High Gear

I found some joy in running this weekend. I love this little ski mountain. My hsuband and kids know this mountain from the top down, I know it from the bottom up. I love running there and thinking about these perspectives.

When I started running again in 2010 after Sophia was born, I was just 9-months sober from bulimia. Running helped me cope. Running is a complicated way to deal with an eating disorder. But it helped me learn to control my inner voice. This is a good thing. it’s much better to say to yourself, “Sarah, you can make it up that hill!” than “Sarah, you’re worthless and fat.” Running helped me find a kinder, more encouraging inner voice. One that wasn’t filled with distorted lies. It was a helpful tool and a helpful distraction.

Lately, my husband and I have been watching the new Apple TV drama, Physical. He watched the first episode and told me about it.

“It’s, um. It’s really accurate.” Mark and I have been together for twenty years, he knows my struggle with bulimia intimately. He’s seen the worst.

“I mean. It might be really hard for you to watch. But it might be interesting to you. I’ve never seen a show use this kind of narration. It’s different.”

Different narration. I was intrigued. So we watched an episode together. Some of the scenes were sadly, embarrassingly familiar. And when the main character, Sheila’s inner monologue started going I paused it. 

“This is it.” Somehow the writers and producers of the show captured exactly what it is like to be in the mind of someone who is bulimic. I read that the producer, Annie Weisman leaned on her own experience with an eating disorder in creating the show. It’s not graphic, but it doesn’t need to be. The monologue is enough. 

And it’s true. Well it is not true. It’s all lies. People who struggle with eating disorders tell themselves lies about themselves and others. It’s the only way to perpetuate self-destructive behavior. It’s all a lie, but it is true to life. Very, scarily accurate.

For me that voice has quieted. It’s been twelve years. And in those years that voice has changed through therapy, through running, through being honest, through finding the truth. But it’s not gone completely. 

The way I quieted that voice was by pushing myself to extremes because when I was focused on something big and audacious and impossible, something so outside myself I didn’t have to focus on myself. I could just focus on the goal and make my inner dialogue all about the goal. That has been the last decade plus two years, pushing, pushing, pushing. It’s an exhausting way to find yourself: trying to outrun the old, hoping to find the new. 

I’ve heard Rich Roll talk about this, talk about his journey from addict to athlete. I think there are many of us out there: we block out the haunting lies by focusing on something bigger than ourselves. And if you fall into the category of ‘runner’ that bigger thing is likely a running goal: half marathon, marathon, 50K, 50-miler, 100-miler. Always going for more. 

The alternative is bad, the self-destruction of bulimia is bad. The running, maybe less bad. It’s not bad. It just is. 

But maybe it’s time to find a new gear?

That’s what I’ve been wondering lately.

But then, who would I be if I didn’t run? Maybe I’m afraid that if I don't operate in this constant high gear of PUSH, that I’ll quit, that the voice will come rushing back and catch me. I’ll be consumed, swallowed back up by the darkness. Twelve years lost. 

But what if I’ve done it? Not outrun the voice, but made it quiet enough so that the good things in life are louder, shine brighter, take up more of my thoughts and emotions and heart. What if it’s time to shift gears? Not stop running, but find a new pace?

There are a lot of things in life that we need to get us started, because if we don’t start we stagnate or get swallowed up. I’ve been working on this writing project and I didn’t know where to start, so I just dove in and I liked what I wrote. It was good. And then I kept writing and what came after was better, I found my voice, I found my focus, I found the point. And then that first piece of writing didn’t fit. In fact, it detracted from everything that came after, it had to be cut. Cutting massive chunks of writing you’ve worked hard to perfect is not easy. So I copy and paste those sections into a document called “cast off’s” so that I don’t really have to delete them…yet. And moved on to make the better stuff even better.

Perhaps running was my start, it was my foot in the door to a life without bulimia. It was a good start, but maybe it’s time for some revisions? Maybe it’s time to make room for the better stuff, the stuff that comes after the rough start.

I don’t think it means life without running. I just think it means life with running in a different gear. I don’t have any answers, but I’m on the path to find out.

Here’s to a new gear and getting to the better stuff, friends.

Sarah