The 12 minute Mile.

     All my life I have felt overweight.  I have two siblings, who are both tall and skinny, I was always tall and rounded.  I have memories of middle school and high school dinners, feeling frustrated that both my siblings could eat more then I could, and still be so skinny.  I was the only kid in my family to do sports consistently in high school.  Track and Field meant that I was exercising daily, working out and practicing, and I felt fit.  I didn't mind my big thighs because I knew I could leg press 600 lb, which was helpful for shot put and discus competitions, but not so much for self confidence. The bane of my high school fitness was gym class fitness test. Every year they asked students to run a 12 minute mile. It felt like they tortured students with this, threatened that they would fail gym class, and be unable to graduate. For a straight A student this always caused anxiety, and yet somehow, I never was able to do a 12 minute mile.  I would get close, but never cross that line in time.  Somehow despite not completing a 12 minute mile,  the whole threat was empty, and I still passed gym class with an A.  But I never forgot the feeling of failure, being 100 meters away from the finish line when they called time.
      College was physically a struggle for me, because somehow when looking for colleges, I didn't want to be defined by sports, so I turned down scholarships for shot put after competing at the state level in high school, so I wouldn't feel pressure from sports when I wanted to focus on academics.  In college I did crew for a semester before they wanted me to move to varsity, but I couldn't bring myself to work out at 4 am.  After that I started neglecting my physical fitness.

     Fast forward to now. I've got three beautiful daughters, who are my world.  And for the last 10 years I have further ignored my own health.  I've gone on and off of every diet I could find.  I've gained and lost the same 50 lbs more times then I can count.  At some point I get frustrated with the plateau, and I stop trying so hard, and I tell myself "I'd rather be fat and happy, then miserable and always dieting."  I've never been able to stick to any consistent exercise because it always felt too hard, and I could never motivate myself.

     My eldest daughter came home from kindergarten with a Mother's Day card for me.  There was a form when each child got to fill in information about their mother.  The line "she likes to" was filled out with "sleep and watch TV." And "she always" was filled out with "take care of us." This hit me remarkably hard.  How can I care for my girls, and not care for myself?  I don't want to be remembered by my kids as being someone who is never active, and who doesn't have real interests in life.  I began doing more research on healthy food choices instead of diets.

     Right about that time Team 1DOS showed up in my life.  I work with their founder, and just happened to see on Facebook that they were starting a new 6 week challenge. What's your point? a challenge to help you figure out why you want to make changes, and a group of people willing to support you as you make small changes at your own pace.  Having a group of people cheering me on has been more helpful then I could have imagined. For the past 6 weeks I have exercised for 40+ minutes at 4-6 times a week.  And what surprised me more, is that I'm enjoying doing it. I always hated running, so I started with walking on a tread mill.  After a couple weeks I had a big challenge to face, when I went on vacation, and there was no tread mill to keep me in my comfort zone.  So I jogged and walked outside, and what I found was that I could do a 13 minute mile.  Something in me that has been feeling disappointment since high school, decided that I

wanted that 12 minute mile. And I wanted it bad.  So I started pushing myself, shaving off 20-30 seconds a mile.  Today for the first time in my life, I ran a mile in under 12 minutes!  I wish I could tell the high school version of me that it was possible, I just needed to believe in myself.