She do run run run

You know, this running a marathon thing isn't easy.

More on that tomorrow.

But for today...

Thank you, James, for seeing me off at the start and popping up at intervals throughout the course. Thank you, Rebecca, for telling me I was looking good at twelve miles, and Julie and Gwyn for giving up a whole day this close to your wedding to cheer me on. Thank you Carissa for being there with sisterly support, and Mornie and Grandpa for looking after the children. And Jus and Michelle for singing 'She do run run run she do run run,' and Evie for the fabulous sign, and all of you for hanging around afterwards even though it took me forever to finish. And Jane for cheering, not only on Tower Bridge but at Embankment too. And Mum, for kitting the children out with 'My mum ran London 2011' t shirts in advance - if that's not faith I don't know what is.

I finished. Let it be known and sung from the rooftops - I finished.

Post mortems and analysis can wait. I finished.

The rest can wait.

The final night

So this is it. The next time I go to bed I'll have finished the London Marathon. Or not finished it, or been fished out of the gutter and limped to the end...This time tomorrow, I'll know what happened in the end.

I'll be sure to let you know.

And thank you. All of you, for everything.

The final week

This time next week, it'll all be over. In fact, this time next week I'll be at chorus, where my fellow singers will be raising a bit more money with a charity raffle and book sale in aid of the Wegener's Trust. When the marathon gets too much, I am going to think about how utterly shameful it would be to walk into rehearsal on Tuesday next week, knowing that people have sponsored me and donated raffle prizes and brought along books to sell and will be buying raffle tickets, and say, 'Thank you for all this, but I didn't actually finish the race.'

Likewise, how could I look at my mother, who's so often held the fort at home while I've run, or at The Bride, who's coming from Taunton a fortnight before her wedding to shout at me from the sidelines, or James and the children, who've waved me off on my long Sunday runs for what seems like an eternity now? Or my friend R, who, with a million other calls on her time, is coming to cheer me on, or my parents-in-law, who are coming to care for the children so that James can see me off? Or any of the people, friends and strangers, who've sponsored me, asked questions, left comments on the blog, or simply said, 'Well done?' I won't deserve all that if I don't finish.

I have to finish. I have worked so hard for so many months now. I've run in the dark when it's been impossible to run in the day. I've run in rain and cold, after nights of less than five hours' sleep, at weekends when I'd have given anything in my power to stay at home with James and the children. I've done the long runs, I've read books, I've taken advice. But the fact is that I haven't done enough. I'm terrified it's going to be hot on Sunday. I'm scared I won't make it past twenty one miles, the furthest I've ever run in one go. I'm worried that I just don't have it in me to do this thing. In a funny kind of way, the taper isn't doing me any favours. I never feel like going for a run - it's always a real battle with myself to get out there and get going - but the first three miles are always the hardest. Now, with the runs being shorter, I do the difficult bit without really settling into the run. But it's so good to be back in tens of minutes rather than in hours, to set off knowing that I'll be home soon. The training programme has two more runs - a five mile one and a three mile one. It doesn't seem like enough.

On the plus side, we're on holiday in Cornwall, which is making it extraordinarily easy to follow all the advice about eating plenty of carbohydrates in the days before the race. Clotted cream scones, fish and chips, ice cream, treats from the bakery in the village, the odd glass of red wine. And rest. Even though the nights are quite broken, the days are relaxed. DVDs, walks to the village, sandcastles on the beach, stories on the sofa, lots of laughing. Lots of happy images to think about when the going gets tough.

At the end of the day, those images are why I'm doing this. Funding research, raising awareness, all the drama of setting up a charity and training for a marathon - it all comes down to watching three little children dancing on the sand, chasing the waves with their daddy, who's holding the baby in his arms.

Oh How Are The Mighty Fallen

Well, it's not surprising. And I knew it was happening because my clothes stopped fitting me. You've lost weight is fine. But you're looking gaunt isn't. I didn't really get what people were talking about until I pulled my sports bra on over my head today and took at least a minute to realise that I'd put it on back to front.

