Help!

I'm just gonna go ahead and throw this out there. I'm an athlete. Ya, it's true, I mean I know what BP, MHR, HR, THR, TZ, and TV all stand for. I can run on the treadmill AND drink water at the same time, I use 5lb weights-sometimes 8 if I eat Wheaties for breakfast, and I can almost touch my toes. Don't be intimidated, I mean after-all I was a Cheerleader. And if that's not an athlete I don't know what is.

That being said, I'm kinda afraid I'm going to blow up. Like have a heart attack. I'm not sure I'm going about my workouts exactly the way I should be and knowing that quite a few of you that read this blog are athletes as well, I thought I'd ask yall what the heck is going on with my body!

We got a treadmill in the beginning of Jan cause Bobby's BP is through the roof. Like seriously high-Hypertension stage 2 high-and since I want to keep him around a few more years I ok'd the expense. We have LOVED having it. I have a passionately intense hatred for running. My knees hurt, my back hurts, I can't breathe and the only thing I think about is how much I hate it while I'm doing it. So when we first brought our baby home I was skeptical of her but I have to say I double L O V E running on it. We have it out in the garage and I can pump the music loud and run run away. I think, I plan, I get me time, and I think I'm getting some exercise somewhere in there too, but here's my question...can my heart rate get too high?

Back in Jan. I was running 5 days a week for 30 min. a day. I kept that up for 6 weeks and then everyone in the house got sick so at the end of Feb it was good if I got on 2 times a week. Now that we're all better I'm back into the roll of things, but I'm just running 3-4 times a week for 20 min. and then doing weights for 20min. I feel that I'm a little better balanced this way so I'll probably stick to this for now rather than the 5 days/week since I'm just doing it for *fun* and not training for anything. Okay so here's the deal. My HR stays between 175 and 185 for the entire 20 min. of my intense running (it takes about 5 min. to get it there) and then it takes forever to go back to normal. Bobby says it's b/c I'm still out of shape and that the more I run/exercise the more effectively it will beat and will go back to normal faster. Not that I don't trust the doctor's opinion I just thought I'd ask my fellow athletes what they thought. Is that too high for my HR to be or is that normal for what I want to do-burn fat/increase endurance? Is it bad that it takes so long for my HR to go down? I don't hurt or feel exhausted after I run, just good and worked out, but maybe I should take it down a notch I don't know. I'm not ever sore the next day so I've actually been thinking about increasing the speed and length of my runs but maybe that's a bad idea. Help! Any thoughts, tips or ideas would be appreciated. You know...from one athlete to another.

Although I might be clueless on the running front, here are 3 things I've learned all on my own the past couple months...Keesha is my inner sass/bad girl. I may or may not have Bieber fever and Pandora is my best friend.