DONE!

I wanted to sit down and write this the night after I finished the marathon but I realized quickly that one, I was WAY too freakin’ tired to write and two, I needed a minute to process it all. 2017 Chicago Marathon, completed.

This whole process, the whole year of running and then training, culminated on Sunday and I can truly liken it to the birth of a child or your wedding day. High anticipation coupled with extreme nerves and anxiety and that feeling of “holy shit, what did i do?” It’s just one day but in that one day you plan to do something pretty extraordinary. I’ve also spent the last few weeks downplaying the hugeness of the marathon. But now that I’ve covered every one of those 26.2 miles, I am ashamed that I had the gall to diminish it in any way. It is enormous and overpowering and humbling and truly beyond what the physical body should be able to do and people do it!

So bright and shiny at 6:30 a.m.

I won’t bore you with the mile by mile but everything started well. We were up nice and early, good breakfast, nice little warm up walk to Grant Park. It’s true what they say about the energy on marathon day; if you’ve never spectated I highly recommend it, it’s downright palpable. It was a sunny, clear blue day (this proved a not great thing later) and the morning started cool. We got in our corral and I instantly felt the bigness of it all. Heidi and I were in the last wave of people, there were 3, and there were probably 2,000 people in our corral. Around 50,000 people ran this year. That’s a lot.

Crossing that starting line came with a wave of emotion. The last year, every run, every victory, every failure, every setback, every question I had about whether I could do this came back at once. I crossed the line in tears and felt strong and determined. I was here. I was doing this and we can do hard things. My first 4 miles felt great, legs shook out well and I knew that my mom, aunt and cousins were at 4.5 so that was the most perfect thing to look forward to. If you ever have the chance to cheer someone on at any race, do it; having people along the course let me set smaller goals and break down the miles knowing I would have a little cheering squad and hug waiting for me.

Seeing my family. 2nd set of tears for the day 🙂

Miles 5 through 10 were comfortable. I settled into a rhythm, stayed hydrated and fueled. I gave myself a 30 second walk break after each mile. This is something I did a lot in training and, for me, it works well and mentally breaks up my run. Heidi was ahead of me, she’s a much better runner and we didn’t plan to stay together the whole race. (Sidenote: Heidi Baker PR’d her second marathon!!! She is and forever will be my running hero!!)The 1st half of the course is through some of my favorite, and most beautiful, neighborhoods in the city of Chicago. I really did fall in love all over again with my big, beautiful city and spent a lot time focusing on just that, how incredible my hometown is. On top of a crazy amount of runners, the estimated total for spectators for this years marathon was close to a million. ONE MILLION PEOPLE came out to cheer on, encourage, motivate and love on 50,000 crazy runners on a Sunday afternoon. If you don’t believe there is still good in the world, be on a marathon course, the love is YUGE.

My next goal was to get to 10 miles. My Mackenzie was at Mile 10 with my mom and knowing I was on my way to her gave me such a push. Third round of tears for the day 🙂

Now is time for the real talk; shit got hard. Real hard real fast. The temperature was higher than was comfortable and a good deal of the course had us running directly in the sun, woof. Starting around mile 6 my left foot had started to bug me a bit; a dull ache in the ball of my foot that kind of shot up into my toe. For a long time it really didn’t effect much, I was aware of it but could ignore it. Just before the 1/2 way mark my friend Jen and her son met me, HALLELUJAH! I was so happy to see them and her little man joined me for a block, runner in training!

Running buddy

I left Jen at 13.1 miles, half way. I was powering through and feeling ok but not great. The next few miles are fuzzy but I started to hurt. Around mile 17, I felt 3 blisters burst on my feet at about the same time, this was the beginning of the end. I focused on just one block at a time, in pain with each step. I was moving so slow but I was still moving. I hit Taylor St, knew I had 9 more miles and broke down. I sobbed and had the thought for the first time, “I can’t do this.” I was walking/shuffling at this point, trying to keep any kind of a decent pace and I looked up and my friend Victoria was standing on the sidewalk. I’d never seen an angel in real life, but there she was. It was like when you’re little and something bad happens and you see your mom; relief and release. Through sobs I hugged her and told her I wanted to be done, I wanted to go home. She grabbed my hand and we walked. We walked one block at a time. She kept me going through tears and pain.

At mile 20 my second angel reappeared. Jen, her husband and her boys stood on Halsted St cheering and wearing “GO KATIE!” t-shirts. I’ve never been so happy to see more faces I knew! Jen hugged me, took one look at the whole situation, took my hand and said “Let’s go”.

Around 21 miles my cousin Joelle, with her beautiful smile, gave me a bit of push. At mile 22 I got to see Mackenzie again, thank god.

My little ray o’sunshine when I needed it most

Mile 22 and beyond was hell. I was in such pain both physically and mentally. I felt like a failure, I wanted to stop. With every step I took I wanted to stop but I wanted to cross that finish line more. I wanted more than anything to get to Tim, who was waiting at the finish line to put my medal on. I wanted to prove to myself that I was stronger than this whole stupid thing. I can do hard things. I was going to do this hard thing.

Jen and Victoria walked/shuffled me the last 9 miles of the marathon. They had no plans to do any different. They talked when I needed voices, held my hand when I had a hard time breathing through the tears and they shuffled with me when I was determined to not walk the whole way. If they hadn’t been there, I would have quit. Without a doubt. You know what else this proved? Everything is easier with your tribe. When you have people who love you enough to not leave when you’re at your worst? You literally have everything you’ll ever need.

As much as I wanted them to, Jen and Victoria couldn’t cross the finish line with me. At the corner of Roosevelt and Michigan, 0.3 miles from the end, I said “Ok, I’m finishing this!” I let go of them and pushed myself. At that point you go up a small hill (marathon planners are sadists) and 1/4 of the way up that awful hill, there was Tim. He ran to me and I fought every urge to jump into his arms and let him carry me across the finish line. I grabbed his hand, mustered every bit of energy I could, blocked the pain and ran. I crossed that line and have never been more grateful to be done with anything in my life.

I finished the Chicago Marathon in 7 hours and 27 minutes. It was almost 2 hours longer than I had planned. It was a time I never thought I’d hit but I don’t care. That number means only one thing, I finished. I didn’t stop. I didn’t quit. I can do hard things.