2009 in Review

This has been, hands down, the most surreal and amazing year of my life.

I spent the first few months of 2009 primarily hunched over the nearest toilet. Pregnancy gave me morning, afternoon, and evening sickness, and I found myself puking in all kinds of places: at home, at friends' houses, in restaurant parking lots, pulled over by the side of the road, and at school. I was pretty miserable, but I kept on running. Around the end of March, the morning sickness abated and pregnancy got a whole lot easier, but running didn't. Still, I kept at it with slow, short distances and little expectation in terms of distance and speed.

I managed to run until I was 32 weeks preggo, but after my 2 miler on June 10th, I threw in the towel on pregnant running. It was too hard and too hot at that point. I am proud of the running I did while pregnant and believe I ran for as long was possible for me. For the remainder of my pregnancy, I still walked everyday, but otherwise, I allowed myself to take it pretty easy. Here I am just a few days before Norah's birth on August 10th: Looking at that picture makes it hard to fathom that I was ever that pregnant! Oh, how quickly that mom-amnesia sets in! I know that, of course, she was inside me, but at this point, it just seems absolutely unbelievable.

A few days after the above picture was taken, Norah was born, and life for me was changed forever.

I spent the first week or two in utter disbelief that I was actually a mother and that I actually had a daughter. And, in some ways, I still can't believe it. As everyone tells you: With children, your life will completely change, and it's very true, but you can't fathom how true it is until it happens. Not just because your sleeping patterns, eating habits, priorities, and relationship with your spouse all change, but also because you experience love like you never have before. At least, this was the case for me.

I fell in love with Norah with an intensity I never expected. And it's such a different kind of love from romantic or familial love that I had no idea that it was gonna sweep me off my emotional feet. Then, I also re-fell in love with Jerry. It's tough to explain, but it's like I fell in love with him in a different way. I guess I suddenly loved him for being a father (and such a good one at that!) not just for being my husband, and that too was a new and unexpected love. Lastly, I simply fell in love with my family: With Norah's arrival, I felt that what we had created was something that was all our own; and while my family still includes my parents, siblings, etc, this family that Jerry and I have built is really MY family.

So, yeah, Norah's arrival certainly was the most significant event of the year, but soon after she was born, I started to itch to run again. I was torn about waiting until the 6 week post-partum mark, or going ahead on my own when I felt ready. In the end, I went for my first post-partum run about 4 weeks after her birth, and at the 6 week mark, I set my sights on a few small races to close out the year. I began running regularly again -- at the slowest pace I've ever run -- and trained first for the Key Biscayne 10K on Nov 14. Completing that felt like I had officially made my return to running.

Since then, I also ran a Turkey Trot 5K and began my training plan for some HMs in 2010. In the end, assuming I do my planned 5 miler tomorrow, I will have run 437 miles this year. A fraction of the mileage many of you have logged this year, but considering I ran half the year pregnant, then took 12 weeks off, and then eased back in post-partum, I am proud of the miles I logged this year. They may be few, but each one meant a lot to me.

At the end of 2009, I find my life is infinitely more challenging than my life at the end of 2008: Balancing being a wife, mother, teacher, and runner has certainly been tough; however, my life has never been richer or more rewarding. And running has come to mean something much more significant to me. It's no longer just a way to maintain my physical fitness and help me decompress. Becoming a mother has helped me see running in two new ways: First of all, now it is "my" time, a space and time for just myself, which is worth a lot to any mother. Secondly, I run now for Norah -- to show her what women can do and what healthy and strong mean for a woman. Granted, she's too young to understand that now, but I hope that growing up with such an example will be influential in how she perceives her own health and strength.

For those reasons, the number of miles I logged this year are meaningless; yet, those same reasons have made running more meaningful.