On running

reclaiming the joy

One of my clearest and earliest childhood memories is being primary school age, possibly around 8 or 10, and running down the hill on my school playing field. It was the last day of the summer term, meaning we had just broken up for the holidays, and it was warm and sunny. My mum was a teacher at the school, so my brother and I regularly had to wait behind after school for her to be finished and take us home. On this particular day, it meant the crowds had cleared and it was just us walking home across the playing field.

I remember running down that hill, the scent of fresh grass in my nose and the warmth of the sun on my skin. I don’t specifically remember what I was wearing, it was probably a blue gingham summer dress with short white socks, the classic British primary school uniform, but I remember the warm air moving past my bare arms and legs. In the memory there’s this feeling of effortless, weightlessness, joy. As an adult, I now associate those feelings with childhood, when (if you’re lucky) your body is young and vigorous, healthy and energetic. That feeling of tirelessness, that you could run and run and run, and never need to stop. I recognise that now in my youngest Labrador, the way her body bends and flexes as she gallops across the sand, no thought on anything other than the pure joy of movement.

At secondary school I enjoyed cross country. The mud, the energy, the feeling of pushing through, pushing yourself, achieving something. The sting of cold air on bare thigh skin. The red gooseflesh and the welcoming warmth of the changing rooms afterwards. It made my awkward teenage body feel like it was worth something more than how it looked. ‘Amy tries hard’ was a common theme on my PE (physical education) report card. I was never on the team, never ran at county level like some of the girls in my class. I was too academic, aiming to get those top grades to get into vet school. Sport wasn’t for me I was told by the people around me. I had to focus on more important things.

I left school with the impression that the aim of sport and exercise was to maintain or lose weight, to stay thin, and to punish yourself for eating. In amongst the diet culture of the naughties, when ‘heroin chic’ and celebrity fat shaming were the height of fashion (how things have changed…), I forgot that exercise could be fun. Coming of age in the milieu of a teenage girls’ school meant I spent endless hours analysing with my friends whether cucumber burned more calories by chewing it, or whether drinking water cold versus room temperature would expend more energy because your body had to heat it up. Caring about sports was not cool. We didn’t choose to exercise.

I remember attempting to join a running club at university, and being by far and away the slowest in the group. As I slogged away at the back of the pack, with one other girl struggling along beside me, a supremely fit leader doubled back to tell us we were holding everyone up and would have to drop out. It was a matter of health & safety he sagely told us, they needed everyone to stick together to ensure everyone made it back to halls safely. Myself and my new companion, embarrassed and ashamed, told him it was no bother and we’d see ourselves home. This was pre-Googlemaps on smart phones, we had to navigate our way across an unfamiliar city alone in the dark. It did not enamour me to university running clubs and I never went back.

From this point onwards, my relationship with exercise was tenuous at best. Being lucky and privileged enough to be a ‘healthy’ body weight, whatever that means, I never felt exercise was a priority. I was slim, so why bother exercising? I told myself. I would occasionally go out for a run, mostly because it was free and I could do it at short notice when the mood took me, rather than having to book in advance to a class or organise to go to a gym. But I often stood in my own way for developing a healthy relationship with exercise. There’s no point going for a run unless I’m doing at least 5km/running for at least 30mins/training for something, was a common refrain I would tell myself. So I would put it off and put it off, and then suddenly I was in my 30s and hadn’t really exercised for a decade.

It took a weekend away with a friend from school, and three rounds of counselling for (amongst other things) a propensity towards body dysmorphia, for the penny to drop. “You were always sporty at school” my pal opinioned, apropos of nothing. “Was I?” I countered, genuinely confused. Sometimes you have to see yourself through someone else’s eyes to realised something you couldn’t see yourself. I WAS sporty at school. I wasn’t great at anything, but I tried hard and enjoyed it. I pushed my parents to allow me to study PE GCSE, when they wanted me to do history. I was a reserve on the hockey team, I cared about cross country. I came home from that weekend and joined a gym. A year later I trained for, and ran, a half marathon. I was super slow, messed up my nutrition and started the race hungry, nearly dropped out at various points because it was too hot and I hadn’t trained hard enough. But I finished.

I still struggle to exercise. At nearly 40, it feels like I’ve learned the lesson but I’m confused as to how put it into practice. Life is busy, exercise feels self-indulgent. Yes, I could go for a run, but I could also do laundry/email a contractor/batch cook/call my mum. Running doesn’t feel ‘productive’, in the way that modern life encourages from us every minute of every day. It’s also hard work, by definition. Why get up early to run, when I could get an precious extra hour of sleep? When I make time to exercise regularly I feel better in my brain and body, more grounded, calmer. But the antithesis is the moment I get stressed or overwhelmed it’s the first thing to drop off my to do list. It makes no sense, in those moments its the thing I need the most.

My counsellor has told me over and over of the importance of mindfulness. It’s another thing on my to do list that I repeatedly fail to manage; meditation, staring at a candle flame, being present in the moment. But when I run, it’s impossible not to be mindful. Sometimes that mindfulness presents itself as a constant focus on the part of the body that hurts, or is struggling. It might be my brain berating me for not going fast enough or hard enough or often enough. But once everything calms down and I settle into a rhythm, it can be easier to recall the joyful feelings of moving my body. The tempo of my feet on the pavement or trail. The timing of my breathing to the movement of my arms and legs. The pure unadulterated glee when your feet match the music, and your breathing comes easily, and it feels for a moment like you could do this forever. I feel moments of intense happiness when I’m running, but also acute sadness. I find myself crying with no warning, unsure exactly why. But I always come back feeling better.

I still struggle with those feelings of needing to run for X minutes or Y distance to make it worthwhile. I’m an all-or-nothing thinker it seems. I try to recall 8yr old Amy, who ran purely for joy. She wasn’t thinking about distance or speed, the number of steps she was doing or the achievement she would unlock on her sports watch. She moved her body for the pure exhilaration and pleasure. That childlike delight is something worth recalling and recreating. It’s a privilege to be able to exercise, in whatever capacity that takes. I need to remember that next time I’m standing in my own way.