help as well. Tara

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Hi Rebecca,
You are singing to the choir, my dear! I have been on hiatus, hence the late reply, but I hope that you have found some middle ground in your exercise. I have a solution for you but I’m afraid that you won’t want to hear it; I didn’t. The solution is to start by walking. This is hard. I am very impatient and want to just RUN and “feel free” as you say “without the ball and chain.” I get it. I”m so with you. But the key to being able to do this is to develop a good base, a good foundation of strength. We all want to go out and “just do it” but running doesn’t work that way, especially if we are struggling with EIA. You must, must, must develop a foundation to run on. Start with walking a mile every day, or as many days as your schedule will allow. Do this for a few weeks. What this does is begin to train your body that every day you are going to exercise. It takes a while to teach your muscles and your brain what to do. The heavy feeling in your legs is lactic acid. All runners and swimmers get this, even the Olympic athletes. You have to teach your mind what your body is feeling and vice versa. Start this process with walking, let all the systems in your body get on the same page before you start running. Do a brisk walk, not slow, get your heart pumping, but WALK. After a few weeks, you can begin to incorporate some running but do it slow. Walk one minute, jog 30 seconds, alternate. And only do this a couple time per week at first so you can let your body adjust. On the other day continue to walk. Then you can slowly work your way up. It took me two years to get to the point where I could run 3 miles and beyond to the 1/2 marathon. A strong, consistent, disciplined, methodical, foundation is the key. Trust me. Get a subscription to a running magazine. This will help. Thanks for writing in and let us know how you are doing! Tara

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Hi Kim! Thanks so much for sharing! If you want the full story of how I went med free, it’s all here on the blog. You will have to read through the various posts. The short answer is this: consistent weekly workouts to develop a strong base, clearing out mental baggage that was holding me back in all areas in life (and it was showing up in my running…”I can’t”…), lots of prayer, and, as I got stronger mentally and physically, I just slowly weened off all the meds. The thing about medication is that the more you take, the more you need. This is just my opinion, I’m not a doctor, but medication can make us dependent on medication. In my case, I found that once I got my lungs to a point that they were strong enough to handle a 1/2 marathon, that is when I started the process of decreasing the meds. And then I discovered that the meds were actually making my asthma worse, keeping me symptomatic. I needed to decide whether to add more medication or go off of it completely. The meds do not strengthen your lungs like regular exercise. So when the meds get to their threshold of being effective (and again this is all just my opinion, I’m not medically trained), then the lungs will require something stronger or different. And this is when the doctor will want to up the meds or try something different. This is why regular, consistent exercise is soo crucial. Exercise adds strength, builds muscle, cleans the toxins out of the body, gets things lubricated, fuels the brain, etc etc. Medication cannot do that. Granted, sometimes we need it; I’m not anti-med. if you have to take it, take it. But in my case, the benefit that the meds once gave me had worn off and I saw the positive effect the long distance running was having on me both physically and mentally and so I decided to try to ween myself off the meds. I was scared, lots of mind games, I went slow, but once I was off I had the benefit of hindsight and that is when I clearly saw that the meds had ran their course and were holding me back. Building muscle, endurance, tenacity, mental clarity, we’re all keys to taking this step. We can get stronger with age, not weaker. Don’t fool yourself. Keep us posted on your progress! Thanks for sharing, Tara

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