Tuesday, December 1, 2009

What this meant to me...

Let me tell you a little about my running life...or lack thereof. I was never a runner, always a walker as a matter of fact I really hated running. But this also comes from a childhood accident that was so severe they took me back into surgery telling my mother they were going to amputate my right leg...At 8 years old I fell off a snowmobile and broke every bone in my right leg with a compound fracture (which means the two lower bones came out of my leg). I also fractured half a kidney. I spent hours in surgery where my mom begged the doctors to do anything they had to do to save my leg. I came out with four pins, a rod and in traction where I spent the next four weeks in a hospital bed with my leg hanging in the air. I spent the next four months in a complete body cast, 8 months after that in a leg cast and another year in a brace. I have had 27 reconstructive surgeries on my right leg alone and three on my left leg as they had to break my femur bone in high school to try and correct the right leg even more. Needless to say...I never really thought I could run, I just thanked my leg for being as strong as it was. When I lost the triplets my sister Kristie really encouraged me to start running, I was so full of anger, hurt and sadness and I think she knew it would somehow help to heal me. So I started running...I could barely run a mile, I had to take breaks. After several weeks I got up to two miles, Kristie and I met at my clubhouse, talked, watched the morning shows and ran. I once ran three miles by myself without stopping, I thought I had run a marathon! Then I knew I wanted to try and get pregnant again so I stopped everything. I laid in around for 11 months to make sure my body was ready and that I wouldn't lose the baby due to too much activity. I thought people who were pregnant and working out were insane, I was too scared. After I had Blake, I decided to start running again to try and lose some of my weight. Kristie again was there to encourage me to get going. When I started working and went on the annual retreat, everyone was talking about the marathon they had ran, the challenge that Stan had given them for the past year. My friend Jill told me I should run a half marathon, Kristie had already been talking about the Thanksgiving Half and I had it in the back of my mind. SO I half heartedly thought...I will do this, maybe I really can do this. So I just started running...then I heard both my sisters, my brother and my sister in law were going to do the Thanksgiving Day half and I said, I have to do this! I pulled up the training schedule and delayed starting it as long as I could. I ran, two to three miles when i could. Over the summer I tried to run with my sisters on our weeks vacation, I couldn't even run three miles, really hardly two without walking and I was dying...they ran circles around me and I thought I can NEVER do this. But I kept going. We started meeting at the greenway for our Saturday morning runs and in the beginning I was dying, I could never keep up and I wanted to quit the whole time but as we got closer, it got in me - mentally I was preparing. Over dinner during a date night, Jeff mentioned he would love to do something like the half marathon someday and I jumped on it...I spent three days convincing him to do it with me, I knew if i never did it again I SO wanted us to do that together. So he started training...we complained some, had many many days we didn't want to run and didn't run the full schedule we were following. But we kept going. During some of my runs, I cried, I actually thought is my leg going to be OK, will it hold me up, will I hurt myself...yet how amazing that I am really going to do this - then it became mental for me, the challenge was hard, the hardest physical thing I have done besides give birth to Blake. Thursday morning we woke up at 4:45 am, got dresses in our layers, ate our power bars, met my sisters and brother in the pitch dark and walked to our corrals. I was nervous beyond words, I didn't know if I would run the whole thing, I didn't know how fast and i didn't know how my leg would do. My goal was 2:15 - 2:30 and I knew I could do close to that. My sisters and brother took off, they had a faster goal and I couldn't do it. I ran the first 9 miles alone and then Jeff caught up, we ran the last 4.1 together and it was the most amazing feeling. I wanted to stop around mile 10, the hills on Peachtree street were brutal but I was too far into it and my adrenaline kicked in. I couldn't believe it, I was about to finish. Each mile Jeff and I somewhat smiled high fived and said 3 more, 2 more, 1 more...we can do it we are there! We passed my step father and Kate who were cheering us on at the end, we saw the finish line and sprinted together, we finished at 2:07 - beating our goal and finishing together - it was AMAZING and such an incredible HIGH! I had so much fun and was so happy we did it!
Picture the photographers took while I was running.



But here I went...from this...(excuse the awful picture, you can see my body cast under my shirt this was the most i could sit up for four months)

To this...we did it!!!



I said I would never do it again, I was never going to run again...I have already ran again and I can't wait till my next one, I will do it again!


6 comments:

MBKimmy said...

Wow this one gave me chills! What a great post! Way to go!

Ashly said...

I'm so proud of you Katie! Way to go:)

Jennifer said...

Katie, what an amazing accomplishment for you!!! You are a warrior and seem to amaze me all the time. I hope you give me motivation to get back into running after I have #2 in April. I was a runner in high school but my knees have gotten so bad over the years. But I am going to try and set a goal and do it.

Congrats Katie, and how awesome to have done it with your best friend/hubby :)

Kelly and Brent said...

Way to go Katie!!! What an amazing accomplishment. I am not a runner, I get bored too fast! I hope to one day take up running but until then I will live through you :)

Congrats again!

Nana said...

Congratulations Katie, "With God, ALL things are possible". He proves this over and over to us doesn't He?
Our family was very proud of Amy for running this half marathon also.

ag0129 said...

Katie, Congrats!! I knew you could do it..now you just need to motivate me...Barry just finished his 4th marathon, and is already signing up for another one..You are a true inspiration!
Aubryn