I almost backed out of the Boston Marathon… video

I’m not proud of this. And I really am not ready to completely talk about why I this happened. But I want to share because it was a really big deal for me to push through this.

I was doing an interview about my experience at Boston a few days ago with the Hyland’s team and was asked, “What did you find in Boston?”. The theme of sharing our journey was “Find Yourself – Find Your Finish Line”.

My first thought was – I found a lot of Run Eat Repeat followers! It makes me smile to think about all the people who said “Hi” in Boston or messaged that they saw me. Thank you. It made me feel like we were all in this journey together. And I really needed that over race weekend.

Every single hello made me feel a little better, like I had a friend there. I feel like I know you too. And you didn’t know it at the time, but almost quit the race before it even started. I wanted to share because your support meant so much you didn’t even realize.

I’ve been dealing with a family emergency that’s had some ups and downs for a few weeks now. Two nights before the Boston Marathon I just couldn’t cope with it anymore and completely lost it. I stood in my condo’s tiny bathroom crying so hard I was afraid something was wrong with me (besides the obvious things). Every single ounce of strength I had left decided to abandon ship and flowed out of me in the form of tears.

I suddenly realized that I couldn’t travel from SoCal to Boston like this.

What if I had a panic attack on the plane? What if I started to randomly cry at the team breakfast?? I could NOT keep it together and I was going to embarrass myself. Running a marathon requires a strong mental attitude – I did not have that. What if I just felt like I couldn’t keep going and quit?! How mortifying.

I can’t do this.

I was already stressed about travel and um, actually running 26.2 miles on the most prestigious course in the world. That’s normal. But the additional stress of a looming breakdown was just too much. I could not do this. I don’t know how I could cancel at this point, but I had to. I can’t do this…

Then, I had a light bulb moment (right there in the bathroom).

 

Be brave.

Monican, right now be brave isn’t about running and pushing through a tough hill. Right now you’ve gotta be brave. You have to show up.

 

This is an awkward situation, but it’s a part of my journey.

I’m very glad I showed up.  I’m so grateful for the opportunity. I’m very lucky to be able to blog about running and eating and share my experiences with you. And I’m super thankful that I was able to be brave, push through, run the race and meet a lot of awesome people.

I’ll share more as I process all of this but I did want to tell this story because it was a really big deal for me. I hope you are not going through anything hard right now. But if you are – Be brave.

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source http://runeatrepeat.com/2017/05/08/i-almost-backed-out-of-the-boston-marathon-video/