30 Days of Truth: Day 15

Day 15: Something or someone you couldn't live without, because you tried living without it.


This one is probably one of the most difficult to be completely honest about. There are many "someones," and I don't know that I could write about just one someone.

My thought process on something that I tried living without has taken much time. I think that is probably why I stopped on this day. But THANKFULLY, I have come to the conclusion that the thing I can't live without (because I have tried) is two very related things:

RUNNING AND PLAYING SPORTS.


I know, completely ridiculous. When I was being recruited in high school, I thought I would be done playing sports, I thought I was going to be glad to be rid of the long practices followed by losing games. I have never been more wrong in my life.

I immediately begin to play intramurals once I went to college, and I have even found myself playing in leagues during the summer for volleyball. I didn't even play volleyball in high school.

Then my family and I play various sports on the holidays. Typically, we play football on Thanksgiving and kickball on the fourth of July. The sports are some of the things that I love most about the holidays :)

And then, then, I don't know what caused me to decide that I wanted to pick up running. It was always the punishment for both softball and basketball in high school, but one day I decided I would give it a try as a sport itself.

I ran a couple 5Ks at school. I liked the challenge of the race, but didn't really care if I finished first or last. Just wanted to finish. Then my friend Sam at Love Never Fails finished a FULL marathon just about 4 years after an accident that broke her pelvis and resulted in the doctors telling her that she would be lucky if she ever ran again. If someone who had the possibility of not running again could finish a full, why couldn't I take on the challenge of distance running? So I challenged myself. In March of 2010, I ran my first 10K through my major's club at school. I was exhilarated at my finish/finish time. I didn't think I could do it. Naturally, my next challenge was to become a finisher of a half marathon.

On November 21, 2010, I completed that goal. Training never went as well as I had hoped it would, but I finished. I finished. I finished. I didn't necessarily have the best time in the world, but I finished. During the race, I wanted to give up. I wanted to let my calves cramp and have them take me off. I wanted to shoot myself in the foot for registering for the race. But then I would think of what finishing meant to me, and think about everyone that was my inspiration for doing it, and I pushed on.
(Inspiration: of course Sam, Mimi, my 4 cousins, my brothers, my mom, my big)

I want to run more. It's kind of an addicting task, to complete a half marathon. I know it's weird, but I will most likely never run a full. My field of study in school is Health and Exercise Sciences, and many, many times we have gone over how the human body is not made to complete that many miles in one sitting. I know, I know that so many people have done that (and so much more), but I feel like that with my knowledge of the HUGE risks that come along with running 26.2 miles at once, I don't think I could go against my learning.

So, thank you for learning what it is I can't live without. I've tried to keep playing and running out of my life, but it won't go away! I guess it's a good thing though, running and playing sports are what keeps me healthy. :)