NYC Marathon

I’m sitting here on the airplane coming back from New York to Lima wondering how all the events that transpired to my being here right now came about. I just ran (and finished), my first marathon, the NYC Marathon 2013, which was especially meaningful for the city of New York given Hurricane Sandy last year and the bombings in the Boston Marathon this year.  As I sat in the seemingly endless waiting pattern to begin the race I wondered “Why this one? Why now?”…

See, last year I basically trained for a whole marathon without actually doing it.  Some family members were training for the Chicago marathon and while I couldn’t make it because I had a trip to Puerto Rico previously planned I decided I would do the training as a way to keep them company while they trained and getting some good workouts in after having moved to Lima.  While I didn’t do the middle of the week runs I ran almost every long run with them and felt like I was in good physical shape from all the work I had done in Geneva prior to moving to Lima.  While the longest run (30 km) was hard, it felt doable and I felt like I could really do a marathon.  I had run a few half marathons throughout the years so I felt mentally prepared to take on longer distances. I feel like I may not be a fast runner, but my body can take me long distances.

This year was totally different. At first I thought I hadn’t even gotten into the marathon and when I found out I actually had I was scared silly of doing the training. Mostly because I knew training was supposed to end in running an actual marathon this time, not just playing “pretend”.  So this year I knew I wasn’t going to be able to do the long runs alone and so I joined the local running group so that I could least do the long runs with them.  I even found an English-speaking running buddy that kept me company for a few runs when the faster folks in the group had left me behind already, and then she hurt her knee and had to drop out of the race.  And then one day on one of the long runs my knee started to hurt. And then the next long run it hurt some more. And then the next long run I couldn’t finish all the way because it hurt so much I just couldn’t keep going. I took everyone’s advice – ice the knee, rest after the long run, get an MRI, etc.  The MRI results came back (too little too late) saying I had some cartilage tearing (level 3 of a possible 5, which is somewhat significant but at least not the worst). I tried to schedule myself for PT.  But due to timing constraints and finding out about the MRI results so late, I basically had ONE PT section before heading to NYC, obviously not enough to make any significant improvements on the pain.  I was supposed to have a second PT session but was stuck at work and couldn’t get out in time.  That’s another story…

I spent about 11 months at a company in Lima before I finally decided to quit. I had too many nights where I left work so late I didn’t see the kids before they went to sleep.  So I ended up only having weekends with the kids and then those crazy weekday mornings when you’re trying to get everyone ready and rushing to get them to school on time.  Some nights I slept 4 hours only because I got home from work so late.  Jose would tell me “don’t take the kids to school today, sleep in a little bit more”.  But I couldn’t do it.  Those mornings were my only precious time with them every day and I wasn’t going to give that up. Even the kids would ask me “Mommy are you coming home today before we have to go to sleep?” when I spoke to them on the phone (which was sometimes the only way I could “spend time” with them when they were out school). It was killing me.  Not to mention training during the week for the marathon was nearly impossible during those circumstances.  On the nights I actually got home from work before the kids were asleep I didn’t even have the energy to go on a 4-6 mile run.  Especially as training progressed and the mid-week runs got longer and longer.  So I finally decided to quit, but my last day was the day BEFORE getting on the plane to NYC, so it wasn’t like I would be getting any more mid-week runs in thanks to not working anymore. So I was just afraid I wasn’t nearly as fit and ready as I was last year.

So again, this year, as I sat in the Staten Island ferry waiting the endless waiting game to start the NYC marathon, I wondered “Why this year?” “Why didn’t I do this last year when I was more ready?”  And the answer came…the body might have been ready last year, but the mind wasn’t. I had to endure the hardship of injury and not knowing whether I could actually run on race day.  Or whether I could start the race but not be able to finish it because of too much pain on the knee. I had to endure the hardship of a job that didn’t allow me to spend as much time with my kids as I feel like they needed (and I needed).  I had to endure the stress of a job that didn’t let me train as much as I felt I needed to train.  I had to then make the heart-wrenching decision of leaving that job for the sake of my sanity and my family’s well being. Basically, I had to quit to know when NOT to quit. 

So my body was ready in 2012, but my mind was ready in 2013.  Everyone says running long distance is a mind over matter game.  But I had never had to train the mind so hard as I have had to this year, one of the most difficult years of my life.

So even though I was scared in those endless waiting moments before the race started, where I felt like I was about to go on an amusement park ride that I didn’t really want to go on because I knew it would scare the crap out of me, and even though the pain on my knee around mile 18 seemed unbearable, and even when my sister started to lose steam on me as she needed to walk more and more as the race progressed, I knew yesterday more than ever, that there was no way in hell I was going to quit. 

I had to quit to know when NOT to quit.  And here I am, a FINISHER. Feels pretty damn good. :)