Los Cabos Ironman 70.3

November 7, 2018November 8, 2018 ~ betsyhartley392 ~ 3 Comments

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1.2 mile ocean swim, 56 mile bike, 13.1 run.

That’s how you get the 70.3.

78 degrees water temp, 84 degree biking/running temp.

70 minute cutoff out of the water. 5:30 cutoff on the bike from the start. 8:30 cutoff on the run from the start. My goal was FINISH, or if we want to get really specific, I was hoping to pull off an 8:15-8:20 finish and beat the cutoffs.

This was my first triathlon. Ever.

Mike Larsen (Spencer’s coach and my friend) talked me into trying this. I was cussing him at points and turns during training. His ears had to be burning intensely the 48 hours prior to the start.

Mike is the kind of man who instils instant confidence with short declarative statements of absolute belief in your abilities. Someone believing in you is powerful-good medicine in my book. When he said ‘Bets, you’re ready, why aren’t you doing this?’ I freaking hit ‘register’ on the event before really thinking it through.

And then I buckled down and trained hard and well and smart.

Waiting on the beach, sun rising, with a bunch of nervous-as-hell, back-of-the-packers, getting ready for a running start from the sand of Palmilla Beach into the ocean to swim… I thought I was going to cry, puke, pass out, grab a cab all the way back to Oregon AND kick Mike Larsen in the shins for convincing me I could try this distance. I felt like I didn’t want to disappoint Mike. Or Spencer. Or me. Or any of the humans in my life who hand me their blind belief when I tell them my wild dreams. I was in Mexico, standing on a beach with 1,000 other people, in a bathing suit, getting ready to run into the ocean and swim a mile.

Dumbest. Idea. Ever.

Swimming for me has been a damned soap opera. I panic in the water. Like; flop on the deck of pool and cry. I never learned how to swim as a child. I’m not strong or fast in the water. Getting to the ocean swim was a white-knuckle, mean-street-fight of simple grit over the past few years. I worked my ass off to get to a point where I could swim remotely well enough to even think I could try this.

Standing on the beach watching the fast folks run into the ocean – Spencer among them – I decided that my mind was my biggest tool in this whole thing. She needed to be on my side. She needed to believe we were doing this. So I had a little internal pep talk.

‘We’re doing this… We’re strong. We’re brave. We’ve worked so hard. And you can always grab a kayak and go back to shore – but you HAVE TO START. And SMILE DAMN IT!… You are alive to be part of this. You chose this. Quit acting like a kicked dog who doesn’t belong here. YOU EARNED THIS — go swim…. ‘

The man at the swim chute patted me on the back and said ‘vamanos’. I ran down the beach and hit the water. Ran a bit in the shallow water and then — dove and started swimming.

The first 750 meters was ugly. I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t get into a rhythm with a stroke. I was hitting people. They were hitting me. I was fighting waves and currents. I was fighting panic. I finally decided I was done. I was quitting. I couldn’t do this. I was clearly in over my head. I looked for a kayak to flag over and tell them I’d like a lift back to shore. I was bobbing up and down in the water getting face-smacked by the waves. Done. I wanted to be done. I would just go watch Spencer race this thing.

My trail sister Daisy – her brother Scott was a triathlete. Scott was killed in a training ride over a year ago. It was a horrible, senseless tragedy. I had talked to Daisy before coming down here to get a boost of confidence and she had said Scott would be proud of me for being scared senseless and doing this anyway. So I was bobbing up and down in the water, unable to see a kayak, wanting to cry and finally said out loud — ‘SCOTT… Uh, wanna swim with me…? I’m terrified. Daisy said I could ask you for help…’

Then I got stung by a jellyfish. Ouch. Stung a second time. WTF? That hurt…

Then I pulled my head out of my ass and decided that I wasn’t going to quit this thing.

I was not going out of this event without a fight.

I put my head back in the water determined to get cut-off in the 70 minutes and dragged out of the water, but this was not ending with me QUITTING… I started to swim and saw a pair of feet (ugly feet BTW) and bubbles and I suddenly knew — I FOLLOW THIS GUY. I stick to him like glue and swim for all I’m worth to keep following him. I am 100% convinced his name was Scott. 🙂 I swam hard and strong and learned to turn to the non-chop side to breathe, and breathe on the 2 count, not the 3 count. I threw my training out the window that worked for the pool and got aggressive about adapting to the ocean. I didn’t worry about sighting the buoys — he ‘ Scott’ was doing that work. And I swam… Hard. Steady. Turning around buoys, never losing site of the ugly feet, and finally I could see the bottom of the ocean coming up to meet us and I could see… shore… Whoa. SHORE.

I came out of the water and Tracey was there and I said ‘Did I make the cut off????! and she said ‘YES! GET YOUR ASS ON YOUR BIKE!’ So I took off running to my bike.

59:56 out of the water on a 70:00 cutoff.

Then it hit me.

I never for one hot-second thought I was going to actually get out of the water.

I hadn’t looked at the bike course. I was going through the motions getting ready for this thing; but I had not convinced my mind I could swim. The details of the bike and run were murky at best. And now I was going to get to go bike and run! IN MEXICO, in an IRONMAN…. WOO HOO!

The bike was hilly. The roads were in pretty crap shape. HUGE potholes, lots of determined driving to keep from wrecking my bike. Spencer was kicking ass on the bike and was coming toward me on the out and back and gave me a subtle 2-finger wave as he sped past that I knew meant ‘YOU GOT OUT OF THE WATER AND I AM SO FUCKING PROUD OF YOU. FINISH THIS THING.’

And it was game on…

I had gotten out of the water.

I was on my bike.

