A Reminder That Your Body Doesn’t Need to Be ‘Fixed’
I spent the last months of 2019 feeling broken. I didn’t run for 49 days. Not a single lap. Not even a single step. That’s 7 long weeks of slowing down. There were plenty of warm winter days during that 7 weeks where I wanted to lace up my shoes, throw on a winter headband and get back out there. And there were plenty of days during that 7 weeks where I raged at my body for letting me down.
I fell into a gray area of depression. Lacking motivation on all levels, I couldn’t shake the negative thoughts spiraling in my head: Broken. Ruined. My fault. My fault. My fault.
And then in that hellish week between Christmas and New Year’s where you don’t know which end is up or what day it is, I reached my breaking point with the noise in my head. I couldn’t mope around another minute. I needed to get back out there. I was ready to get back out there.
So I laced up my shoes again and started what I thought of in my head as my penance: One mile a day. Every day. No more, no less. My body could run one mile without injury, so one mile — only — is what I’d do.
Those first few days, that one mile felt awful and amazing at the same time. I was euphoric to feel my feet pounding the pavement again — but my body didn’t feel like my own. Breathless, heavy, slow. Broken.
The negative thoughts spiraled again. I had done this to myself. I had pushed too hard and in doing it, I had ruined everything.
But giving up on myself isn’t how I got to where I am on my fitness journey. Dedication and drive and straight-up stubbornness have. (I don’t like to lose and I just keep going. Period.)
So, noise in my head or not, I kept moving forward. And then it was a night I had been dreading: Body Back Assessment Night. If ever there was a time when I needed to get my body “back,” it was now. But I dreaded that mile run. I hadn’t yet broken 10 minutes on my daily 1-milers. How could I mark that on my assessment sheet? It was black-and-white proof of how far I’d fallen.
I swallowed my pride, said “SO WHAT” if my mile time was double digits and got out there with the other moms to run our one mile in the dark and the cold. I didn’t look at my watch. There was no clock to pace me. I just ran — because I CAN — and when I heard my time at the end, I was so shocked I dropped an f-bomb.
In a single moment (or in 7:47 moments to be exact), I had shown myself: My body wasn’t broken.
What was broken was my confidence. My belief in myself had wavered. I let self-doubt creep in and I stopped pushing myself, believing I couldn’t and shouldn’t instead of just picking myself up and trying again. Yet the numbers were there: I was faster and stronger and more capable than I was giving myself credit for.
I still have work to do before my body feels like mine again. But my body is not broken. Yours isn’t either. Our bodies change. We may be different than we were before. But we are never broken, and it’s time to stop thinking of our bodies as something to be “fixed.”
Think of your body like a landscape instead. A landscape changes over time and it evolves based on the forces that impact it. A landscape can be eroded — but it’s still there. Strength beneath the erosion. Waiting to be built up again or transformed into something new entirely, to flourish and even bloom when the right forces align.
I’ll be working on the landscape of my body in 2020, because I always am and it’s what makes me feel good. But what I’ll be focusing on in 2020 is the landscape of my emotions. Allowing the negativity that crept in during these dark months to erode. Breaking open the constriction of self-doubt like an earthquake. Rebuilding the hills into mountains of strength. And nourishing myself holistically, from the inside out.
One day at a time. One mile at a time.
Do you have fitness goals for 2020? I want to hear them! Share in the comments below or DM on Instagram. We can inspire each other and keep one another motivated to reach them.
Keep following here and on social media for more ideas and inspiration for fitness, food, family and F U N. I promise there’s a lot more fun coming in 2020!
