Should I Run A Full Marathon?

Ok, this post has been a long time coming.
A warning, it might get kinda whiny at times, but stay with me.

In general, I can be a really indecisive person.  I have trouble choosing restaurants when I go out to eat, I change my outfits a couple times many mornings, I can't decide what to make for dinner half the time...

But this is kind of the ultimate indecisive battle.

I'm struggling with this question every day now and analyzing it to death. 

Should I run a full marathon or not??

I CAN NOT DECIDE!!

If you ask my fellow runners what I said at the end of my first half marathon in June, one of the first things I said was, "Never let me run a full marathon."
About a week after that, I started thinking about it and then it was sort of a moot point, because I got injured and couldn't really run at all, let alone consider running a full marathon.

Then my knee got better and I started running again.  The idea of running a full marathon has slowly crept back up into my mind as I've been training for my second half marathon next month.
I find myself looking up marathons, plotting possible training plans on Runner's World Smart Coach, and dreaming about whether I can or should run a full marathon.  I go back and forth every.single.day.  It has got to stop!  I need to make a decision for my OWN SANITY!

Why is this essential for me to figure out soon?  Well, Greg has been recalled.  It's looking like he'll start flying at Continental again early next year.  We want to start a family and have been saying for a while that we would probably start trying to conceive when he went back to flying for Continental.  I really don't want to wait too long to start trying because we don't know how easy or hard of a time we will have and we've already waited a while for this.  I know a lot of people end up trying for a while without results. 

So, it sounds like a no brainer right?  Just sign up for a marathon in January or February, train now with the base I have from half marathon training, run the marathon, and then I'll have it done around the time Greg goes back to Continental and we can start trying to conceive.  Perfect right?

Well, no, not perfect.  Here's the problem.  Nature.  It's getting dark outside early now.  You may remember, if you've been reading my blog for a while, that around late October of last year, I basically hung up my running shoes and went into hibernation for the winter.  I am a big safety nut and I don't think it's a good idea for me to run by myself in the dark, especially with a husband that travels a lot and no one really here a lot of the time to account for me.  Long runs on weekends shouldn't be a huge problem, but I worry about the weeknight running.  This is probably my biggest concern. 

How do I solves this problem?

• I could join a gym again.  The closest gym to me is the YMCA, and it's kind of expensive.  Back when I got into running, part of the reason was because I canceled my membership to the Y, so we could save money.  I'd rather not spend money on unnecessary things, but maybe it's necessary, at least for a couple months so I can train. 

• We could buy a treadmill.  Again though, the problem is expense.  I think the cheapest treadmills are like $400 (after a quick search on Amazon), but I don't know a lot about treadmills and wonder if those are decent quality for running or not.  No idea.  Buying a treadmill would require further investigation and I'd again have to decide if this is necessary and/or if we can afford it.

• I can run with people.  But probably not all the time.  It's realistically not convenient to run with someone on EVERY weeknight training run, so I can't really count on that.

• I could run my neighborhood loop in the dark 80 bazillion times.  If I am going to run in the dark it's probably best if I stay close to home.  My neighborhood is small, so I'd basically just keep doing laps around there.  It'll probably get really old really fast (especially since I'm already sick of it now).  Plus, I'm not sure that's much safer than running in the dark alone anywhere else, even if it is my own neighborhood.  It's an option though...

Hmmm...  I don't know.

The other question is do I REALLY want to or NEED to do a full marathon or should I just let it go and move on with my life?

Some reasons not to?

• I've already had an injury and worry it'll come back or that I might injure myself in another way training for a full.  I worry that a marathon is too much for a body to do and might do damage to me.

• I worry training will eat up too much of my time and I'll be chained to running.  Once I start doing really long runs it could potentially eat up entire days of my weekend if I'm exhausted after.  It's been kind of nice to still get in long runs for my half marathon and not have to plan the entire weekend around them.

• Aside from the darkness, it's about to get COLD here. Do I want to run/train in the cold?

• Is it that important for me to do a FULL?  I've done a half marathon, will be doing another one next month.  I could potentially just keep doing half marathons...

 The nagging comes from the fact that I feel capable of training for and running a full marathon right now.  I feel like this could be my last chance to accomplish this goal (if it is a goal).  I know a lot of people train for or do full marathons after children, but I have to face the fact that I might not want to then and I might not be able to because of the time involved in training, especially with a husband that travels and me being the sole parent a lot of the time.  I don't see how I could train with a child to look after.  Life might get in the way once I have kids, so I really need to figure out if I want to do this now, before they're in the picture, or not.

 If I do a full marathon, I will ALWAYS have that.  I love that I would always have that.

 I want that feeling...

I don't want to have the regret that I never did this.

In the words of Lance Armstrong, "Pain is temporary.  Quitting lasts forever."

So I think that tips the scales much in favor of running one.

What do you think???