Running for Herself

I run a little under a nine minute mile. I still, as a senior in high school, can’t do a push-up. Even in the peak of my athletic prowess, I could only bench press the light bar — which weighs a measly 15 pounds.

So I didn’t start running C-team cross country my senior year because I’m some sort of stellar runner — or even an outstanding athlete in general. From the time I slipped on a silver YMCA basketball jersey in the fourth grade, I’ve made up for my lack of hand-eye coordination and general physical ability with a seemingly endless stream of energy and some frantic arm-waving.

That same all-encompassing desire to win overtook my mind in every sport I tried — even fourth grade recreational basketball. That’s why I joined cross country: I wanted to get rid of it.

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It started my sophomore year, just before swim season. I had spent the last year at the bottom of the varsity team, and practically had a spot reserved at the back of the slowest lane.

Desperate to improve, I threw myself into 10 hour practice weeks and preseason conditioning.  It worked. By my sophomore year, I was swimming in the second-fastest lane, dropping time by the minute and qualifying for the state meet.

And in the midst of all that, I became convinced that swimming was my one chance to excel at something, my one chance to win.

For those three months, it didn’t matter if I had an asthma attack (twice), was projectile nervous-vomiting (once) or was temporarily blinded by my own tears welling up in my blue goggles (nine times).

I. Would. Not. Stop.

Exercising had become my fixation, a sort of sordid test to see how far I could push my body.

Either until I won, or until it broke.

May 20, 2017, prelims at the state meet. I finished swimming the most muscle-numbing 500 yards of my life, looked at the timer and promptly started crying.

Broadcasted in giant, red letters, there it was. 5:44.70. 11 seconds slower than I needed to make finals, and 20 seconds slower than I had gone two weeks earlier.

Terrified that I had disappointed my entire team, I slung my limp body out of the pool, hobbled to the bathroom, and spent the next 15 minutes spending some quality time with the bottom of a toilet bowl.

I knew I had become overly competitive, but I didn’t realize the extent of it until after that race. I had somehow normalized the race-induced tears, the weekly mental breakdowns, the constant fear of not meeting expectations, into something that I considered rational.

But it wasn’t. And I was sick of it.

So just before my senior year, I decided to join a sport that couldn’t possibly get too competitive — C-team cross country.

But my first two days were hell. Leg-shaking, chest-aching torture. I was ready to quit after the second practice — until I was handed that fateful blue popsicle.

I ate it as I laid, legs pressed flush against the wall, on the dirty linoleum of the basement hallway. Lactic acid running through my muscles and artificially flavored blue raspberry popsicle juice running down my chin, I smiled.

So this is how exercise is supposed to make you feel.

Full. Deserving. In pain, but happy. Not the frustration and self-loathing that I had been struggling with for months.

I came back for a third practice.

In the four weeks that followed, running became a much needed relief from the pressure I had put on myself during swim. When my black Sauconys pound into the sidewalk on the side of Mission Road, I’m not scared that I’m going to let the team down or worried that everyone else is better than me — I can’t be.

I have to be focused on finishing, my mind trained on those two yellow poles at the entrance to the junior lot. I’m fixated on that god-awful hill that looms ahead of me, comforted only by the fact that my own nervous laughter and gasping breath is mirrored by the girls running next to me.

I had my first cross country race after a month of training. There were no tears, no almost-puking, no self-loathing — even when the runner on my back surged ahead of me at the very end.

I finished that race, my calves caked in mud and my ponytail slicked back with sweat, smiling.