Why I run

Because it changed my life.

For a long time I struggled with a low self image, I lacked self esteem, was very insecure, struggled with body image and felt I had nothing to say because I never did anything of importance. When I look at old photos of myself, behind the smile I see someone who didn’t feel good about herself.

Two things made a huge change for me: moving to the UK and the change in lifestyle as a consequence. I made new friends who were into running, joined Parkrun and got talked into taking part in a 10K race. To my surprise, I did better than I’d ever expected. Having said that, my bar was very low. Still, after completing the 10K, I thought why not go a step further and sign up for the Great North Run? Again, I did better than expected, completing my first half marathon in 02:15:59. In a way, doing better than expected at those two events made me even more insecure because I wasn’t sure how to deal with “doing OK”.

It’s not as if running comes naturally to me, I never did any running in my younger years so I have to work hard to get anywhere near “doing OK”. Going for training runs several times a week, cross training in terms of strength training, walking, swimming, cycling and Pilates are a must. If I don’t keep it up it all goes downhill very quickly. And even in spite of the amount of training, some things will remain out of reach while other things that may seem to be out of reach at first sight, probably aren’t. Every day is a new attempt to figure out which is which. More than a physical struggle, every run and every other challenge I set out on, is a psychological battle with myself.

The other demon is (and probably always will be) food and the effect what I eat has on my mood, motivation and self image. I’m Belgian which inevitably means I like food. It’s part of my culture. Belgians don’t get the nickname “Burgundian” for no reason. (In Belgium and in the south of the Netherlands, a ‘Burgundian lifestyle‘ still means ‘enjoyment of life, good food, and extravagant spectacle.’ ~ Wikipedia). Burgundians have always had a reputation for loving big portions of tasty, rich food. I try my best to have a healthy and balanced diet and cook meals myself on a nearly daily basis, but I also like the good stuff: chocolate, cake, fries, beer. Mostly it’s fine but it only takes one bad day to get me down and make me feel bad about myself.

If I have to summarise what running means to me and how it changed my life, then I think it comes down to this:

It has given me something to talk about but more importantly: it has given me a purpose. A reason to get out of bed in the morning, learn something new and be the best version of myself. Especially completing the Coast to Coast in 2018 and the Newcastle to Edinburgh run as well as Kielder Marathon in 2019 made me feel that finally I’d done something I could be proud of. I often still struggle with accepting that maybe there’s something I’m OK at. I still feel awkward when people seem to be genuinely interested in the things I’ve done and often feel out of place when I’m talking about myself. I’m still learning every day and that probably is my biggest challenge of all.

However . . . on the bad days, the days when my runs or races don’t go according to plan (and believe me – that happens more often than you may think!) or the days when I order pizza rather than have the healthy, homemade meal I was meant to eat; those days it’s exactly running that gets me by. Because a bad run is better than no run. And I may have had the pizza, the ice cream or the cake but I also did the run.