Goodbye to All That

After I had given birth, running seemed as possible as flying. My life as a runner was over I decided. I stashed all my running clothes away in a dark corner of my closet where I expected them to moulder away. I knew that I would NEVER wear lycra again.

As my body healed along with my mind (yes, your mind also needs to recover from birth), I made a few feeble attempts of hitting the pavements. But it didn't feel right, My body was still awash with breastfeeding hormones and I felt like I was hauling around the body of a cow, not my own.

Over! my burning lungs screamed at me as I came back from the run/stagger around the block. Your running days are O-VAH.

Then winter came. The worst winter of my life. My baby got sick. And stayed sick for six long months.  Then I got sick and stayed sick despite seven courses of antibiotics. One day, I lost my rag. I pulled on my rusty trainers, went outside and ran.

I ran and ran and ran to escape the long, cold months of coughing, infection, medication upon medication, ignorant doctors, despair and the hard reality of parenting. I was so pissed off.

In my mind I ran like a gazelle but in filmed reality it was probably more like a goat.

On surviving that run, I set myself the goal of completing a 5K, 10K and half marathon all before the end of 2012. 

This coming weekend will see the completion of those three goals. I have done my 5K and 10K.  Once the Royal Parks Half Marathon ends this Sunday, I will have done all three. And also raised a sum of money towards curing Retts Syndrome.  Which makes it the most important race I have ever done to date.

Which will also make it the last.

The sum total of reclaiming running is that I realise that long distance running is not for me anymore.**

It's good to stop something when you want to rather than when you have to. I'm glad I ran again to know that I didn't want to anymore.

Gruelling long training runs in the cold and wet. No energy for anything else for the rest of the day. Repetitive strain on aging joints. No time for any other hobbies because of training.

Goodbye to all that.



** I will however continue to compete in 10K races due to the lower level of committmet to training they require, as well as trail running which I love.
 

Music Soothes the Savage Beast

For my uni lectures this week I had to read several interviews about the work of Raimund Hoghe. Hoghe is not your standard dancer. He has severe curvature of the spine, a.k.a - a hunchback. In one interview he was asked if he follows a physical training regimen in order to be able to perform. He replied:

No. The music gives me the power. With music I can do things I can’t do by myself

Raimund Hoghe at work

This stuck in my mind. It's true. Music does have that power.

Which is why I have started to ponder my music playlist for labour. Whilst I am in the throes of giving birth, I need music that will carry me through it.

Of course I may not want music when the time comes but prefer the sound of my own screams ricocheting off the hospital walls. Nonetheless, I best be prepared.

The only thing I have to compare birthing to is training for a marathon. When I trained for the marathon, I needed a mantra, music and motivation. The music that got me through and gave me that extra push was metal. The wailing of the lead guitar plus the grunt factor of the bass overlaid with the guttural screams of the singer and manic drum bashing blend nicely to aurally simulate the agony and ecstacy of running a marathon.

And perhaps birth too? Whaddya think?

Will our kid come out looking like this?

So that's whats on my playlist so far. Metallica, AC/DC, Black Sabbath, Iron Maiden and some home grown Perth talent, Karnivool.  With a bit of Apocalyptica for the quieter moments.

The Edinburgh Marathon 2010

Photo credit: Y Luu


Ok , so I am full of shit.

It turns out that I am a runner. A few posts back where I said I wasn't. Rubbish.

You know how I know this? How did this dramatic turnabout happen in a matter of days?

I ran a marathon. In Edinburgh. On the hottest weekend ever recorded in May in Scotland. It was brutal. I suffered. But so did 13,999 other people.

It seems like a surreal dream and I would think it so apart for the fact that I am limping badly and have a very strange tan.

Memories of the pain are fading already. All I remember is rounding the corner and seeing the finish line, 200 meters ahead of me. The end that I had longed after for 42 kilometers had finally come. Time seemed to slow. Pat Benatar started to sing, We Belong, on my ipod:

We belong to the light, we belong to the thunder..

Adrenaline coursed through me, propelling me to sprint. My breathing became jagged.

No, I thought. Relish It.

