About Me

Running and I were first introduced in the summer of 2009.  It was a blind date of sorts that started off innocently enough, as these things often do. A work friend was following a blog, 344 Pounds. Back in those days, YouTube hadn't taken off yet and Vlogging wasn't really a thing. People still followed blogs.  I know!  Imagine that!  Tyler, the blogger, was training for the Cooper River Bridge Run in Charleston, S.C.  One day at lunch, my friend threw out the idea of us doing the race with him. At that point we'd both had semi-successful flings with cycling so it didn't seem like a completely absurd idea. My response? "Gosh, I dunno. Running?  South Carolina? Sounds hot and miserable to me." While it did sound hot and miserable, there was a tiny part of me that was intrigued.

 

And so it began. I agreed to meet running in the park around the corner from my house. We slipped off to the side, in the grassy area away from the soccer field, tennis courts, and heavily trafficked parts of the park.  Using an old school Timex that tracked seconds in addition to the hour and minutes, I started running.  I ran for 30 seconds and walked for 60 seconds for 10 cycles.  After meeting up a few times, we grew a little bolder, moving to the soccer field.  60 seconds of walking and 60 seconds of running for 10 cycles.  It was August in Southwest Virginia.  It was hot, so incredibly hot.  Yet, I was somehow hooked. 

 

It was a love affair that I thought would last the ages. Don't get me wrong. Running and I weren't a perfect match. We struggled. When things were good, they were incredibly good. Perhaps I was naive but even when things were hard, they were still incredibly good. For the first time in my adult life, I lost weight without fixating on what I could (or couldn't) eat. I felt good, physically and emotionally.

 

We made new friends. We traveled. We bought new clothes, and of course new running shoes.  Oh the running shoes! Running and I, were having the time of our lives.  I never felt better! In May 2011, at the height of our relationship, I ran the Pittsburgh Marathon. It was, and still is, one of the happiest days of my life. . 

 

Running and I, we plodded along after Pittsburgh. We tried to continue on as we had before but a marathon, much like having a baby, changes a relationship. It's something you can't ignore and something that profoundly changes everything. Things were different. Different but still good.  Hoping to recapture the magic of Pittsburgh, I entered the lottery for the 2014 New York Marathon.  Odds of getting into the New York Marathon vary from year to year.  In 2014, 12 percent of those who applied got in. The minute I submitted my information, I knew I'd gotten in. My friends were skeptical. Running was skeptical too. That's possibly when the trouble began.

 

The 2014 marathon proved to be our breaking point. Maybe I was too cocky. I'd already completed a marathon. I got into New York on my very first try. We trained together, attempting to recapture the magic but something wasn't quite clicking. Come race day, the wheels officially fell off the bus. Where the Pittsburgh marathon was one of the best days of my life. New York was one of the worst days of my life. I hadn't approached my training with the same level of consistency. In terms of conditions, it was the second worst to that point in the history of the event. I started off the day expecting to PR by at least 25 minutes. By mile 18 I was crying in a porta-potty questioning if running and I were officially through.  Somehow we pulled it out in the end, finishing almost 32 minutes slower than we had in Pittsburgh.  That was it. I was broken. It was good while it lasted but I was done with running.

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Ten years later, I've survived a pandemic and a breast cancer scare. I've moved my family cross country multiple times. I nearly died from an allergic reaction to a colonoscopy prep.  Through it all, I've done some serious soul searching and come to the conclusion that it's time to reunite with running. From the couch to the Chicago Marathon. I'm all in on Chicago 2024.
 

I created this blog mainly for myself. If someone else reads it and finds it helpful, all the better. I realized through my reflection on my journey that my memories of running faded and I did little to document my first love affair with it.  I don't want to make the same mistake twice.

 

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