Sleep and medals

Here's the question - what's better for marathon preparation? A good long run or a good night's sleep? On Friday night, something amazing happened to me. Something I'd almost given up on. You see other people on the streets - not models or film stars, just ordinary people commuting or buying bread or queuing in the post office - and you know that they are regularly experiencing something I've only dreamed about since June 2005. Or at least, that I would have dreamed about if I ever got the chance. One of those wonderful Things That Happen to Other People finally and gorgeously happened to me. On Friday night, I went to bed and went to sleep and (this is the incredible bit) stayed asleep until I woke up. No crying baby. No toddler wanting company at two in the morning. No children ready for breakfast at sunrise. No school run or lift to the station or crack-of-dawn deliveries. Just a comfortable bed in a quiet location with no children or commitments within a radius of some hundred miles. Nice place, Eindhoven.

I've promised myself that, if I survive April 17th, I'll never run again. But with an entire night of uninterrupted sleep behind me, I began to wonder whether I'd be able to look beyond survival in another marathon. If you could make a commitment to meet a friend and run together, knowing that your children would, as a rule, be at school - or join a running club - or be able to commit to a particular time and prepare for that time instead of having to grab opportunities as they arose - maybe, just maybe, the process would be more (whispers) fun. If going for a run didn't mean missing time playing with the children, or watching a film with James, or writing a chapter or meeting a friend or even keeping up with the bills and household administration - if one could do those things AND go for a run, maybe it would be less lonely. Less of an effort to actually get out there.

I've stopped beating myself up about my time. Between six and six and a half hours is how it is. Maybe one day, in the distant future, when the children are all at school and James' Wegeners (please God) is in the past, I'll be able to try again. But for now, I've done the long runs. I've put in the time and the distance. I've raised money.

When Amersham A Cappella, the wonderful ladies' barbershop chorus in which I sing baritone, was competing at the UK Convention of the Ladies' Association of Barbershop Singers (no, I didn't make that up, it really exists), a coach came to work with us. And she told us to sing our competition package as though we had already won the gold.

We got on stage, and we sang our competition package as though we had already won the gold. And, my friends, we won that gold. Hence we were in Eindhoven at the weekend as the guests of the Dutch Association of Barbershop Singers. Hence I got my full night's sleep, the effects of which have not fully worn off yet. Hence all the optimism flourishing in this post.

So, here and now, I make my declaration. I will finish this marathon and live to tell the tale.

Counting down

Not this Sunday, not the Sunday after that, but the Sunday after that. Twenty sleeps (or, if last night is anything to go by, twenty lack-of-sleeps). On 17th April, I have to run more miles than I have nights left to sleep in preparation.

And I have discovered that, in 2003, Mike Watson took six days to finish the London marathon. He had been in a coma for six months and had six brain operations following a boxing match with Chris Eubank so for him to do it at all was spectacular. My performance, along with every other person who's ever run the marathon, will fall somewhere in between Paula Radcliffe and Mike Watson. They're both heroes. Therefore the rest of us must be too. Even if it is going to take me six and a half hours to finish.

I've also discovered that the Guy's and St Thomas' Charity (under whose umbrella the Wegener's Trust is run) is laying on a congratulatory party for its runners at a pub near the finish. Hurrah! I never imagined, in a million years, that I would walk into a party with a sporting medal round my neck, to be feted as an achiever.

The trouble is that the race starts at ten. I'm a six-plus hours runner. And the party finishes at 4.30.

The Last Long Run

Until I started training for this marathon, I thought a taper was a thin candle used by Victorian parlourmaids in pintucked cotton nightgowns taking themselves up the garret stairs to bed. I quite liked that. However, since I discovered that a taper is a planned reduction in the length and intensity of training runs in the weeks before a marathon, it has become one of my favourite words in the English language. Only 'rest' and 'day' (in that order) come ahead.

'Long' and 'run' (in that order) are really quite far behind. 'Long run' is down there with 'While You Were Out' or 'ADT alarm systems' or 'I'm sure I mentioned it to you.' From Long Run's position in the league tables, it can just about see 'Nits are about again' in the distance ahead. Long Run hopes that, if it works really hard, it might just catch up with the need to replace the hoover or the fact that the school's given dads a chance to go in with one week's notice, during the time that James is in Saudi Arabia. Long Run aspires to the position of Internet Connection Cannot Be Established or Password Not Recognised. It's got a long way to go.

But now, thanks to Taper, Sunday's Long Run was my last before the marathon. Not my last run, I hasten to add. But I don't have to run 21 miles again until Sunday 17th April. The fact that, on Sunday 17th April, I'll have to go another 5.2, really isn't important right now. Neither is the fact that those twenty one miles took me five hours and two minutes. I'm tapering now. I knew there'd be good moments if I stuck with it for long enough.