The Run That Saved Me
It’s cold. Bitter cold.
The kind of cold where you can feel the inside of your nasal cavities start to crack and your breath hangs in the air for a noticeably long time. But a mile and a half into an intended four-mile record-breaking run, I can’t get it out of my head that I’ve worn too many layers. I’m getting too hot and it’s hurting my pace. This run is slow.
Give yourself a break, my Inner Voice says. This time last year you were probably holed up in a bar, sulking.
The "record" will be running my 200th mile in a single year—more than I’ve ever run in my lifetime … combined. No joke. In 37 years of life, I can’t think of a time when I’ve run more than 4 miles in a single year in various fits of occasional fitness. This is not an exaggeration.
But I didn’t start 2017 with a power-of-positive-thinking-go-get-em-champ-style goal to better my life by running 200 miles. No, it started in a much more banal, Forest Gump-ian kind of way: I went for a run because I was angry.
And that's why the habit stuck.
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It was January 20, 2017 and I, like the majority of Americans, didn’t like what I was seeing on TV.
Personally, I was in the midst of the lean times of a media startup grind, with two young kids at home, and the constant struggle of balancing being present with them, while my mind was always on a business that I desperately needed to work. I wrestled with the guilt of being selfish for talking about work so much with my wife, and the guilt of leaning on her too much as the family rock, having to consistently remind myself to just ask her about her damn day and be a good husband already. I would lie awake at night with anxiety about whether or not my career decision was the right one, then had anxiety the next day because I didn’t get enough sleep because I was awake all night with anxiety. All of this made me angry and more cynical with everything. How could I let the basic things that come with being an adult get me so down?
Stress, as a friend recently put it, had become a turtle shell that crawled up my back, hunching me inward until I just accepted it as normal, while it slowly pushed me into to grave.
So yeah, that day was like a turd-clamtion point (an exclamation point made with turds) on the end of two very long years.
This would be much easier if we had a drink.
My Inner Voice wasn’t wrong. This would be so much easier to forget about and just not deal with if only we were drinking. We could quiet that heavy “what more could I have done to prevent this?” thought and go on about the day in a dull, dumb fog, eventually passing the time by watching old GNR concert videos and vowing to “be the change"…first thing tomorrow.
And candidly, most days like that Inner Voice would’ve easily won out. For the bulk of my life, he’s been the champion of bad coping habits, the path of least resistance to dealing with conflict, the quick and easy short-term fix to dealing with problems, and he's won with far less at stake than the state of the Republic. But in doing so, that voice had also helped enable me to get to a very unhealthy place: woefully out-of-shape, with the overall diet of a college freshman, overworked and saddled with daily anxiety, growing more cynical every day, and generally unable effectively deal with stress.
Mentally and physically I was in a very bad place.
Maybe we run out these feelings instead?
Run? You idiot. What a terrib—okay, maybe…maybe that’s a good idea.
I don’t know where it came from, but a seed was planted. A weird, uncomfortable, very unusual-for-me seed was somehow rooted into my brain and I couldn’t get it out.
You're angry and you should run until you’re not angry anymore.
The logic was simple and ironclad.
So that day I ran, S L O W L Y, stopping every quarter-mile to take these gasping, rattling breaths, while profusely sweating despite it being January in Chicago. That first “run” was a 12:30/mile pace and only lasted 1.18 miles. But it was a start. The next day I went for another run. When I ran for a third day in a row, my typical post-fits-of-fitness thoughts of “OK, that’s enough of this nonsense,” were replaced by, “This feels … ok.”
Even by that third run, I saw progress on how far and how fast I could go. Don’t get me wrong. I still HATED it. Running was slow and boring. So to stave off that boredom, I joined a CrossFit-style gym that had these boxing classes that just kicked. your. ass. Negativity, meet punching bag. Justin, meet results.