I rode as aggressively as I could. I love my bike. I’m getting better all the time. I at one point hit a pothole and lost all the fuel out of my pockets and damn near wrecked my bike. So I had to play fueling catch up for the rest of the ride/run — which was not ideal, but my ultrarunning training kicked in and I happily looked for ways to adapt. It was hot and hilly, but I loved every single pedal stroke of that course. Ocean on one side. Desert on the other. Fans yelling ”Andale Vamanos!” and cheering wildly. Aid stations so stocked and friendly. I learned QUICKLY how to keep peddling, grab bottles, eat fuel and throw the trash in a very short distance.

I looked at my watch and it said I had been on the course for 2:51. I knew I was biking about 16 MPH and that I had 16 miles left. I remember thinking ‘Mike would be so freaking proud of me if I could break 4:00 hours on this ride…’ My goal had been roughly 4:30. I picked a bigger gear and decided to push. I wanted Mike to be proud of me. And honestly — I was kind of trying to chase down Spencer. I worked hard all summer learning to handle my new bike; now was the time to throw it all together and finish this thing strong.

I hit the bike finish line at 3:50 and ran into the transition. Racked my bike, threw on my shoes. Started walking out briskly to eat and settle down and get the feeling back in my feet.

I exited the transition to start the run and saw Spencer and said ‘I FINISHED THE SWIM!!!!’ He said ‘Enjoy every moment of this.’

I walked fast, jogged. I had to wake my feet up from the bike. I was hot. The pavement was new blacktop. But I know how to run on tired legs. And I was grateful to be healing so well from a bad hamstring/knee injury. I was NOT going to hate on even a single second of this run. Again – ultrarunning training kicked in. I grabbed ice and stuffed it in my bra. Dumped water on my head, ran from shade spot to the next palm tree shadow. I pulled out all the ‘cool body temps’ tricks and used them.

In the back of the pack — we usually form informal tribes. We cheer each other on. This event, with a multitude of languages, was no different. Encouragement in forms/languages/gestures I didn’t understand as anything other than encouragement. I gave back all that I got.

I was coming into mile 7(ish) – the turn around. And I saw a face that was a brand-new-to-me friend. She’s a professional athlete. Her name is Adelaide. And she was cheering for me – using my name. I was floored. She’d been done for hours – and she had come back onto the course to cheer for me. I stopped and said ‘how’d you do ?!” And she started yelling and waving her arms at me ‘DO NOT STOP — RUN, RUN, RUN!!!’ So I did.

IMG_5420 5.JPG — Adelaide and her husband Kennett, so, so supportive! Kindness matters. Deeply. They’re proof.

Shortly after that, I heard Spencer cheering. I was DYING to know how he had done. He jogged next to me for a few steps and I said ‘How did you do?’ he simply said ‘Podium.’ I sobbed. Another story entirely, but to see someone work hard and chase their dreams and have a stellar day, all of that was contained in that one word… He kept telling me to run – and I was; crying for pride and happiness for him.

Between Adelaide’s kindness at staying at the event to cheer on a back-of-the-pack athlete and Spencer’s podium finish news — I negative split the last half of the run. I was running with the lightest heart and springy legs and … I was just happy to be able to run and I was feeling fit and healthy.

Coming into the finish I caught up to a guy walking. Santiago. We had been sharing bike/road miles trading places during the day. There was NO WAY HE WAS WALKING to the finish line. I patted him on the back and said ‘think maybe we should finish this thing together?’ He smiled and fell in beside my slow, steady run gait. We ran the last mile. He let me cross the line right before him.

I will admit it’s pretty damn cool to hear ‘Betsy Hartley, Bend, Oregon, YOU are an Ironman.’

I finished in 7:47 (ish).

Open Water Swim

September 10, 2018September 10, 2018 ~ betsyhartley392 ~ Leave a comment

I did an event this past weekend that combined a 500 M open water swim (lake) and 12 mile bike ride. With my knee not 100% healed for running just yet, I opted for the very elegant sounding aquabike event.

This recent swimming episode started six months ago as ‘I am a supremely pissed-off, injured runner who HAS to be in the damn pool because I can’t run.‘ It’s morphed into ‘I really like swimming, a whole lot.’

I’m as surprised as anyone.

Trust me.

I am afraid of the water and have been my whole life. My friend Kerri reminded me that once upon a time I told her I would never visit Hawaii because it meant flying over water.

While a pool is a contained environment, the idea of an open water swim (OWS) in a lake or ocean takes fear to a new level. I have never been a swimmer and yet knew I wanted to do a triathlon at some point. I have been reminded a bunch of times that swimming is a skill that can be learned. And I have also been reminded that I don’t usually let fear stop me… So I began over the past few years, with coaches, trying to learn how to swim and manage anxiety around water. I was not gaining endurance or building skill or learning forward momentum in the water; I was simply learning that I have a wicked strong dog paddle and can ‘safety stroke’ through a panic attack while staying in the water.

Plus there’s the whole body image thing that just hangs around like an annoying little sibling shadowing my every move… Right on my butt at all times…. Being seen in a bathing suit is something that once upon a time (for about 20+ years) kept me out of the pool. I’d been made fun of in a bathing suit in high school and the taunt/words/mortification are still easily remembered. I have gotten a WHOLE lot better about being in a bathing suit in public through practice and being around supportive people of all shapes and sizes who are comfy in their own skin. My body works hard and I love her. Yet I would be lying if I denied that those first few moments on the pool deck, in a bathing suit, always increase my heart rate just a touch.

So, all of that background is to say; there has been a whole LOT of focused practice in the water these past six months. Learning endurance, getting over the bathing suit hurdle and learning to like and respect water.

I signed up for the event at the last minute, after thinking about it for 3 months. The tipping point was realizing that once I did the event — I’d have my own opinion and experience to base things off of, instead of a creative cache of ‘worst case scenarios’ playing out like Netflix in my brain.

