The Fitness Diaries

It was roughly a year ago when I took up running. I had no expensive trainers, no fancy gear; I just decided to run, so I ran. Before that day I did the odd home workout here and there, following youtube videos in my living room like a crazy woman, and I also dabbled with pilates and yoga, but I had no regular routine. That meant I really struggled to keep up with workouts, and ultimately hated exercise and hated myself for being so bad at exercise. Add to the mix a mild chocolate addiction, plus my pre- vegetarian self’s love of burgers, and I was pretty unfit. Now I’m not saying my life was all doom and gloom, but looking back I definitely wasn’t happy or confident in my body and I saw no end in sight.

Fast forward to a year later, when I run 4 times a week and work out on top of that, I truly care about myself and what I put into my body, because I have seen the effect it has. But even more importantly, I’m steadily learning how to love myself.

There have been many hurdles (pun intended) along the way; like the time I was bed bound by illness for 3 months and couldn’t exercise, or the time I decided to extend Christmas to February and had a very lazy few weeks, but on the whole, I’m really proud of myself for keeping up the running habit, and even more proud for bouncing back when it would have been easier to give up. And I’ve never felt better.

I think the body confidence we get from exercise comes from the challenges you overcome when you start and carry on running. There are no two ways about it, the first week of running- or any fitness journey-is going to be really hard (hellish, actually), and that 1 mile you can barely reach the end of is a real killer. But the fact that you reach the end of the killer mile, and keep coming back to go through it again every day, until eventually the mile doesn’t feel so hellish; then you can even run a little further so that before you know it you’re running 2 miles and beyond, is a huge achievement. You didn’t give up and that’s something to be proud of. It teaches you how good it feels to challenge yourself.

When I used to hear people saying how good exercise was for your mental health I genuinely thought they were lying; like a trick health freaks play on the rest of us so they can watch us suffer as we sweat, and they sit feeling very smug about themselves. I definitely didn’t think it would be something I preached myself, but here goes: running is amazing for your mental health. When I get to the top of a hill I feel amazing about myself, especially if I’ve sprinted past people in their houses eating takeaways on the sofa. No matter how slow I am, I’m faster than everybody sat on their bums.

Along the way I’ve gradually noticed that I actually want to take care of my body, now I have more to lose. Isn’t it funny how being healthy in one area of your life seems to act like a domino effect? I really want to be kind to myself by feeding my body the right balance of fuel and treats, a balance which has definitely been a bit ‘scew whiff’ in the past, as my Grandad used to say. These days, no amount of pizza of brownies comes remotely close to the feelings of pride when I think about how far I’ve come. It’s this pride which drives me to keep on going, because boy do I have a long way to go.

I am no Karlie Kloss, but I not even lying when I say that it’s knowing I’m doing my very best to be healthy that makes me feel most confident. And it’s really important to bear in mind that there is almost no correlation between health and size. Obviously, there are some exceptions, as I’m pretty sure a morbidly obese person can’t be healthy as long as they’re that big. But in general, women of all shapes and sizes exercise regularly and that’s the important thing; not whether or not you can fit into size 6 jeans. Running makes me feel good, and the icing on top of the delicious cake is it makes me look good too.

Of all the lessons I’ve learnt on this journey so far, the most important is that most things in life are mind over matter. If you can motivate yourself to work through the pain to reach the top of that hill, you can achieve anything as long as you believe you can.