So I slowed down and took in the shimmering crowds and wall of noise. The other runners hurtling like coloured bullets past me. The blue sky and hot sun. The feeling of freedom, strength, lightness and joy as my legs carried me over that threshold; where I would never have to run again if I didn't want to.

That's what I remember.

Is that how I know I am a runner?

No.

I know because 48 hours after putting my body through that hell, I find myself thinking that it would be nice to go for a bit of a run.

Why Run When You Can Walk?

Four years ago I wheezed my way through my first 5K fun run. It was the annual Crisis Square Mile Run; a charity that I volunteer with every Christmas.

After completing the race and getting my free banana and t-shirt, I felt a sense of achievement. I'd run 5k! Roll out the red carpet! Sound the horns! Where was the Queen to congratulate me?

What was a one-off foray into running soon grew legs and took hold. 5ks became 10ks which became half marathons. I graduated from level running to hills. I came to love earth and trails rather than plodding interminably on concrete. Yet if someone asked me if I am a Runner, I would say No. If this person then asked, Well why do you do all this running then? I would reply, Because it makes me feel free.

Bearing this in mind, I must've been feeling very free and easy the day that I committed to a marathon because quite why I did it is at times, beyond me. It definitely was not a long held dream of mine unlike my wish for naturally curly hair or to have seen Nureyev perform. No, my marathon journey was born from curiosity. Just to see if I could.


Come this Sunday when I gather with 15,000 other curious people at the start line of the Edinburgh Marathon, I hope I'll be able to find out.

The London Marathon

Oh my freaking god!

Today is the London Marathon. It's 7.30am and I have been up for the past two hours. I barely slept and my stomach is churning over with nerves.

Am I running?

No.

This pre-marathon frenzy is just my excitement and anticipation. My husband and four of our friends are running today in what is reputedly the best fundraising event in the world. For all of them, this is their first ever marathon. I've watched them work their guts out over the past 4-5 months in preparation and I feel so proud of them all. To run a marathon requires not just physical capacity but huge reserves of mental strength and discipline. It's very tough.

If this is how I feel I can't imagine what it must have been like for them over the past few days. No wonder when I met up with a few of them yesterday, they could barely eat or talk.

I have never been to the Marathon. I've heard it's brilliant. That the atmosphere is incredible and that it is a day where the whole of London comes together to cheer on our runners. I can't wait.

Go Team!

Puff Puff Paree

There comes a time in a woman's life where you realise that you gotta Use it or Lose It. By this I mean that once you hit your early to mid 30's, certain physical realities start to manifest. The onset of aging becomes apparent with clicking joints and funny aches. Things start to sag and bag. Your body is no longer a house of fun but a treacherous course that has to be navigated more carefully. For me, the onset on bodily decay was rather startling. For the past 29 years, I have danced so my body has served me, not the other way around. I did not like this new world order.

Luck would have it that around this time I moved to an area in London which is populated with joggers. When we first moved there, my husband and I would gaze at all the bobbing figures and joke about whether we would eventually succumb.

"Nah, " we'd mutter as we sank back into the depths of our sofa. "It's too cold. What's wrong with those people?"

Three years later and we are now those people. We run in the cold. We run in the rain. We run alone. We run with friends. We run in events and to our continual delight and amazement - our bodies don't fail us. We feel stronger than before and it's a good feeling.

Last weekend we ran in the Paris Half Marathon with a group of friends. It was our first big running event and we were all nervous. It was raining and the event was poorly organised. There were no toilets along the route and no energy drinks either. I have always defended Paris when others tut-tutted about the Parisian attitude of disdain but not this time. I ran the route with a semi full bladder and cursed the organisers the whole route. My tears on sight of the finishing line were not tears of relief and joy, but happiness that a toilet was perhaps close to hand.

Bladder relieved and divested of my sweaty, rain soaked garments, it sunk in that I had completed a test of endurance. Not only completed it but done so in a decent time and with energy to spare. I had trained to do so and had taken back the mastery of my body and mind. Not against time but against apathy and inertia.

Everyone ages, grows old and dies. But some of us are lucky to feel that they have a choice in how this happens. Running is seeing me through this mid 30's phase. It makes me feel like I have a choice and that I can do anything I put my mind to.

Not bad for a free activity in this day and age.