Got tired of being afraid of a bunch of unproven, unknowns…

Signed up.

Showed up.

Swam.

Loved it.

When I was wading into the water to start my assigned wave, I acknowledged that the chances of panicking and fleeing for the shore at any moment were fairly decent. I wasn’t being defeatist or negative about it at all. I didn’t start this whole thing with the idea that I would bail. Quite the contrary. I designed a race plan to give myself a little breathing room and grace in a new and scary situation. My fear of water was big. So I made a big, safe plan to help my brain accept and manage the fear.

I mean one of my friends, trying to explain the OWS to me said ‘It is kind of like swimming in a washing machine with maybe one or two pissed off cats thrown into the mix to keep it from being boring’. That kind of requires a plan. 🙂

Here’s what I was going to do…

I would give it my all. ANY stroke that worked to move me forward was fine!
At any point and time, ONCE things started, if I panicked or felt unsafe I would flip on my back for a count of ten and breathe.
If that didn’t work THEN I could simply swim for shore or swim to a lifeguard and ask to be done.

My only self-imposed rule was that I had to START this thing. No quitting before the gun went off.

Having that safety plan actually made me feel a whole lot braver.

I think I swam some variation/interpretation of every possible legal type of stroke and about 15 made-up strokes. It was a chaotic, messy, funny, rolling shitshow of a swim! NOTHING perfect about it from a technique standpoint. Not a single thing. I simply swam to keep moving forward no matter what it looked like. All those hours of practicing in the pool and watching videos and being coached on the perfect stroke suddenly seemed HILARIOUS! This felt like a freaking street fight of a swim where anything was legal and allowed. ‘I’ll see you one free style stroke, with a subtle left hook to get your foot out of my face’ HA! AGAIN – nothing intentional or mean. Just a bunch of forward moving bodies, in close proximity, trying to get back to shore. I was laughing in my head the entire swim.

It was awesome.

I thrived in that chaotic environment in the water. I knew I could roll on my back to breathe – so I never panicked. Not for one moment. It was this glorious, bubbly, mess and we were all trying to get to the buoys and get to the shore.

I came out of the water, almost dead last, smiling and happy and wondering how I would ever go back to the boredom of the pool again.

Back to the pool is exactly where I’m headed. Today. I have so much work I can do to get stronger and build endurance in the water.

I will also acknowledge that the very next time I hit the open water I could in fact panic and wind up swimming for shore or a course lifeguard. I’m keeping my safety plan intact. It worked perfectly.

Every experience in the water is to be respected and I understand that every event experience will be different.

I feel so, so lucky to hit the shore after my first OWS and have loved the experience of being in a competitive, lake environment exceeded ALL my expectations!

Kudos to Best In the West Events (Blair and Staci) for putting on a safe, well-run race that welcomes ALL levels and abilities into the sport.

Sierra giving me the ‘you can do this and you’re going to love it!’ pep talk. I adore this women who crushed her own event this past weekend!

Five – oh!

August 25, 2018August 25, 2018 ~ betsyhartley392 ~ 4 Comments

PC Rita V at Waldo 100K — we were all volunteering. 🙂

I turn 50 tomorrow.

I’m excited for this next decade.

I’m healthy and active and living a pretty fantastic life. Which wasn’t true even 10 short years ago. A lot has changed and I am ready to enter a new decade as healthy and active as I have ever been!

I remember when I was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes — and my numbers were shockingly bad — the off-hand comment from the Doctor was ‘you won’t make it to 50 if you don’t change your ways.’ I know it was a randomly selected number chosen to simply scare me into action. It didn’t work for about 8 years. In your 30’s – 50 seems a long, long ways away. (It isn’t. 🙂 )

Yet, I will admit that number stuck in my head and has been a sort of ‘destination’ for a the last 7 years or so as I worked to get healthy.

So, yeah – there is some pretty nifty satisfaction in reaching 50 years old and being in good health.

Healthy. Happy. Non-diabetic. Living a life I could never have imagined had I stayed 400 pounds and dependent on insulin. Assuming I’d made it this far the realities are that if I was still Type 2 Diabetic, I would likely be missing digits or limbs or be dealing with failing kidneys or far, far worse….

Flip to the other side of the potential coin? I will admit that there is some wistfulness as I wonder what life could have been like had I heeded that warning in my 30’s and bought myself another whole decade of this healthier version of my life.

Yet, that’s not my story.

I have no regrets.

I’ve learned and loved and lived the best I could once I decided I was going to change things. The saying ‘when you know better, do better’ resonates deeply with me. Regret is a wasted emotion. I eventually learned better and I’m doing better.

So tomorrow is a day to celebrate simply being alive. I’m going for a bike ride with my friend Cat, we should hit the halfway point up by Mt. Bachelor/Elk Lake for an open water swim with Spencer sometime before noon. Then Cat and I will bike back home. Hopefully gathering some Bend-area folks for a guacamole-only dinner. 🙂 My sappy/mushy point of view on this celebration/journey/adventure; bike 50, swim and leave the last 50 years of the old me in the lake, walk out with the new me ready to live the next 50 with gusto and then bike 50 home.

That’s the plan. 🙂

I wonder what the next 50 years will hold in store for me? What I’ll get to do? How I’ll choose to embrace each of the remaining days I get?

I’m honestly just glad to be alive, to give it a go and see where life takes me in this next decade or two or five.

#lifeisgood

Being called names out the window of a car…

June 27, 2018June 27, 2018 ~ betsyhartley392 ~ 9 Comments

Biking today up a popular climb in Bend, a guy in a car slowed, nosed over toward the bike lane and yelled out the car window at me…

‘Fat C*^%!’

Ok.

First. I wasn’t doing anything wrong and we have a really wide bike lane — I was way to the inside of it. He was the only car on the road. He wasn’t pissed at my biking skills or road etiquette.

