Run, Girl

Growing up, my older sisters were amazing runners. The kinds who set records and in our small town, everyone knew my sisters as the twins who were runners. All I'd have to do is say my last name and people would say, "Oh, your sisters are the twins! Are you going to run, too?" Or sometimes, I wouldn't even have to say my last name, by basis of looking so much like them, people would say, "Are your sisters the twins who are runners?" I never minded it much, until I was in middle school and decided to go out for cross country. I really didn't mind running that much, but I knew I didn't have their aptitude for it. My body wasn't as small as lean. I didn't like to sweat. Still, I stuck it out until I overheard one of the coaches say to another, "Aren't her sisters the runners? I hope she's half as good as they are."

I wasn't. And I knew I wasn't going to be, so I stopped going to cross county practice after that. I know that's silly, because maybe I could've been okay on my own terms... but I was worried that I was going to let everyone down by not being as good as I should be. The beautiful thing is that I've learned, as a teacher, to never, ever compare my students to their older siblings, to never even mention older siblings unless they bring it up first, because they should be allowed to exist individually.

From that point on, I was adamant that I was not going to run unless someone was chasing me. I stuck to that until Luke was a year and a half old. I was still carrying ten pounds of baby weight that I could not shed, no matter what. Desperate times call for desperate measures, so I bought a pair of Asics and started to run. Well, I started to walk, with the occasional burst of 14 second sprints before walking again. I stuck to it, though, and I actually lost those ten pounds and you know what? I kind of liked running. No, I hated running while I was doing it, but afterward? I kind of liked it.

I kept running even when I was pregnant with Tommy, until I was 24 weeks and Braxton-Hicks got the better of me. I swore I'd start running again as soon as I was able, but then, I'm sure you'll remember the part about Tommy not sleeping. I was too tired to put my clothes on the right way, let alone put one foot in front of the other in some sort of forward motion. Three weeks ago, I did the March for Babies walk and realized that I'm out of shape, that I was in better shape when I was pregnant with Tommy. I'm happy with my weight, but I should be able to move a little faster without getting out of breath. I started Couch to 5K that night (which was kind of dumb, because I could hardly walk the next day) and I've gone every other day since.

I don't really have any actual goal in mind, except to hopefully not drop dead. I completed Week 3, Day 1 yesterday and although I thought I might die toward the end, I did not. And today, I ate two donuts, because I was like, "Well, I did go for a run last night." If you think of it that way, running is actually pretty awesome.