That sounds too easy when I read that back. It wasn’t. At all. I would start feeling physically and mentally better because I’d been putting in the work of consistently exercising, then because I felt better, I’d slack off from the exercise, eat the nutritional equivalent of a baloney Lunchable for every meal, and cram a bunch of craft beers down my gullet multiple nights a week. The negative turtle shell would crawl up my back, pushing me down, and I’d feel awful again. Justin, meet rut. Worse yet, I found the idea of running or boxing to re-jumpstart myself boring.
Been there, done that, Inner Voice would say. What’s next?
Every previous attempt at any kind at fitness would’ve ended here. Back to the same old coping habits for stress. Back to the version of myself I was running from. Back inside the shell. Repeat the attempt in 365 days or so.
But this time, relief came in the form of two bright orange bike rims I found earlier in the year at my local bike shop. I thought they looked cool and would make for a great start to a bike.
Maybe we should use these as the starting point to build a bike ourselves?
What in the hell? Who builds a bi—hey, maybe you’re right? That could be fun.
I was looking for a challenging, non work-related project, so I bought them. I built a bike and started riding everywhere, constantly tinkering with something I was intially sure was a bad idea to build. Negativity, meet handy project and the road. Justin, say hello to results again.
This year was the year I learned to love and embrace all these feelings as a tool: stress, negativity, and anger combined to be the catalyst I needed to do something that wasn’t easy for me. Running? Consistently being in the gym? Me? I mean, come on. That stuff is for other people, not me. But I created a new, more positive habit by putting all the negativity to work for me in a productive way. Agitated at something? Go to the gym and sweat your mind clear. Feeling blue? Hit the road for a long ride and do some soul searching. Anxiety getting the best of you? Run. It’ll require you to breathe, the thing we forget to do when we’re anxious.
More importantly, I was under no delusion that a new, active, semi-healthy lifestyle would somehow cure me from feeling angry or depressed or anxious or stressed or overwhelmed. I’m not a robot who can be totally reprogrammed not to feel anything, nor do I want to be, so I still feel like that from time to time. But now, I have a far better handle on how to deal with all those feelings and put them to work for me in a productive way.
Old Me: Today I feel like shit. Let’s wallow for a while then go get drinks, shall we? A solution should present itself.
New Me: Today I feel like shit. Let’s acknowledge that we feel like shit, then go for a run and think about what we can change or fix, shall we?
It was working. I had more mental clarity, physical energy, I was losing weight, and my anxiety was (mostly) a thing of the past.
We humans, though, we’re pretty dumb. If a little of something is good for us, an obscene amount of that same thing must be amazing for us, right? RIGHT?!?
————
“Sir? Sir, are you ok??"
My heart is beating so fast I feel like it’s about to explode. I’m desperately trying to tread water, but my breathing is so rapid, I can’t get enough air into my lungs to keep my head above water for longer than a second or two.
Oh no. This is it. I’m gonna drown here.
"Do you need assistance? Sir?!?”
I look up long enough to see a woman on a stand-up paddleboard headed my way.
Oh thank, God. Get me out of here!
Back under again briefly, then back up just in time to see her rush past me to help a man who seems to have been knocked out and is actually drowning. An intense wave of shame washes over me followed by an actual wave, knocking me back to reality.
Dammit, you asshole. Get it together and just swim.
Welcome to the open water swim portion of the 2017 Eagle Creek Sprint Triathlon in Indianapolis, Indiana. Inner Voice is not a fan of the predicament I’ve gotten us into and frankly neither am I.
I was 100 meters away from shore when I couldn’t touch the bottom after getting kicked in the face by another swimmer, descending into the chaos of a legitimate panic attack. Heart and breath racing, numb extremities, overall feelings of impending doom. All of this leading to a lack of air in my lungs, which led to me sinking, which led to more panic, doom, etc. You know, just a typical sunny Saturday morning in early June.
Here are all the things that go through your mind when you agree to do a triathlon:
"…."
