Hamster wheel.

I’ve never really thought of myself as a runner, it’s honestly hard to even think of me as an active person. The truth is I am though, if there was some sort of graph displaying how I’ve spent most of the time in my adult life I bet the largest portion would reflect some sort of work out. 

In elementary school I think I was amongst the bottom 10 for slowest mile in all of the student body, so what would make me want to do this? I know people love to rag on millennials for not letting go of uncomfortable moments from our youth but this one has really stuck with me, not necessarily bc I like to get mired down in the bad stuff, but because I’ve come such a long way. 8 year old me would NEVER have believed you if you told her I’d have a life where I lift weights every other day or have signed up to run a half marathon, yet here I am. 

I had a brief running phase in my early 20s, working the night shift left me with a lot of spare time in the afternoons and while I would spend most of it wandering around my city I found it encouraged a lot of mindless shopping, so I started running. I started off small and grew and grew until I got to the point where I was running the entire duration of Lady Gaga’s Born This Way (Special Edition) album.  It was something to do and totally surmountable, and a much better way to spend my time than buying clothes. 

I sort of fell off when I started developing a social life, I’d go out with gaggles of girls, go on dates to try to foster a love life, I’d still hit the gym for sessions with my trainer, but I didn’t run like I used to. At some point I found a half marathon I thought sounded fun so I told the man I was dating that I planned on doing it, his response was that this was the dumbest thing he has ever heard which I think was rooted in jealousy and a pathetic mourning for his youth but that’s neither here nor there. Regardless I was psyched, it gave me something to look forward to and goals other than hoarding my gold. Unfortunately I had a terrible concussion shortly after that and couldn’t walk for a while, let alone balance. Oh well, there’s always the future right?

That was some time ago, aging happens, sprinkle in some issues with chronic pain, and I just figured it wasn’t in the cards for me any more. It’s not the end of the world, it was just another novelty to pursue in my life. I thought, maybe if I was lucky I would be able to bang out a 10k. Just maybe. 

Last summer I began a regular pilates practice and I found it to do wonders for the achier parts of me. It was fantastic to develop this morning ritual of pilates and then coffee, I was really digging it. Then it came to the point where nearly all of my aches and pains have subsided. I’m not saying that this is the cure for all of my chronic pain homies, but for me it really helped and I’m super grateful to  live a relatively pain free life again. 

Pondering what I was to do with my new bodily spoils I had a thought, I wanted to run again. That’s something I definitely couldn’t do when I was constantly feeling like shit but it’s something I felt compelled to do now. So in my typical  fashion, I signed up for a half marathon and have thrown myself into it body and mind.  

The hardest part is consistency, the freelance lifestyle doesn’t lend itself to creating good consistent habits or practice but the silver lining is that the running part has actually been easy. It’s the getting my ass out the door part that is the most difficult. Yet here I am, 8 weeks into training and I can’t imagine anything stopping me now.