Hey friends! Long time no see! Things got a little bit crazy over here.
I’m pretty sure everything, including kitchen sink, has been thrown at me in the last couple of months. I planned to write a detailed post about some of that stuff, I am mentally exhausted and am having trouble evening forming words. We’ve been dealing with a lot of sickness, work deadlines, work travel, depositions for a [completely unavoidable and slightly ridiculous] lawsuit over a driveway easement, testifying at a parole hearing and a few other little things that *seemed like a big deal at the time* but are slipping my mind at the moment. Combine all of that with my husband being out of town for a 30 day hurricane relief deployment and I have been in literal survival mode. I told Richard that my only goal while he was gone was to keep all the living things alive. Spoiler alert: I didn’t. We lost a couple chickens. However, a few baby chicks also hatched while he was gone, so I’m thinking we’ll just call it good. It’s the circle of life.
If you’ve been following my blog for a while, then A. THANK YOU! and B. you can probably guess what the parole hearing was about. This is the thing that I want to write more about, but don’t want to think more about. If only I could write without thinking! Ha.
This was news to me, but apparently most inmates are eligible for parole after they’ve completed one-third of their prison sentence or 10 years time, whichever is less. However, individuals who have been convicted of violent and severe Class A felonies until they’ve served the lesser of 85% of their sentence of 15 years. Let that sink in for a minute. What in the world?! This is a United States Department of Justice rule and is not specific to the state of Alabama. The man who attacked me has been in jail for 15 years (less than his sentence) and per this rule became eligible for parole in October. I knew about the 85% rule, but I definitely didn’t understand the whole “lesser of” or the 15 year part of it.
As the victim, I was able to protest his parole. Victims can protest in writing by sending a letter to the Bureau of Pardons & Paroles or in person by being physically present at the hearing. After a lot of careful consideration, I decided to do both. The whole experience was more painful than I expected. I’ve done so much work to move on with my life, but this process basically forces both the victims and their families to relive it all over again.
The letter was supposed to provide some context for how the crime has impacted my life. Deciding whether or not to write a letter was not a hard decision. Granted, the actual process of writing it was not fun. Deciding whether or not to attend the parole hearing was a much harder decision. I talked to a lot of people on the phone before the hearing, but I never felt like I had a very clear picture of what exactly was going to happen that day. As someone who likes to plan and know what to expect, this was really difficult. I hate to think how much mental energy went into this from my side. It was a lot.
I was also able to contact the state attorney general’s office to find out how many “disciplinaries” he has gotten while in prison (i.e., has he been a good inmate or not). It was several. This gave me a bit of hope. Surely if he hadn’t been on his best behavior, he wouldn’t be granted parole.
At the hearing two people from each “side” are allowed to speak for two minutes each. Basically you present your case of why the inmate should or should not be granted parole. I spoke on my own behalf and Richard also spoke on my behalf (more on that shortly). The inmates are not present at the hearing and the victims families are kept separate from the inmates families at all times. We didn’t know this ahead of time, but no one showed up to speak on behalf of the inmate in my case. It appears that the hearings go somewhat in the order of when you arrive the morning of, so if you ever find yourself in this scenario (and I pray that you don’t!), plan to get there early. I was one of the only “living” victims present … so yeah, most of the families were there to support their loved ones who were murdered. I can’t even imagine.
When it was my turn to speak, I was very matter of fact. I explained that there was no way I could summarize how this crime has impacted my life in two minutes. I referred them to the letter that I wrote, pleaded that they not release the inmate and begged that they would delay his next parole consideration for the full extent that the law will allow. When it was Richard’s turn to speak, he [unexpectedly] very emotional. He started with, “I didn’t know Sam when this happened to her” and then there was a very, very long pause. I was sitting there thinking, “Well … this is not going to be extremely helpful.” However, after he regained his composure he went on to give a very helpful and heartwarming speech. He told the parole board that I was supposed to be the one to cry, not him, which of course made everyone laugh.
Part of why I am writing this now is so that I can remember what to do next time. And yes, spoiler alert: parole was DENIED. Parole can denied for up to 5 years, so this process will repeat every 5 years until either parole is granted or his sentence is served in full. All of this happened shortly after Eliza Fletcher’s murder. She was on my mind constantly. I heard that the man that murdered her was out on parole (I didn’t fact check this). In my mind, I kept thinking, “this one’s for you Eliza.” I want to do my part to ensure that the man in my case is NEVER able to hurt another woman.
Now that we’ve got that stuff out of the way, let’s catch up on training! I’ve got a few races on the calendar, which makes me REALLY EXCITED. I’m planning to do a 10 mile race (this weekend!), a 5k next week (Turkey Trot!) and possibly two half marathons (either in early December and/or early January). At this point, I’d say that there is at least a 50% chance that any of these races will actually happen. Ha. Is it just me or does life seem completely unpredictable to anyone else at the moment?!
Hopefully a quick bird’s eye view summary will provide some context when I start updating my training logs weekly again …
Week of 09/04/22 – 66.5 miles
- I did two workouts and a long run this week, which I would say is fairly standard.
- One workout was 12 X 1 minute on/1 minute off, which is such a sneaky little workout! I averaged 5:25 pace for the minutes on.
- The other workout was two sets of 8 X 400 w/ 200 recoveries, so basically just 16 X 400. Splits were 86, 84, 84, 84, 84, 84, 82, 84, 81, 83, 83, 83, 84, 83, 81, 80.
