There will come a day...

I have spent the last year and a half nursing an injured hip. There have been MONTHS of physical therapy, surgery, crutches, more physical therapy, tears and frustration, and now... suddenly I'm cleared by my surgeon to be a normal, active human again.

It's the day I've been waiting for for almost two years... and yet now that it's here, I'm a little bit scared.

When I finally reached a point where running was challenging but fun and re-energizing, it became something that I built my day around. I got up at 4:50 IN THE MORNING so I could go running. There are so many things about that statement that don't describe me that it still feels funny to write it down. I loved running. I felt good, I felt strong, and for the first time in a really long time - I didn't hate what I saw when I looked in the mirror. I was proud of myself.

Now I'm horrendously out of shape, 15 pounds heavier, unmotivated (because let's be honest, exercise right now HURTS and it SUCKS and I don't like it. At all.), and so intensely scared. What if I can't get back in shape? What if I start running and the pain comes back and this whole mess was a waste of time and effort and insane amounts of money?

I hate how I look and I hate how much that matters to me. If one of my friends or students were to say that they based how they felt about themselves based on what they weighed I would threaten to smack them because I know it's not a fair unit of measure. But somehow that truth doesn't work in my head. I look in the mirror and the only truth I see is what I SEE - not the kind of wife or mother I am, the kind of friend or teacher. It is a fundamental error in reasoning.

So now what?

I start training. I can't call it working out because then I just won't do it - I have no motivation to work out. I HATE working out. But I want that feeling back - I want to go out before sunrise this summer and run the hop fields and watch the sun come up as I'm making my last turns toward home. I want to be able to participate in the See Spot Run 5k in May as my first race post-surgery. But more than anything, I want to look in the mirror and be proud of the person looking back at me. I want that moment where all the pain and the tears become worth it... and to do that, I have to train.

It is going to suck and I'm going to hate it. I'm going to whine and I'm going to want to quit. I'm going to feel like I will NEVER get to cross that finish line... and so I need my people to have my back. Please don't let me quit on myself. Life's too damn short to spend it on the couch.