I Live, Therefore, I Run

I didn't set out to be a runner.  And arguably, I'm not necessarily a very good one, if "good" is measured by how fast you run or how far.

I don't really get into all of that.  The only person I'm competing with is myself.  The only time that I care about beating is my own, and at first, my goal was to be able to do a 5K.  Now that I'm able to complete that, I think I might like to do a half marathon.

Really, though, I'm getting ahead of myself.  Because all stories have a beginning, just like this one.  And sometimes, out of a great tragedy, something good can happen.

It was like any other Saturday.  I went to work, and talked to mother via email.  We decided when I got out, I'd pick up some lunch and swing by with it.  Mom and I had an impromptu meal of Chinese take out.  We talked about normal things.  I was pregnant with my second child, and we discussed her taking care of him while I worked, and how we'd manage to get my first one to afternoon kindergarten, and in general, things that seemed so terribly difficult at the time, but in reality, weren't such big deals.

I hugged her and kissed her when I left.  I knew she wasn't feeling well.  I even recommended her seeing a doctor, but she didn't think it was necessary.  She'd just been on a trip and thought maybe she was a little under the weather from the plane ride, that maybe she'd caught a bug.

I thought about that a lot.  What I said and what I did and if anything would have made a difference.  The sad reality is that life unfolds how it's meant to, not how you want it to.

The next day, for all intensive purposes, she was gone.  My mother had a heart attack, and though they were able to resuscitate and bring her to the hospital, she never regained consciousness.  After almost two weeks of pure hell on earth, my father, sister, grandmother, and I had to made the most difficult decision that I have ever faced in my life.  We let her go.

My mother, being the type of woman that she was, went on her own steam.  I remember being at the hospital the night before and knowing that was the last time I would see her.  Somehow, that knowledge settles into your bones.  I hugged her.  I didn't want to leave.  I couldn't fully comprehend that she'd never again open her eyes, never again say my name, never again hold my son.  Not be the life of the party, the most well put together lady in the room, my beautiful mother.

The next day, I went back to work.  An hour after I got there, I got the phone call from my husband.  I wasn't surprised.  I knew, much like I knew it was the last time I would see her, that she would not pass while I was there.

She was only 55.  I may have been naive, but I didn't see it coming.  I'm only 31.  I didn't expect to lose my mother when I was just 30.  Thirty seemed too young to lose a parent.  Fifty-five seemed too young to die.

After her passing, I went to see a cardiologist.  My grandfather (her father) had died of a heart attack.  My paternal grandfather had them as well.  I was pregnant, and I was worried.  Although when you're fifty-five or over, heart attacks are considered "normal," it was concerning.  I checked out fine, but I worried.

After my second son was born, I knew that I had to do something to get fit.  Something totally out of my comfort zone, something to get in shape and stay in shape.  It had to be something totally different.

And that's how I came to running.

I was one of those kids who barely finished the mile in high school.  I was not a runner.  It's funny, because now, when I tell people I run, sometimes, I still feel like that kid in high school.  I may have been accomplished in other areas, like English and the arts, but when it came to running?  I gave up.

When my mother died, it took me a while, but I learned that I didn't want to give up anymore.

Initially I started doing the the Couch to 5K because I wanted to learn how to run.  I wanted to learn how to run and how to do it properly.  I was really spurred on by reading The Courage to Start.  The book was recommended to me by a friend who was training for a half marathon.  Inspired by that book, and the thought that if my friend could do it, I could, too, I gave running a whirl.

Honestly, I didn't think it would change my life, but I can't express to you how much it has.

When we lost my mother, there was a part of me that just lost hope.  I felt as though I had a big gaping hole in my heart the shape of my mother and no one would ever be able to fill it.

I had a lot of one sided conversations with my mother while she was in the hospital, and I read her the whole Wizard of Oz.  It was her favorite movie, and I know she loved the book, too.  There were so many times that I wished I could click my ruby red slippers and make everything go back to normal.

When you go through something like that, it changes you irrevocably.

I've been in therapy since, and I'm doing fairly well.  My husband and I have had no shortage of life changes since her passing.  Our second child was born.  Our oldest went to kindergarten.  We bought a house.  It's really been one thing after another.

Running was something to do.  Something constant.  Something that I could measure.  It was also something that previously, I'd hated.

I have to tell you, since my mother died, there's very little I won't do.

I am alive.  I can move my body of my own will.  I breathe.  I eat.  I love.  I live.

I am SO lucky.

So I began to run.  I followed the Couch to 5K program, and when I started, I couldn't even run a mile in 30 minutes.

Now, about 7-8 months later, I run 3.1 miles in just under 50.  I'm training currently to maintain a speed under a 16 minute mile, the minimum requirement for a Walt Disney World 5K.

Eventually, I'd like to do a half marathon.

I run every other day, and I do the full 3.1 every time.  I prefer my training on the treadmill, as I live in a really hilly neighborhood, but every now and then I'll go outside and get that experience as well, so I'm used to it.

I'll continue to run at my 14 / 15 minute mile pace, and eventually, I'll start adding on another 1/4 mile at a time, and trying to increase my distance so I can get closer to my half marathon goal.

I figure if you can run 3, what's 10 more?

Any time I have a doubt in my head, I think of my mother.

That's not true.  Sometimes, I imagine I'm chasing Jack Sparrow, and that works pretty well.

But when I have a dark moment.  A moment when I have a stitch in my side, and I'm thirsty, and I don't want to go on, I think of my mother.

I think that she is dead.  And that I am alive.  That my body lives and breathes and moves.  And what a blessing that is.  I like to think that she's watching me, and that she's proud of me.

A girl who never was a runner.

Who has become one.