Second. C*^% is just a word. Not one I own, accept or use. It’s just a word to me. But he had some intended meaning and anger behind it and I understand that it is vulgar and offensive.

Third. DO NOT CALL ME FAT. That’s my own personal weapon of choice. I am the only one that is allowed to call me fat. I usually use it when I’m beating the shit out of myself. Don’t try to validate my emotionally-messed up thinking by using my favorite self-loathing word… Asshat.

Fourth. Hugely threatening to be solo on a stretch of road and have someone nose their car over (only enough to yell – I never worried about him hitting me with his car – just to be clear), slow… YELL. Then pull back onto the road. I’ve heard too many stories about riders of all sorts being harassed by drivers. I’m pretty damn sure this wasn’t even me as a female being targeted. This was simply me as a cyclist.

Fifth. You made me slow down on a climb and I had to jack with all the gears just to keep moving and not tip over in my clips. Asshat X2.

I quickly texted Spencer so someone would have location/time stamp. Also because if I didn’t do something I was going to start crying. And if I got crying, I was going to need someone to come pick me and my bike up off the road….

There’s no crying in cycling.

I hate being called fat. I hate feeling intimidated. Crying is how I respond to most of that. I fight the tears HARD, but then they usually fall. My reaction to stress has always been to cry. I am not a sappy crier. I’m a pissed off/embarrassed/ashamed/overwhelmed crier. Those types of emotions and situations are MUCH more likely to trigger tears.

When the car was gone, someone knew my approximate whereabouts, I still had a hill to climb and a workout to get in…. I started pondering the episode and trying to decide whether to be pissed or cry.

I pretty quickly opted for pissed.

The word ‘fat’ is my own personal weapon. To have someone else lob it in my direction hurts. Always has. The worst memories I have of being bullied in high school and beyond include the word fat. Followed by ugly. They were usually paired up. I hate both of those words. And it always scares me that they’re right – that I really am fat, ugly and ALL the emotional-laden BS that I attach to those words that they have NO CLUE even exists for me….

I have spent a lot of time trying to ‘grow’ past that notion. It took me about a mile of riding to realize…

UH….

This was NOT personal, this guy doesn’t know me. I wasn’t even going to ride this route today until the last minute, so it was in NO WAY personal.

I felt unsafe, but I was prepared. I’ve spent time thinking about exactly this type of situation. I texted a friend with basic whereabouts/time because it didn’t feel like it was at the ‘911’ level. I was watching for other people to help or turn to. I KNEW I could steer and ride my bike around/out/down and escape. And baring something really whacky or scary — I could jump off my bike and run up the mountain. Even in bike cleats. I know I can. (Thank you trail running).

So… I took some deep breathes. Pedaled a bit. Decided I wan’t going to let him have MY workout that I’d been looking forward to all day. I didn’t own the ‘fat’ or ‘c*^$’ part of the yelling because I just didn’t want to. I didn’t cry. I was wary and eyeballs open for the car, to be sure, if he decided to turn around I was going to be ready to react. I never saw the car again for the record.

So I kept peddling.

Mostly to prove to myself that I wasn’t ‘fat’. The difference this time around? It wasn’t punishment peddling; ‘you are fat, he said you’re fat, get moving fat ass.’ It was like ‘NO, you worked hard to be fit, you’ve waited all day for this ride. This is your bike, your body and peddling is what we do when we’re working up a sweat; now get down to rocking this workout like you know you can. And don’t let that asshat get in your head.’ I don’t know that that distinction will resonate with everyone. But it sure made my brain happy that I could choose NOT to own something and re-focuse pretty damn quickly on the task at hand which was trying to push hard up Skyliners.

I got to the turn around point, texted Spencer ‘I’m at the bridge (turn-around). I’m pissed. Might be one of the best climbs I’ve done. F*&^%er called me fat. That pisses me off.’

This is going to sound a little backwards, but I’m always a wee-bit grateful when these little reality bumps hit and I can see how much I’ve grown in my thinking and reactions. I don’t love being called names or feeling threatened. Yet in the end it just kind of highlighted the right things, the healthier thinking, the better reactions in my life. I’d kept my wits, had thought through a safety plan, thought through how I wanted the words to affect me and then chose to just kept peddling.

And by the way….

I PR’ed up and down that road like I’ve never PR’ed before. So — um… Thank you? Mr. Asshat for properly motivating me to ride that stretch as hard as I knew I was capable of riding it.

ISO: Running mojo…

March 14, 2018 ~ betsyhartley392 ~ 1 Comment

08_14_16_trrt_317-zf-7509-90007-1-001-012 In search of mojo.

My running mojo specifically.

I’ve got other kinds of joy, inspiration, drive. In spades. Life is good. 🙂 But my running mojo seems to be on an extended hiatus…

I’m missing her.

Time to admit that I am {temporarily} burned out on running.

I’m kind of an all-or-nothing girl at times. My history would indicate a preferred path of eradication, not moderation. 🙂 And this time I wanted to do things different. I want to find some solid, middle ground around being active even if it doesn’t include running.

You know — maybe be ‘adult’ about it and find a non-running path for now and not over-react. 🙂

And since I want to be that sassy, feisty, fit 90-year-old who still runs and whoops your ass in the gym, this really does take a LONG-range view, not a knee-jerk reaction or sinking into apathy.

The thought of setting running to the side scares me shitless because at my core there is something I deeply love about it. The beautiful reality is that I truly do love it enough to NOT handle it carelessly like I might other things at other times in my life.

I needed a plan.

My current ‘healthy path’ plan…? Get fit and re-energized around being active. Period. I do not have a single race booked for the year and I do not plan to run an ultra this year. I do plan to swim and bike and lift weights and go to social/cardio classes with friends and run some shorter/fun races/adventures. Oh – maybe do some snowshoeing or rock climbing or hiking or skiing.

