Have you ever thought about the reason WHY something you love so much is so important to you? Why you have an emotional, psychological, and physical attachment to it? That is how I often think about running. Half the time, it brings me more physical pain than pleasure. Yet, the idea of not running brings me far more emotional and psychological pain. It is an idea I quickly abolish anytime it manifests. As I pondered and reflected on this, I thought ‘why not inaugurate a blog half focused on running by taking a look at WHY running is so important in my life.’ It will help you get to know me, get some stuff out of the way early because I believe honesty and candidness early on only lead to better relationships, and maybe something I say will connect with you. That is the best I can hope for!
I’ll dive right in. Running is important to me because it has become a source of peace, motivation, inspiration, and healing over the last 10 years of my life. I started running because I was fairly good at it and it was a great source of exercise (more on my humble run-ginnings in an upcoming post), especially starting college at Xavier University when I no longer played team sports and was in ROTC where running in formation made me cherish running freely on my own so much more.
Then, I met my first serious boyfriend, Mike, while training for a marathon the summer after my freshman year, and we fell in love over the course of long runs around Cincinnati as we bonded. Fast forward two years, July 21, 2010, and this man who was my best friend and boyfriend, and an Army First Lieutenant, was killed by an IED in Iraq. He was 24 years old. I was entering my senior year of college. It was at this point while I struggled to find any sort of peace or solace, or even see a future beyond my grief, that I realized what running meant to me. Running became my safety net and my source of strength when I was emotionally drained but could test my physical limits. It was a time to release some of the chaos of my life. My anger and pain were translated to my journal and mileage. It was time alone when I could be with my thoughts, summon positive memories, or clear my mind and focus on nothing but the pavement in front of me. I continued to run and my love deepened as I capped off my senior year running a 3:23 marathon, the Cincinnati Flying Pig, in honor of Mike.
After college, I commissioned as an Army lieutenant and was stationed in Germany. There I continued to run, and to heal. Running connected me with my now husband, Jeremy, as we were training for the same half-marathon on our Army base in Vilseck, Germany. Running evolved to be not only a source of strength and healing but a means to explore (now the blog title will begin to make more sense). As we traveled European countries we always brought our running shoes and went out to see the less traveled parts of cities in the early morning light. After Jeremy had to leave Germany to move to a new duty station, and a long distance relationship commenced, running kept me sane while the 6 time zones and Atlantic Ocean between us threatened my sanity.
I then deployed to Afghanistan in June 2013 to a miserable stinky airfield in Kandahar Province. I braved the air pollution and continued to run to stay fit and maintain a sense of normalcy in an environment that was anything but normal. I also convinced five of my female co-workers to run a marathon in Prague, a first for all of them, while we were deployed. I developed their training plan and coached them through a 16-week plan, 11 weeks while deployed and 5 weeks once back in Germany. This was one of the greatest running experiences I have ever had as I witnessed the joy of sharing a love of running with others and pushing friends to do something they never thought they could. Every single one of them finished that marathon and several have run additional since!
That experience was part of my inspiration to leave the Army and pursue a Master’s Degree in Public Health so I can continue to share the joy and positive effects of running and living a healthy lifestyle with young people on a larger scale. Running is intertwined in my life, relationships, career goals, and happiness. It is not just a verb or an activity, running is part of my passion and my purpose.
I couldn’t refrain from commenting. Very well written!
Thank you!
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