Aching Arms

Alice did 83 push ups in a row this week. She had the highest number of push ups for the girls and the boys. She was stinkin' proud of herself and every adult she ran into after that moment learned about her amazing feat and rewarded her with the appropriate jaw-dropping gasp and verbal kudos.

Well, last night at bed time, Alice starts complaining that her arms hurt a little. We send her to bed anyway.

This morning at breakfast, she cannot bend her elbows. Either of them. She's sobbing and wailing at the pain. Sore muscles! She does eventually feed herself breakfast and get herself dressed, but she doesn't give me a real hug goodbye because it hurts too much.

Alice does not tolerate the slightest bit of pain. Zero pain threshold, this one. Knowing this, we send her to school anyway.

The neighbor friend that we walk with is also enrolled in the FitKids study and will be taking her push up test today. She's intent on beating Alice's record, even after Alice bemoaned her sore arms all the way to school. I find it interesting to see Alice wail about the pain but never once wish she had done fewer push ups. She wished quite often that the pain wasn't there, and she wished that there could be some other physical disability instead of the pain (weak, wibbly arms was one of her suggestions), but she did not regret accomplishing 83 push ups. I find that notable. And I look forward to seeing her after FitKids today...

[LATER]

So, Alice's arms are still sore, but her left one is pretty much functioning like normal. Alice came home from FitKids today with a prize. Apparently, she was the top female performer in three of the physical tests they had run everyone through: push-ups, curl-ups, and something called "pacer" that sounded a lot like a 50-meter dash. She now has her own FitKids t-shirt and a powerful determination to remain the strongest and fastest girl of the bunch. Who knew she had a competitive streak?