But I thought I hated it......

I really hated running. Every step I would run I would be reciting a mental mantra of "I hate this. I really hate this. I haven't even run a minute? How can that be? How am I ever going to finish? I'd look like an idiot if I stopped now. Do I care if I look like an idiot? Why do I keep doing this to myself?" Those thoughts kept me occupied and if I hung in there, I usually would meet my goal for the day. I went from where a minute seemed to be a day to where I could run a 30-minute span and say "Yes!" While I never got that "runner's high" others have talked about, there were moments of pleasure and accomplishment. But still, progress or not, overall I hated it.

So why did tears come to my eyes when they told me I couldn't run anymore? I always would have thought that if someone told me that there would be tears of joy, but they weren't. It made me sad. It frustrated me. I felt regret. Why is that?

Running brought good things to my life. I got to spend good quality hang-out time with friends. We had long conversations as we tried to build our bodies up, and in the process stayed in touch with each other's lives. We wore tutus, were chased by zombies and rolled in the mud. I lost weight. I learned that time invested eventually paid off....but could be lost if not maintained. Running was an exercise I could do in my own neighborhood, or even on the treadmill in my own house. Running required good shoes, but little else in the way of equipment. It did the job and made it easy. Once I got a treadmill, I really had few excuses as to why I couldn't do it. (Don't worry.....I developed some good ones. I am creative!)

But the biggest impact running had on my life was the work it did on my brain. While my mind ran that tape of negative messages, the actual run negated them. Running reminded me that my mind can be my enemy. It is often a liar. My mind tells me I can't do things that I later prove that I can. It tells me that I'm not good enough, don't have what it takes to succeed, that I am not athletic and that is something you are born with....or not (I, of course, was a not). My brain tells me obstacles are insurmountable. It tells me that I am all I ever can be....that I won't get better and if anything I will regress. My mind doesn't always respect me, and yes, I would say that it even hates me sometimes.

The truth is that we're more amazing than the limits of our mind. You've heard the saying "What the mind can conceive, you can achieve." Another lie. We can achieve so much more than we ever can imagine.

A lot of us have minds full of negative messaging. I think some is innate. The biology predisposes us to think in a certain way. Think of depression. Think of our attitudes after a sleepless night. Think of the hormones of adolescence. We were a bit crazy at that time, for no apparent reason. I remember coming home from a perfectly good day if school, going to my bedroom and crying my eyes out, while thinking "Why am I doing this? Nothing is wrong!" I kept it to myself, but had I asked someone like the adult me, I would have gotten an explanation.

Some of us have spent a lifetime receiving negative messaging from those around us. Some mean to say negative things about us, yes, but the vast majority don't. Or do, but wouldn't if they knew the impact they really have one us. (Though never discount that there are some people out there who are either mean and/or unbalanced. They come with no rational explanation.) Sometimes we interpret subtext that isn't there. Sometimes we bear the brunt of their own issues...they feel bad about themselves and want us right there with them. Sometimes they think they know us, know our potential, know our character, and know our weaknesses. They may know something about us, but nobody ever knows everything about us. We forget they are only human, and their judgments, like our own, are limited. Some may be based on truth, but not the whole truth.

Running showed me I could do something that I thought was impossible. I remember the first time someone called me a runner. It was a casual reference they made to someone else, which made it all the more special. It wasn't pandering to me. That is how he thought of me. He saw me run, no matter the quality, and to him I was a runner.
 
I also did have the naysayers (or nay thinkers). Friends who would make veiled comments about my lack of potential. I finally got so I would say to myself "Yeah, I used to think it was impossible for me, too." Once again, their issues, their opinions....not necessarily truth. But for every one of them, there were probably five who said "Of course you can."

I never wanted to be a runner of any great caliber. I liked it simply because it was fast and efficient and effective exercise. I ran worse in the few races I ran in than I would run on my own. My best running was in private. I liked the runs I would do in my own neighborhood . I found people would often discourage or intimidate me more than motivate me (this was not their fault, but once again the fault of my warped mind). It was in my neighborhood, all by myself, that I first ran for thirty minutes without stopping. It was my neighborhood that I built a personal routine focused on improvement. It was in my neighborhood that I celebrated most of my victories, alone and quietly. It was in my neighborhood that I could throw shoes on, go outside, and start fighting to win the battle in my mind. It was in my neighborhood that I could quiet myself the best and actually acknowledge the humorous mental battle I had going on in my head.