ALL THE THINGS. 🙂

I want to be in good enough shape to just go and do ALL the things at any time.

Those are my goals this year.

They feel damn good and exciting.

I know exactly when and where my mojo went missing. Fall of 2016 I ran Mountain Lakes 100. 18 months ago. Training for a 100 miler is intense to say the least. I finished the race fueled by solid training and a dose of stark {and appropriate} terror. I now know I am strong and brave and capable of some pretty fantastic and amazing things.

Eighteen months later I FINALLY realize that Mountain Lakes 100 gave me this incredible gift of believing in myself.

But the event that gave me incredible confidence, also kind of broke my running mojo.

Fair trade off if you ask me.

MONTHS of hindsight needed to arrive at this conclusion. But honestly? Temporarily busted mojo VS. BELIEVE, and know in your heart, you can do unimaginable things?

Fair trade off.

A trade off I will make again, again and again. img_4329-jpg

I spent the last year attempting two 100 mile races. (Zion and Rio Del Lago) Was not able to finish either. Dropped out at 75 and 76 miles. We can talk about training, weather, fueling, terrain, mental state, race conditions – even the reasons I was facing when I made those decisions such as blistered feet/asthma/cramping… These are huge beasts of a race. A ton of things can go wrong. Correction. A ton of things will go wrong. Your training is about learning what to do and how to adapt when those things go wrong.

All things considered I believe that the main reason I did not finish either race in 2017 came down to one simple fact: My heart was not in it. My mojo was gone.

People who run these huge distances will tell you that there is a whole bunch of training, some luck and a slew of other factors that account for being able to accomplish these races. Some of the more mature and experienced ultrarunners will also tell you, when you dig deeper in conversation with them, that the magic ingredient they have witnessed time and again is; heart. Not legs, not training, not shoes or gear. All important. But often the magic is heart, desire, deep longing to get out there and test themselves at any cost.

My heart just wasn’t in it this past year.

I spent all of last year pretending REALLY HARD and trying to blindly convince myself that if I simply hung in/put in the training/went through the motions – my mojo would return. My heart would be in it. I never gave up on trying to chase these suckers down. I stayed in the routine of activity. I ran my workouts. I worked on fitness and mental toughness. I set and chased goals. I learned a ton. Even though my heart wasn’t entirely in it I stayed with the habit.

I never gave up.

I just never gave it my whole heart.

I own and understand that distinction.

Basically since last November I finally realized my running mojo had taken a hike. Not sad. Not scared. Just curious when it might come back. Can I do something to get it back? What to do until it comes back.

I remember early in this fitness journey. I was talking to Spencer and he was brand-new as my running coach. I remember him asking me what I was so afraid of. I didn’t realize I was telegraphing fear, was a little taken aback at being directly called out. I eventually told him I was afraid I would wake-up one morning and my love and desire for running would be gone. That would be DISASTER. It would mean I would instantly, certainly, gain all of the weight back and become type 2 diabetic again. Over night. Catastrophically. Of everything that could happen that’s what I was most afraid of.

I was so busy all these years to keep it in a careful, tight choke-hold so it couldn’t wander away, I didn’t realize I was killing it…

One morning last Fall I woke up and realized she really was good and gone. Until last week, I kept going through the motions of lacing up my shoes and going for a run, hoping she would re-appear. No luck so far. But I slowly realized my desire to stay firmly planted in my new healthy life was alive and kicking and didn’t care that running was out of the mix for the moment. I wanted to move, stay connected and keep getting fit and strong; even if I wasn’t running. So that very thing I feared deeply happened. But the story I told myself about how that fear would result in total disaster did NOT happen.

Fascinating. Liberating. A lesson to remember about the stories we tell ourselves. About the stories we choose to believe.

So I’m not going to chase my mojo down right now. I’ll let my running mojo return when she’s good and ready. I’ll wait patiently, filling my time with a ton of other activities, learning some new skills (swimming!) and testing new boundaries.

And I’ll welcome her back with open arms.

And this time around I won’t put her in a stranglehold.

It’ll be a partnership and a friendship and the weight of my world won’t be solely on her shoulders.

What do you do when your mojo takes a hike?

Binge Eating Disorder. (Getting things in order…)

February 6, 2018February 7, 2018 ~ betsyhartley392 ~ 7 Comments

Processed with VSCO with g3 preset

Thirteen weeks since I last grappled with a binge. There’s been many subsequent days of battling the compulsion and feeling ‘frantic’ about food. But it’s been a solid three months since I actively binged.

I am now working to face emotions instead of feeding them.

Turns out that’s a 24/7 project.

Bottom line? It’s messy and not linear and kinda scary and yet it’s going well. Honest.

Now that I know what I’m facing, it’s easier to fight back.

I will openly admit that there have been days of ‘white knuckling it’. Days of constant annoying/low-level struggle around food and more intense binge-compulsion feeling from sun-up/sun-down. Moments of laughter, realization, grief, melt-downs and giddy successes.

And *whew* an increasing number of recent days that I really do feel sane and balanced.

Some really wonderful people have reached out offering support, encouragement and telling me their stories as a result of my blog about Binge Eating Disorder (BED).

I quickly figured out I was not alone, not a whole lot of people talk openly about BED and not everyone knows how to help someone in their life struggling with BED.

I wanted to figure out what caused or triggered this episode, so that I can avoid a repeat.

I reached the conclusion that it was no single thing; it was the perfect storm of a whole bunch of stuff that unleashed this specific binge. I had BED hidden, pretending fervently that it did NOT exist anymore and tightly controlled with rules/habits/’should’s’.

And then it was loose. And running wild.