Nothing. Nothing goes through your mind, because you’re not thinking when you say “yes" to doing a triathlon. You just say “yes" just because you’re a dumb human and you don’t know any better. You follow it up by saying things like “I’m a runner now, so I should be fine” or “Of course I have time to train for that and run a startup and be a good dad and husband.”
At least, that’s what I said.
As the "Fisher Price My First Fit Year” progressed, it became clear that I needed an end goal to work toward to keep me focused and motivated. I was keeping consistently active, but boredom was around every corner. Weight loss or working toward some kind of "beach Dad bod” weren’t drivers for me, but competition with friends was. So like any well-minded idiot, the first triathlon I agreed to do was the Olympic distance Chicago Triathlon in August. It was March when it was suggested among several friends—all of whom were fitness dorks and at least slightly prepared for the challenge ahead. Five months of training was more than enough time … for them.
But “The Near-Disaster at Eagle Creek” aside, I honestly thought I was ready for the big race. We did a warm up sprint triathlon (half the distance of the Olympic tri) just to get a feel for an open water swim … which … clearly … went … well, and I spent the summer waking up before dawn every day to ride and alternating between swimming and running at least three days a week. All total, I racked up more than 700 miles on the bike between March and August, every mile doing wonders for me mentally. There is this simplicity to being on a bike that makes me very happy. You pedal, you steer, you think. Stop pedaling, you’re still moving, still thinking. It’s an amazing escape, a moment to focus that I can’t find anywhere else. And if it weren’t for the pedestrians you constantly dodge on Chicago’s lake path, it would be damn near zen-like. So naturally, I focused more on training for the ride than I should have, neglecting training for the run.
The Olympic distance Chicago triathlon looks like this: First, you try not to drown in Lake Michigan for 0.93 miles. The swells in the harbor on race day will be so big, they’ll push you against the retaining wall. It’s great! Then, ecstatic you didn’t drown and actually finished the swim with a semi-respectable time, you go all out on your bike for 24.8 miles, legitimately loving every second, particularly the ride through Lower Wacker. You find yourself saying things like, “Well, this is definitely Lower Wacker Drive,” as you pass other cyclists. You’ll chuckle to yourself and you’ll literally say it 10 times, getting funnier every time for some reason. Finally, you park you bike in the transition area and that’s when you realize, 1) your legs are jelly, 2) you didn’t train enough for the run, and 3) the beer tent is probably open now. You then “run” 6.2 miles to a merciful finish line, where you’ll immediately drink beer instead of water “because you earned it." Victory will be yours, as will triathlon suit chafing and you’ll swear you’ll never do another triathlon again. This is because you’re a dumb human. You’ve already signed up for next year’s race.
————
A turning car waits as I run through a crosswalk, the occupants staring like something is wrong with me. It’s so cold, I’d probably do the same.
I was right. Too many layers. I’m getting hot. My pace is off.
I pick it up and cross my 200-mile finish line at an 8:48/mile pace in a “feels like” temperature of 22 degrees. By the end of this month, my total tally for the year will read something like:
- 225 miles run
- 720 miles biked
- 48 pounds lost
- some amount of perspective gained
Old Me and Old Inner Voice wouldn’t know what to think about this. I’m sure they’d think it was impossible and all really stupid. New Me and New Inner Voice … we celebrated this unexpected accomplishment with as restful a night’s sleep as a father of two kids can get. Oh, and a vow to get my per mile average below 8:00/mile by the time triathlon training season begins.
Thinking about the past year, it’s still odd to me that I now care about things like the pace of a mile—but I do. It’s a motivator now and that’s crazy to me. If you’ve known me for any time at all, that’ll be crazy to you too. But, I’ve not been able to get past that and do like several friends do and “just run.” What in the world is the point of that? For fun? Bleh. No thanks. I’ll see your “run just for fun” and raise you “run hard and with purpose because it makes you a mentally happier, healthier human and better equipped to deal with all the garbage that gets thrown your way every day, in turn making you a better father, husband, friend, ally, positive force in society, and creative businessperson."
Shit, I guess all that is pretty fun.