My body has been incredibly healthy all of my life. I've never gotten a stitch, never broken a bone, never had an injury that made me have to do more than limit activity for a day or two. When I started to have problems with my knees, I never thought it was anything serious. But when the pain got worse, and the x-ray showed the damage was not something that would heal and go away, I was told running would lead to a definite knee surgery. Therefore, no running in my future, since I am surgery adverse. There are many other exercise alternatives certainly, but it will take a while to find something that will give my body a quick and sufficient workout as effective as running, So I mourn a bit.

The news that running was not part of my future was grim. I will miss it, even though it was such a hated activity in my life. Currently I am undergoing physical therapy, to strengthen the muscles in my legs so they can support the bum knees for a long time to come. I know I will be able to hike and kayak and do many of the other things that I really love (but which haven't brought as much instant gratification in weight loss!) I will learn ways to strengthen the rest of my body. There are many, many possibilities....some which I suspect I will enjoy more than I ever enjoyed running. I'll find something that will again test my brain in its life-long conviction that I cannot do athletic things.

But the lessons I learned, I carry with me. No one knows my full potential but God.....not me, not the "experts", not the people around me. As long as I live there will be tests to show me how to get better at all of the different areas of my life. Most of these will require I exercise (or is it "exorcize") my mind. I could do as some running friends have suggested and just ignore the views of the medical professionals and continue running (some actually said "Knee surgery isn't that bad"), but there are times you ignore the experts and times you listen and re-adjust as a result of their wisdom. God nudges us sometimes to head in a different direction, and I have experienced that enough in my life to know sometimes heading in another direction is best, even if I don't always understand why. So I may not be running, but the adventure continues. Good things are ahead. My feet...and my knees... will still be taking me places I have never been before. Hopefully for a long time to come, because I intend to enjoy the journey.

Going the Distance and Winning the Race

I can't really tell you why I agreed to run a 10k.  I know it happened after a few of my girlfriends had just finished doing our first mud run in Atlanta (a 5k) and we were all in pretty high spirits from that.  Prior to the mud run I had just finished the Couch to 5k program, and sometimes could run 30 minutes straight, but not all the time.  (My body does nothing consistently!)  That was huge for me.  It wasn't long ago that running a minute and a half at one time was a major feat.  Being able to run a mile at one time took me far longer than I would like to admit.  More than a year.  Maybe close to two.  But the second timeI tried the Couch to 5k program worked.  The first time I decided it was too hard and stopped.  But the second time I did it, my friend Patsy told me that I didn't have to do it in the nine weeks it sets out.  She said to do it as slowly as I needed to.  That took the pressure off.  If I was having problems with a week, I needed to repeat it until I could do it.  I repeated a week early on....I had trouble doing three five minute runs in one session.  That was the only week I had to repeat.....and the other weeks were much harder.  There is no accounting for it, other than I believe that progressing at running is about 75% mental!  That may be under-estimating.

So by the time I returned from Atlanta, I think I had agreed I would run this 10 k in Charleston.  Over a bridge.  I am phobic about bridges.  Yeah, I can't explain why I agreed to this.  For some reason it sounded like it would be fun.  The only explanation I can think of, is that it is the company I was keeping.  They lead me to crazy.

In preparation, I began the Bridge to 10 k program at the first of the year (the program's name is coincidental...the bridge is from the Couch to 5k program to a 10k program.  Still, it is fun that it fit my situation so well!  In my case it was Bridge to 10k over a Bridge.)  I never finished the program.  Especially the last month it was tough to find the time and when I did, I just wasn't feeling great about my running.  I never thought I would not finish the distance.....I knew I could walk it....but the idea of running the whole thing started to seem less likely.  I decided I didn't care.  And during the program I ran as many as 53 minutes straight.  Unbelievable for me!  And though my first 10k is over, I won't put it on the shelf.  I will still use that program to help me progress.  I plan to finish it.