It was there all along, no matter what I thought. I just hit the right set of conditions and it roared to life.

I’d had an off year running (4 races, 3 DNF’s), was burned out on running/routine/journaling food/watching the scale, work stresses and successes. I have some big, exciting life changes I’m working to make happen. Lots of good and some not so good. Not all of it in my immediate control.

Uh… Life.

You know.

Just life.

Stuff I’d been dealing with for a long time and convinced I was balancing quite well. Suddenly ‘it’ was the straw that simply broke this camel’s back…

After a four day binge on trail mix, I found myself sad and panicked and needing help to battle this really big, pissed-off demon.

So I have been working on getting the help I need. This is roughly what my recovery plan looks like at this point…

Found a new therapist. We meet weekly.
Reached out to friends in recovery from eating disorders and asked for their support and accountability.
Took things out of my eating/living environment that were just not helping.
Changed some of my shopping/eating/snacking habits.
Avoided high risk situations until I’m feeling more ‘in control’.
Food journaling before I choose to eat anything (MyFitnessPal) and food/emotion journaling if I stumble or struggle (Moodnotes).
Meditation in the mornings.
Mindful running.
‘Feeling my feelings’ and not hiding my tears or joy or fears.

All to keep from cramming fistfuls of trail mix in my face.

Learning to identify and face my emotions, appropriately. Learning to feed my body, lifestyle and running, appropriately.

I mistake or mask pretty much any emotion a human can possibly experience as ‘hunger’ and then eat my emotions.

Have for as far back as I can remember. Decades of experience acknowledging/denying/ignoring an emotion. Happy or sad — doesn’t seem to matter. Then deciding eating is the best possible solution to dealing with fear, happiness, anger, sadness, joy, lack of belonging…

Food is comfort, problem and ‘answer’ all in one.

I’m rudely breaking them the hell up.

Figuring out what emotions are, how they feel, how to feel them, how not to feed them. That’s what I’m learning.

I was standing in front of the frig the other day. Opening, closing, opening, closing, opening the doors…. Trying really hard to figure out if I was TRULY hungry. I looked like I was fanning myself with the door.

“Am I hungry (open), or am I feeling sad (close)? Am I hungry or am I feeling anxious? Am I hungry or did I get my feelings hurt?” I couldn’t figure out the answer. I grabbed some water and walked away from the frig. Sat myself in a time out. Did a really quick scan from head to toe to see if I was feeling the emotions ANYWHERE else besides my belly… I’d had a pretty big run and was increasing mileage for the week. Thought carefully about the stresses of the day/week. Scanning my food journal… Decided that I really was truly, belly-hungry. HAHAHA! ALL of that thinking and pondering and wondering — I really, truly was hungry for some calories.

So I ate. One portion of something healthy and filling. 🙂

While this is funny and I highlighted it in detail, on purpose — this decision making about hunger/feelings is something I’m suddenly very aware of. And I’m going through the exercise of thinking about hunger a WHOLE lot these days. A whole lot in a single day.

A study by Cornell University estimates that ‘normal’ humans (most of you!) make over 200 food related decisions a day.

200 decision. A DAY.

Go to bed, wake up, start making another 200 decisions…

WHEW.

No wonder fighting an eating disorder is EXHAUSTING work.

To those who have BED… Don’t suffer alone and don’t hide. BED loves it/thrives/GROWS when we hide and suffer. Do NOT give it that edge, do not give it that power over your life… Do NOT feed it. (Get the pun?!)

Just START!

July 12, 2017July 12, 2017 ~ betsyhartley392 ~ 8 Comments

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Spencer and I started this business, Novo Veritas, over 2 years ago.

I love it. All of the work and hours and challenges and success. More and more every day. It’s a hell of a ride, an intense privilege to work with our clients and we’re currently taking this business in directions neither of us ever dreamed possible…

My personal favorite part of the whole business adventure? The privilege and honor of being invited into someone’s life at a time where their hearts and minds are more than likely vulnerable, ashamed, determined, brave, scared, fierce, focused and much more. They invite us in. Trust us with their stories, their history, their fears and deepest hopes.

And then sometimes, if it all works out just right, they even allow us to join their team.

Most of the people we get to work with approach us for one of two basic reasons…

Tell me how to get started.
Be on my team.
(A close 3rd place would be….) Hold me accountable.

In the past few weeks a handful of people have reached out to me asking how to get started – and how to build their own teams. The following is a list I created about a year ago and pulled from one of my previous blogs. And it’s still the advice I give, still what I believe in my heart.

AND it also happens to be the advice I wish I could have listened to when I got started on this journey to change my life.

Here’s what I wish I had been told. And in the cases where I was told; I wish I could have embraced and BELIEVED it…

1. Your weight fluctuates. Daily. It will go up or down during training. If you have your period. If you eat too much salt. You smelled a cake being baked. The rotation of the earth. 🙂 Sometimes it’s really legit gain because you simply ate too many calories over a period of time. But you have to understand that your weight isn’t stable in the day to day. Not gonna happen. Quit even thinking it’s possible. And you know what? It isn’t meant to be. You thought you got to a number and stayed there with just a little effort? That this whole bodyweight thing was simple math and cut and dried? Uh… HELL NO.

2. Take measurements. I really WISH I had known how big my hips or belly or thighs were at my largest. I didn’t take measurements because — hell — who really wants to know that they have a 90” waist? You will wish you had those body measurements for reference and reassurance in the process. At any point when you’re feeling ‘fat’, stalled, discouraged or just wondering how far your journey has taken you — you can pull out a tape measure and be assured, well beyond the confines of a stupid scale, that you were NOT gaining anything but muscle or fitness.

