I'm an official half-marathon survivor.

How did that happen, you might be wondering? Good question... since I admittedly avoided cross country and distance track in high school because i didn't want to work that hard! Prior to Christmas 2009, the farthest I've ever run is 3 miles.

So here's "the rest of the story."

Back in August (was it really August?), I joined an online Christian bookclub called Bloom. I really wanted it to just be a Bible Study, but it became so much more. I developed friendships with a select group of these wonderful women. One such friend is Reese.

(This is us PRE-RACE on March 21, Downtown Atlanta)

Reese came up to visit us in November, which happened to be our local Girls on the Run race. I was on our office's committee to work at the race, so she came along as well. She mentioned that she'd always wanted to run a half-marathon. I believe I responded that I'd NEVER wanted to run a half-marathon. Jon of course jumped in and gave me a hard time about my comments. Then he added that he'd give me a back rub for every day I trained.

For whatever reason, the two combined challenges made me take the bait.

Just before Christmas 2009, I put on my running shoes and actually used them for their intended purpose again. I had taken basically 5 years off. I had essentially quit working out the day Amara was born. I hated that fact, but hadn't taken the opportunity to get back into the habit.

Admittedly, I didn't train well. There were many opportunities for excuses, not the least of which was the crummy weather we had, the cold temps, and the unexpected amounts of snow. I effectively used those excuses and trained poorly. Infact, I trained so poorly that the farthest I ran pre-race was 6 miles. Most of my training was indoors on our elliptical.

That said... I finished!


(Me crossing the finish line.)

It wasn't pretty, but I did it.

Remember that I said I'd only run 6 miles in training. Well, as you might know, a half-marathon is 13.1 miles. I had hit nearly 8 miles on the elliptical, but it doesn't mimic well the pounding that your joints take in an actual run.

And my joints felt it!

I started off well -- the first 2-3 miles felt pretty good (other than being oh-dark-thirty). The next couple miles I didn't like real well. Then after a bathroom break at mile five (oh the joys of having children), I felt great through about mile 9. Somewhere between miles 9 and 10, I began to wear out. I was still able to talk (ok, so I was singing), but my legs and joints were screaming at me. I was very happy about my lung strength though -- because that had gotten ridiculously bad in my time off.

So anyway, miles 10 to 13 were painful. I knew that the pain was temporary and not an injury, so I pushed through. But I won't lie and tell you I enjoyed it! When Greg said, "Only a 5k left" I thought I might have to punch him! Never had a 5K sounded so long!

But then I saw the finish line. The gray drizzle that had been present through the last half of the race was still there. The orange finish line, balloons, crowds, music -- all the stuff that had been absent through much of the course due to the rain was there again. I dug in and kept going.

As we got within a block of the finish line, Greg said, "Go for it!" I just laughed and said, "Not a chance." I didn't have any more in me to sprint across the line. But I did run across it! I saw my family on the side lines cheering me on and gave them as much of a grin as I could muster.

When all was said and done, I ran about 11 of the 13.1 miles. Not too bad considering my lack of preparation! It would have been more like 12, but the last 2 miles really did me in. I registered with a 2:30 goal time, and finished in 2:35. Again, not bad.

I do owe it all to this guy though...

(My brother, Greg)

You see, Greg's a GOOD distance runner. He thrives on this kind of running and these distance races. He slowed his pace down to a crawl to run literally every step of the way with me. He took my verbal abuse when I didn't like his encouragement ("halfway there" doesn't sound so good when all you want is to see the finish line). He told me my pace was good and my form was solid. And maddeningly, he talked on the phone to my family, who was enroute, AS HE WAS RUNNING and WITHOUT GASPING FOR AIR. Crazy runners. Seriously though, I couldn't have run as much as I did without him by my side, because I certainly wanted to walk more of it!

And of course my kiddos. You can't see their "Run Mommy Run" shirts, because it was too cold to go jacketless, but they wore them with pride.


(Post race hug from Amara & Dominic)

You see all those shirts that say "Running is my life." During the race, I saw a shirt that said, "Running is my hobby. My children are my life." Still not quite accurate as far as my priorities go (God, Jon, Kids), but it echoed my sentiments much more closely. They are a big reason I chose to run this race. They need to see me modeling healthy lifestyles -- and my couch potato lifestyle just wasn't cutting it.

They're also the reason I signed up to run it again next year.

And next year... I plan to run all 13.1 of the hilly Atlanta miles.