Hey all, just a quick post today as I’m about to zoom off to work.
Today’s post is about running, about my running. I class myself as a runner, I started running properly in 2013 when I completed the NHS Couch to 5k podcasts. I can’t describe how running made me feel, time to think, some space, something that was only mine and all the while burning calories.
Unfortunately as my eating disorder took hold I came to be at odds with my running and ended up running far too much for far too long on far less fuel that I needed. This was like a kind of self harm, I got up at silly o clock in the morning, if I didn’t I felt I wasn’t working hard enough, I had to push myself constantly, to be better than the day before, to be fast and of course to lose weight. It became such a huge part of the cycle of me needing to lose weight that when I started therapy with the Eating Disorder Service in my area I was asked to sign a contract promising to cut down my physical exercise by 50%.
I am today two stone heavier than I was at the height of my eating issues at the end of 2014. This is for many reasons, the main one being that I now actually allow myself to eat! Others are that I am now happier with myself, eating a balanced diet and accepting of the fact I was never built to be a size zero.
My running then has had to evolve massively to the me I am today. For example getting up early to run is something now that feels alien, why would I want to go running when I could lay in bed cuddled up to my boys and listening to the birds outside the window. See, that’s happiness, contentment and allowing myself to not be so regimented. I accept that to stay the weight I am (still healthy for my height) that I can’t sit around doing nothing so now I run to keep fit and enjoy the world around me (oh and eat cake!).
I managed to pull myself out of bed this morning and did a run around the woods, it was hot, sunny and beautiful. The light breeze in my face, birds chirping and fellow runners greeting me as I went by. I am so much slower than I was when I was lighter, I still struggle with not looking at my Map my run too often as it’s no longer important how quickly I do it I just need to remember that actually being out and doing it is what it is all about.
I was mean and nasty to myself and my running helped me to continue that. I now see that being healthy and fit is a far greater part of being happy than being skinny ever was. Don’t get me wrong I still have those days where I look in the mirror and groan but…. Ladies that’s normal!
Embrace who you are, what you do and how amazing you are! Walking, running round, swimming, cycling, you name it, it’s all exercise and all does us a world of good, not just physically but mentally too.
Leaving you with a very sweaty picture of me after my run and another lovely Roald Dahl quote:
‘A person who has good thoughts cannot ever be ugly. You can have a wonky nose and a crooked mouth and a double chin and stick-out teeth, but if you have good thoughts they will shine out of your face like sunbeams and you will always look lovely.’
tiredfromwhitstable 