3. Worry is wasted energy. Spend time looking for solutions and opportunities.

4. And for the love of ALL THAT IS HOLY quit beating yourself up. YOU, who you are at the very CORE of your being, has nothing to do with the number on a scale or the packaging of your body. NOTHING. Please, oh please, just believe me on this one. I’m in tears writing this. I am crying for you and for myself too. Because I know you won’t believe me, you can’t fathom what I’m trying to tell you… This is the last thing you can possibly wrap your mind around when you’ve battled your weight your entire life and a number is staring you in the face — a number you hate. A number so large you didn’t know the scale went that high. I know that feeling of panicked desperation and hopelessness as well as I know the sound of my own heart beating. Text me, call me, reach out to me and I will spend the rest of my life relentlessly reminding you of your value to our world. And if you can’t believe yourself, then trust that I’m a way better judge of YOUR value than a stupid mechanical piece of crap you bought at Costco.

5. Don’t pick a number for a goal. (See 1.) Don’t pick a clothing size either. That’s really just another number. Pick a feeling, activity, ability, destination. You want to climb stairs and not be gulping for air? You want to feel solidly OK with how you feel in your birthday or bathing suit? 🙂 You want to be able to hike, run, walk, move better…. PICK something that isn’t a transient, essentially meaningless, number.

6. Know that the BIG picture is worth all the little steps, mis-steps, concerns, questions, sacrifices. It’s hard work. It’s worth it. They’re points of feedback and learning. And this whole ‘get healthy’ thing is in NO WAY linear. No way. There is nothing direct, logical or straight about this path you are on. And you’re going to be making shit up as you go.

7. Do NOT let that scale dictate your mood to the world. So you can’t not weigh… I get that, but we should keep working on that. 🙂 So you step on the scale and it’s up a bit? DO SOMETHING about it. Don’t be a bitch. Or walk around like someone ran over your dog. Or have a short fuse with loved ones. Or start restricting food because you don’t ‘deserve’ to eat. Or start secluding yourself from the people you love because you feel you don’t ‘deserve’ their love or you’re deeply embarrassed. Stop allowing that stupid, effing, scale to affect your mood. Reach out. You may not have great control over how you feel, but you can ALWAYS choose how you act and react.

8. Please, please, please love on yourself. And believe in yourself. Hang tightly to HOPE. Hope is powerful stuff. YOU will do this. And you can’t see the day, but it’s coming; you will be healthy and happy. Your weight should not be allowed to dictate ANY of that. You have so much to offer the world. You’re an aunt. A sister. A friend. A daughter. A momma. A lot of really, really remarkable things that no one else in the whole entire world can possibly be! We were only given ONE of you. One. Do what you can each day to help yourself get healthy so you can be around and enjoy the life in front of you.

9. This isn’t a short-term investment. Trust the process. Life-time commitment. You will look at something daily and judge it as not moving, plateaued, failing. HANG ON and look at this from the 3,000 foot view, look at this from a 365-day investment. You will see growth. YOU WILL. Really! Keep at it. You didn’t gain the weight over night. You will not lose it overnight. Trite and irritating – but TRUE.

10. One of my favorite songs is ‘Live Like You Were Dying’ by Tim McGraw. If you are like me you’re living this weight loss journey with a lot of fear. Fear of going backwards. Fear of judgement. Fear of FAILURE… The ‘what if’s’ can paralyze you… Holy smokes. The fear you have embraced and live with could choke an elephant. What if you could just enjoy the journey for what it was and live each day like you are trying to be your very best? Living like you’re dying doesn’t mean you live with no consequences for your choices. It means you accept each day, each moment for what it is and keep moving toward the goal you want to reach… (And for back-up… See this video by Brene Brown.)

Trust the process.

Keep moving forward.

Love on yourself.

Happy trails. 🙂

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Zion 100 miler and chasing a finish line…

April 11, 2017April 11, 2017 ~ betsyhartley392 ~ 4 Comments

I trained for the Zion 100 miler. This past Friday/Saturday I ran 75ish miles of the race.

On their official race list I am what they call a ‘DNF’. Did Not Finish. It means that I toed the start line and never crossed the official finish line.

But life isn’t really about finish lines right..?

It’s about the journey.

It’s about living the dash.

It’s about learning and growing and moving and loving — not just about arriving.

This was a vivid and forceful reminder that I need to spend more time and effort just enjoying the journey.

Hannah, Matt, Spence. So many sappy, heart-felt emotions when thinking about these 3 souls.

I have no idea who the quote or idea is truly attributed to – but it’s common advice given to those embarking on these monster events that you run the first 1/3 with your legs, the second 1/3 with your brain and the third 1/3 with your heart.

I think I used a lot more heart this time.

While you can run these buggers unassisted, I live for the moments when I can see my crew and meet new friends. This sport, for me, is the ultimate team effort.

I am proud of what I did, how I raced, problem-solved and stayed calm. I am also proud of how I accepted the results when it became painfully obvious halfway down Gooseberry Mesa that we couldn’t make the cutoff to the next aid station.

I didn’t cross the finish line, but I won big in some very important ways.

The terrain was tough and there were some challenges. It’s an ultra and if you aren’t ready for tough or challenges or fear or pain or being humbled — um… You have likely picked the wrong sport.

Examples?

I reached an aid station that had run out of water, as I had, during the heat of the day. I got lost navigating around on some of the endless slick rock in the daylight. Got lost again with my trail sister/pacer Hannah on the rim of another mesa about 1 AM along with about 5 other people; and Hannah saved us all with her quick legs and sharp mind. I started getting hot spots on my feet — that would turn to blisters — around mile 3 of the race. There were fierce gusting winds that almost blew me over and I weighed close to 190 pounds on race day.

I want to share, in random order, some of the things this ultra schooled me on…

Mile 53. So excited to see crew. I got to pick up my pacer Hannah, I would no longer be running alone in the dark.