So last weekend, it was time to run the Cooper River Bridge.  I didn't run it all, but that is OK.  I ran a lot of it.  The crowds intimidated me.  They also interested me....my ADD mind was in overdrive as it tried to process all of the people around me.  There were bands along the route that I passed in a blur.  It was odd...you could only hear them for a few minutes as you passed by.  It was almost like you were fast forwarding a video tape.  There were crazy costumes and interesting people to see.  Some people kept re-appearing.  You would pass them, they would pass you, then you would pass them again.

Then, about 4.5 miles in, my ankle started hurting.  I rarely get injured, so this annoyed me beyond reason.  I don't appreciate it when my body betrays me...especially for no reason (I didn't trip, turn it or otherwise do anything that would seem to make it happen.)  I hobbled for a while, but then tried to run again. It didn't hurt any worse, so I was able to run to the finish line.  It helped that at the last part of the race there were people cheering, cameras that would forever capture my image if I were walking, and the hope of the finish line.

I am rather confident at this point that I will never love running.  As I talk to people who run a lot, though, I find I am in the majority.  That gives me hope that love it or not, I can keep doing it!  My friend Joanie tells me she feels the same way....and she has done a half marathon, is training for her second, and appears to do it all effortlessly in comparison to me.  We were in conversation at breakfast when in Charleston last weekend and talked to a couple who also run.  They said the same thing. They don't love running either.  But the guy said he tracked his running and was surprised when the program told him he had run every week for 52 weeks straight.  Even on vacation....though when he thought about it he realized that all their vacations had been planned around a run.  That's what happens.  It sneaks up on you and you don't even realizing what you have accomplished until you start to think about how far you have come.  We all concluded is we all love the feeling of accomplishment when we have done it...particularly because it requires we conquer the hate and our mind telling us to stop  That is why we continue to run.

I've tried to describe what goes on in my mind to people and there are a couple of different dialogues, depending on the day.  Such as "I can't do this today.  Really.....I don't think I can even do a mile.  I have to do a mile!  OK....that is what I am going to try to do.  Just one mile.  After that I can turn around and walk home.  So OK.  I'll do it.  No, I can't do it.  I really hate this.  Shouldn't I have begun liking this by now? I may not even be able to do a mile."  Or "I can't do this today.  My breathing isn't right.  Why is it so loud?  Is there something wrong with me?  Maybe I should go see Judy (my nurse practitioner) and have her check me out.  Maybe I should just walk.  No....I am going to run just a bit more and see if it levels out."  Or "I can't do this.  I am not a runner.  Stop it....you are a liar.  You are running.  You are a runner.   No, I'm not.  It seems easy for everyone else.  It's not easy for me.  It's not natural.  I am not a runner.  I can walk.  I am a good walker.  Just not a runner.  Stop it....you are a liar.  You are running.  You are a runner." 

When I look at it logically, I know the truth.  I run, so I am a runner.  I will probably never be fast.  My time for the bridge run was 1:23:38.  Nothing to write home about.  But still...for me it's not bad.  I went from the start to the finish line.  While I did walk some, that actually added to the experience.  I was able to look around me and see some of the fun characters that were also running (though I missed the guy running in just Speedo running "shorts" and shoes that Joanie got to see pass by her.)   I was able to see the beautiful views from the bridge...and the bridge is so big it didn't scare me in the least to go over it.  Plus I was able to keep going though I felt pain in my ankle with every step (let me point out that I knew it wasn't a bad injury and I knew it was OK to keep going....I do listen to my body and think that is the most important thing to learn to do for any activity!)

31,449 people finished the Bridge Run this year.  One of those was me!  What was significant to me was not that I finished....I knew I could walk 6.2 miles.  What was significant to me was that I ran a good part of the way.  Slowly, carefully, a bit too tentatively, I think.  I know I could do it faster and run more than I did, but it really doesn't matter.  I enjoyed the experience and didn't spend that time sitting on the couch.  That is why I believe I won.  While I am never quite sure how I get myself into doing these things, I am glad I do.  It's a definite celebration of life and health and a bonding with humanity.  I can do it.  So can you.   Set a goal, and give it a try.  It doesn't have to be a run.  Try something you don't think you can do and then keep at it.  You will surprise yourself and learn some great life lessons.  And add a great chapter to the book of your life.