Week of 09/11/22 – 39.0 miles
- The only notable run this week was the 8 mile run at 4:30 a.m. to “finish Eliza’s run.”
- I got a horrible stomach bug that weekend and was worthless for a few days.
Week of 09/18/22 – 44.1 miles
- There were no workouts or long runs this week, but I did do a 5k on Saturday. I got a sinus infection and an ear infection after recovering from the stomach bug, but ran the 5k anyway because … #stubbornness.
- While I didn’t run the time I would’ve wanted to if I had been completely well, I am glad that I participated. My husband is a volunteer firefighter and the race supported his department.
- My splits were 5:42, 5:49 and 6:05. Ugh. I typically race much smarter than this, but it was tricky as I really had no idea what to expect given the sicknesses. I was done with my antibiotics at this point and I actually felt good for the first mile and a half or so, but I ran out of steam after that.
Week of 09/25/22 – 63.7 miles
- Things seemed to be back to somewhat of a status quo state this week and I got two workouts in.
- One workout was 6 X 800 at threshold pace with 70 second recoveries. I did this workout on the road and averaged 5:52 for the 800s.
- The other workout was within the long run and included a four mile warm up, a 2 X 3 mile tempo with a half mile recovery and a four mile cool down. Paces were 6:32, 6:33, 6:12 and 6:30, 6:27, 6:09.
Week of 10/02/22 – 63.4 miles
- I did two workouts and a long run this week.
- One workout was 6 miles of tempo effort alternating between 6:10 and 6:50 every half mile. Paces averaged out to 6:41, 6:23, 6:28, 6:36, 6:27, 6:38. I really enjoy any workout that has varying paces throughout!
- The other workout was 10 X 200 (ish). I say “ish” because I did this one on the road instead of at the track.
- I did 14 miles on Sunday with the last two being a “victory lap” for Victor, a beloved member of our local running community who we lost incredibly too soon.
Week of 10/09/22 – 59.1 miles
- I got two workouts in this week.
- One was a fun little 5-4-3-2-1 [minutes] fartlek with 2 to 3 minutes of recovery in between the harder efforts.
- The other workout was within the long run and included a three mile warm up, a 3 X 1.5 mile tempo with half mile recoveries and a three mile cool down. Paces were 6:10, 6:06 and 6:03.
Week of 10/16/22 – 60.5 miles
- I did two workouts and a long run this week. As I am recapping this, I am realizing that my training has been much more consistent than the rest of my life has been and I’m not quite sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing …
- One workout was 10 X 1 minute on/1 minute off. How do the minutes on take twice as long as the minutes off?! Ha. I averaged 5:35 pace for the minutes on.
- The other workout was 8 X 800 w/ 200 recoveries. Splits were 3:01, 3:02, 3:02, 2:59, 2:55, 2:54, 2:54 and 2:49. I also had the best cheer squad ever at the track! All of the grandparents were incredibly generous and helpful while Richard was gone. I truly couldn’t have done most of this without them!
Week of 10/23/22 – 63.1 miles
- I got two workouts in this week.
- One was a ladder fartlek of 1-2-3-4-4-3-2-1 [minutes] with 2 minutes of recovery in between the harder efforts.
- The other workout was within the long run and included a three mile warm up, a 3 X 2 miles at half marathon effort with a half mile recoveries and a three mile cool down. Paces were 6:15, 6:14, 6:28, 6:33, 6:11 and 6:10. I was on some gentle rollers for this run and the splits are a very accurate portrayal of the terrain.
Week of 10/30/22 – 62.5 miles
- I got two workouts in this week.
- One was 6 miles at marathon effort. I had to run on the treadmill and am estimating my average pace to about 6:30-6:35. Average pace per my watch with the foot pod was 6:19, but that tends to be slightly aggressive.
- The other workout was within the long run and included a four mile warm up, 4 X 2k with 400 meter recoveries and a three mile cool down.
Week of 11/06/22 – 66.6 miles
- I got two workouts and a long run in this week.
- One was a fartlek workout of 4 X [2:00, 1:00, 0:30].
- The other workout was one of my favorites in recent memory! It was a track workout with 4 X “broken” miles followed by 4 X 200. The broken miles were run with the first 800 at 5k pace, 400 at marathon pace and the last 400 at 3k pace. The mile splits ended up being 6:01, 5:51, 5:45, 5:46! It’s wild to be able to run these splits with one of the laps at what feels like a fairly easy effort. My 200s were also really strong at 37, 37, 37, 36. These were my standard pre-pregnancy 200 splits, so I was ECSTATIC to be seeing those again!
Week of 11/13/22 – 53.3 miles
- This week was a bit of a cutback week with one workout and no long run. The week was structured this way because 1) it had been a little while since I’ve had a cutback week and 2) we were traveling over the weekend.
- The workout that I did have was a doozy! It was a two mile warm up, a three mile tempo with a half mile recovery, a two mile tempo with a half mile recovery, a one mile tempo and a two mile cool down. On the tempo portion, I averaged 6:14 for the three miles, 6:08 for the two miles and 5:58 for the one mile. The goal was to drop the pace down a little bit each set. Done and done!
Okay friends, we are officially caught up on the training front! Perhaps this will be the week where I get back on track with my weekly training logs and hopefully some race recaps too. Ward will be 9 months next week (how?!) and I really want to write a post about these first 9 months of postpartum training. It’s been a wild ride, but the human body can do some amazing things.