I Am Not A Runner

After I saw this video on Amber's blog, I knew it would be the perfect start to tell about what happened today.

This was me not quite a year ago (minus the man boobs). Noah was about 3 months old, we had some friends over for dinner, I was complaining about how I wanted to start losing weight so I'd be a little skinnier at Kara's wedding, they told me that they run every morning and I should start running with them. UGH. I HATE running. I hate any form of exercise/dieting/whatever. I've never been a fan of any form of physical exercise whatsoever. Reluctantly I agreed to start running with them cause the weight wasn't going to come off by sitting on the couch. I almost died that first day. I think I ran a total of 3, maybe 4, blocks before I had to start walking. And then I'd run a block, walk a block, repeat. It was horrendous. I was not a runner. Yet. 2 weeks later, both my knees were killing me and I had to stop running for about 3 weeks. Keith said I was walking around like a 92 year old, instead of a 29 year old. But I got new shoes, started running again after the knees stopped hurting, and kept going from there.

The route they run is about 1.8 miles long. I can't even tell you how proud I was of myself the first time I ran it without stopping. It took a LONG time to get there. Then winter came along and it was too cold and icy to keep running outside. So we started getting up even earlier and going to an indoor track to keep running. I decided to start adding in a lap so that I could eventually be able to run the route twice. By the time we were ready to run outside, I was up to 3 miles indoors and thought that was all I could do. The first day we went back to outdoor running (I think it was the end of Feb or beginning of Mar), I ran the whole route twice. Without stopping. WooHoo!!

One of the friends has since moved, and the other can't run right now... but I found 2 other friends to run with and so I've continued running. 3 weeks ago I decided to run my first 5k. I dragged Keith's brother, Arax, along with me. We got there ahead of time, heard them say to start lining up, and got ready to run. I had looked at the map the night before so I'd be prepared and when everyone started turning where we weren't supposed to turn, I wondered what was going on. I just figured they'd had a last minute change of plans and we kept going. We got to mile 2 and then they started turning again. There was also a half marathon going on that day. I had looked at the map for that as well and realized we were running with the half marathoners. ACK! We were so not ready to run 13 miles!! So while everyone else turned, we kept going straight and eventually made it back to the finish line as the other 5kers were coming back in as well. We ended up running 3.7 miles (a 5k is 3.1 miles) and did it in pretty good time. Oh, and did I mention it started raining about 5 min in to our run? And then the hail started coming down? Yeah, that was a lot of fun. But we did it. And we were proud of ourselves. Then last weekend there was another 5k. So we ran that one too. This time at the right time and on the right route. Arax hadn't run for two weeks and ended up grabbing Amya's scooter halfway through so he could keep up with me lol. We came in at 32:06. Not too shabby.

Today was another 5k. This time I got my running partners to sign up with me, Arax, our nephew Joseph, my bil & sil Noel and Carrie. So there would be 7 of us running together. I was pumped. Until 4am this morning when I woke up with horrible stomach cramps and had to make a few trips to the bathroom. I was up from then on, in a lot of pain. I couldn't run. I was SO upset. I was supposed to be there. I was supposed to run with everyone. I cried. Can you believe it?!??! Kathleen... crying about not being able to run? It doesn't even sound like me. At all. But it's the truth. I guess I'm now a runner. The amazing thing is, Amya ran it for me. She put on my shirt, got my number, and ran with my group. She came in 2ND out of our group of 7. (Arax was first - he said he felt so guilty about last week that there was no way he was going to walk or run slow this week.) I think her time was 35 min:something... I don't remember the exact time and she's already asleep so I can't ask her. Oh. I am SO proud of her. First, for filling in for me and second, for doing such an amazing job at it. Seriously. She is so cool. I'm so so proud of her and everyone else in our group who ran today. They did an awesome job. I'll post some pics tomorrow when I get them loaded onto the computer.

And I guarantee you I'll be there running next weekend with all of them. I think there's at least 6 more 5k's I'm planning on running this summer. Now to work up to the 10k. :D