Tuesday night I won an award. It was called the Fitness Inspiration Award. I have never won something like that before. It was the most touching, memorable thing I have ever experienced. Now I am being asked to share more of my story. I have been told by my family and oldest friends to WRITE this down but it is hard. There are so many things to tell and so many things I am afraid to tell for fear of losing people's trust, fondness and care for me. But at some point you have to say "It's okay. It's the past and I don't live there anymore."
My journey began a long time ago and it is not a pretty one. I became sick with my bipolar disorder quite young and it really brought down my whole life in one fell swoop. I lost pretty much everything I had in less than a year. I went through four years of hell after that and then came a reprieve from it. I started to be able to work again watching little ones in day care. I worked in that field for five wonderful years. Then I got sick again. I could not care for myself. My oldest friend invited me down to Bloomington and she said she would help me and she did. I lived with her for a year and she really did a lot for me. I don't know how to thank her really except to say I love her like a mother and a sister and am grateful to her beyond measure.
I was not well for a long while. I was in and out of treatment trying to get better but it seemed kind of "end of the line time". I met someone, fell in love and we were together for five years. Although I was still sick and needing assistance I was pretty happy. Then one night my partner died. It happened suddenly and was very traumatic. I went out for Wendy's and her last words to me were "Hey get me a chili with cheese okay?" When I got back home she was dying. There was really nothing anyone could do. The EMT's could not revive her. That happened in November 2007. That winter was pretty horrible. I mostly sat at home and really didn't feel like doing much. I gained an enormous amount of weight. My feet hurt, my back hurt, my heart hurt. Everything was physically and mentally a struggle. I didn't know if I would make it back from this. Ever.
Then in 2008 I was told I had Type 2 diabetes. That was the end of rock bottom for me. That week I started walking. I was slow. Unbelievably slow. It took me a good hour and a half to walk from downtown to my home a couple of miles away. But I kept at it. I was told by others I was walking too much. I ignored them. I got to where I could walk upwards of 10 miles in one day just doing errands and stuff around town. The weight gradually came off. Of course I had changed many things about my diet as well. I had also started taking classes at the YMCA like kickboxing, power pump, boot camp and other hard classes. They were very hard for me but that is what I wanted. Hard work. Putting in maximum effort for maximum results.
I was walking very fast now. I liked to cruise around the YMCA gym walking very fast. One day I was speeding around the track (walking) when I overheard one lady say to another "God if she is going to walk that fast why not just run?". Oh. That was an option. Ok I started running. It felt good! It felt better than good! It felt natural. So I started running more. I would at first stick a bus ticket in my shoe so I would know if I got tired I could stop. But that was mostly a Dumbo Feather trick. I would get to one bus stop and say to myself "You could take a bus home now if you want to OR you can try to make it to the next one." And I would generally go to the next one...and then next one....and the next one.
The final stage of my transformation was joining BARA (Bloomington Area Runner's Association). That has been a defining moment in my life. I learned everything I know about running in BARA. I had no idea about garmins or the right shoes to wear, proper running form, running workouts, speed training, hill training. It was really the best decision I made. And I started studying to be a personal trainer because I KNEW how much fitness could literally change a person's ENTIRE life. It was not just physical. It was emotional, mental, spiritual, occupational. Everything that makes life worth living is enhanced through health and physical activity. It is a better stress reliever than anything else. It boosts depression by flooding the body with endorphins. It takes the place of a myriad of unhealthy and self-destructive coping mechanisms and turns a bad day completely around.
I know my readers will know the story from then until now but let's just say running has become an integral part of who I am. Reaching others through personal training and teaching has also become who I am. My illness is in remission. Those who know me now would not have known me then. That's a fine thing. I want to be in the present. Don't judge me by my past. I don't live there anymore.
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