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My Life As a Runner: Mandy's Blog Posted on February 21, 2014

I began running when I was thirteen years old, not because I thought it would be fun but because I was desperate for a change. I was going into high school and I felt way too young to be overweight, but I was. "I don't really know how I got here", I remember thinking, "but I hate it". I was never an athlete. I was an artsy kid, a thinker, and I was clumsy. Too clumsy to enjoy any sport that required coordination. Up until this point, my athletic career had consisted of me playing right field on the church softball team. I liked it alright. I could sit out there and search for four leaf clovers.  Most of the time I was removed from the action. Every once in a while a ball would come my way. I would awkwardly retrieve it and throw it to the pitcher (because that's what the coach told me to do) and it was in these moments that I was reminded, once again, just how terribly unathletic I was. A lifetime of these situations led me to the conclusion that anything physical was simply not for me. I spent my entire middle school existence abiding by that principle and avoiding an active lifestyle at all costs.

On the verge of high school I was beginning to realize that this philosophy wasn't pointing me in the direction that I wanted to go. I was 25 lbs overweight. I was the butt of a lot of fat jokes (middle schoolers can be so cruel). Simple things like rollerblading to a friends house or riding my bike to the park were no fun because of how out of shape I was. I decided I needed a change. Well, I'm sure you all know, change is a real bitch. It makes you feel uncomfortable; physically, and emotionally. It forces you to do things that you are bad at, and it's SLOW. I would say that those were the feelings that characterized the beginning of my life as a runner. I didn't look cool when I ran. I looked red faced and jiggly. I certainly didn't feel cool. After years of being sedentary, I wasn't used to my heart beating in my brain, or my lungs burning, or my legs feeling like Jello. From start to finish, I hated it. I didn't run because I felt capable and strong and in control. I ran because I secretly hoped that if I kept at it long enough, maybe, just maybe, I would have one of those runs that the skinny, fast people talk about; a “Chariots of Fire”, wind in my face, sand in my back kick kind of a run. My first season as a cross country runner, I never broke 30 minutes in a 5k. I spent most of my time on the bus ride to the race praying that I wouldn't be last. "Please just let there be one girl, just one, who finishes after me." Change is slow, painfully so, but it does happen. Eventually I got faster. I wasn't running varsity but I was solidly middle of the pack and that fear of being last across the finish line no longer haunted me. I put my miles in during the off season, and every once in a while I had a run that felt alright, almost comfortable. I always chuckle to myself when people talk to me about running and they say things like, "I wish I was one of those people who liked to run." Or "I wish I could just go out and run and be comfortable like you"....ahhh if they only knew.

23 years later, I have way more runs that I really savor. I hit the trail, and my problems start to dissolve. I notice the way the sun filters through the branches or the way spring slowly seeps up the trees from the forest floor. somehow I become more grateful for the things that I have instead of discontented with the things that I don't. I feel small when I'm in the woods and my smallness gives me peace. "You're not as important as you think you are," I say to myself. "The world will go on regardless of how much you screw things up". Occasionally I have a run that's brutal from start to finish. My legs tie up, my breathing is ragged, every step feels like a battle. But its different now because I know that during those long hard miles, my body and my mind are learning; how to be strong and focused, how to make possible what feels impossible. One foot in front of the other, one step at a time; that's how change happens. That's how the slow, overweight, out of shape middle schooler becomes a lifelong runner.  

*Mandy is a freelance blogger for the More Miles More Smiles team*