76 miles is still a long freaking way to run.

Running a race in smaller segments, mentally, is the ticket for me. Thank you Andrew and Spencer for that racing trick. I raced 13 mini-races, within one single race. My strategy was to get from aid station to aid station and then focus on the best strategy to get to the next aid station.

Cactus are assholes of the plant world.

Coke is amazing, soul-saving liquid when you’re racing. Followed closely by watermelon with salt, pickles, cheese quesadillas. BUT not all together. Especially the pickles and coke. That was a mistake.

If you are pooping in the middle of the desert and following trail etiquette by being off course 100 feet or more, facing your bum away from your fellow approaching runners…. It does NOT mean that an entire pack of mountain bikers won’t come right up behind you. Literally. They, nor I, will ever be the same for the experience.

My brain is my biggest enemy. I have to stay alert to her shenanigans. She can be cranky, sneaky, mean. They only person ever doubting my ability to do this race, was me. Not Spencer, Hannah or Matt. Or any of my beloved running friends. Or any of the bazillion kind souls who sent texts, called, emailed, FB’ed me… Just my brain. And I am getting better and better at shutting that crap down, ignoring it or re-directing my thinking. So much better.

*Sap alert*. We are better people when we have strong, smart, caring, loving friends in our life. We just are. We might have one or two or fifty. Number doesn’t matter, quality does. Friends. That’s what this is all about for me.

I trained hard, raced well, fought hard, dug deep, did all the right things that I knew to do. Our crew was spectacular. And I can honestly say the results were better than the belt buckle I thought I was chasing… This course taught me some crazy cool lessons about what I’m doing right and where I can get stronger if I choose to commit to the work. I didn’t get injured. I live to train and race another day. This race was a win on so many levels.

I fought my head hard for the first 35 miles. Around mile three we had hit a narrow segment on the steep single track that required about a 20 minute slow down. Ok. Actually it was a total stop; stood in line on the face of a mesa and chatted with my new friends. (We had a rope assist up a chunk of the trail that all 250(?) of us were waiting to use… One at a time.) And we had the same traffic jam on the way back off the Flying Monkey Mesa. For those who race — you’re doing the math… Yeah. When you are up against time cut offs from the start line, like I am… That bottle-neck took AWAY any of the margin I was planning and working to build. By mile 3 I was already in head games about cutoffs and not having any breathing space in my race plan. It hit me HARD. By mile 3 of this race I was seriously thinking I needed to just quit and was already fighting off tears. GOOD LORD. My head had a list of reasons why I should just quit and stop for just about every step of the first 35 miles of the course. I KNOW that when you get in a ‘low’ (moment of fear or doubt or apathy) you KEEP MOVING. So I kept moving according to plan while I fought with my pissed off brain. Getting that far behind that early in the race was a serious mental road block that I battled for 12+ hours. But I didn’t quit… I did NOT QUIT and this right here is probably my biggest win of the race… Because all I wanted to do was quit. And I didn’t.

When a near-by runner tells you they feel like they’re going to throw-up, trust their judgement and get out of the way.

When something starts to nag at you — take care of it the best you can because it’s only going to be magnified with miles. Take the moment and fix it. So… I was getting blisters by mile 3. In the past I would have kept going figuring I didn’t have the time to spare and I could manage the pain. Spencer and I actually talked about this pre-race; he reminded me that as crew they would make the call and I was to go along with their call if they were working in my best interest. The example he actually used was about shoes and correcting whatever was wrong with them at the first point I noticed them. I’m notorious for trying to ignore the nagging — when it’s something FIXABLE and have created some bad situations for myself and my feet. THIS TIME I think I shocked Spencer when I cruised into mile 15 and asked to stop, change socks and shoes. While blisters were kind of my downfall at the end of the day, I KNOW FOR CERTAIN I bought a hell of a lot more mileage by trying to take care of things early — when they presented themselves. BIG lesson for this mop-top trail runner in patience and paying attention to what my body is telling me can be fixed.

You can sunburn the back of your knees.

Putting on lip balm in a dust storm is just a dumb idea.

Ice in your water pack/bladder, when it’s warm out is a straight up gift from the heavens.

Peeing when the wind is gusting and swirling is just… interesting… And I’m not the only one who struggled with this little practical joke from Mother Nature. (Same goes for snot rockets.) It was actually funny to watch the guys dancing around and trying to outsmart the wind. We girls… Uh… We’re not quite so flexible or lucky. I had some serious penis-envy going during the wind storm.

‘Fear is what you’re feeling. Brave is what you’re doing.’

Barreling into an aid station and hearing your friends yelling for you is the sweetest of all sounds in my world… (Sappy again…)

Barreling into an aid station and seeing the faces of two other runners you know and love and who you did NOT expect to see jumping in to hug your smelly ass and help you without any fanfare or hesitation… One of several mental snapshots I will have the rest of my life. (Thank you Rebecca and Ben!)

Mental snapshots? Climbing Gooseberry Mesa. Wicked steep climb. (1.5 miles and 1,500 foot of vertical gain…) I was struggling up that biotch of a climb and bombing down is our friend Ty Atwater. He yells my name and must have seen the tears, dirt – and possibly vomit at this point – on my face. He was on his way back down and headed for the finish line and would be top 25 for the 100K… He stops, hugs me and reminds me to breathe and tells me quickly to climb, stop, breathe, repeat and keep repeating until I get to the top. Deep gratitude for this young, talented runner taking the time to stop and comfort me. Another mental snapshot I’ll keep close to my heart for years to come.

I managed my pre-race nerves and taper craziness WAY better. I think it was meditation, better nutrition, focusing on time with friends and simply knowing that you can’t know everything about what’s in front of you. And that’s the beauty and magic and secret of these events. I was afraid and nervous no doubt and apologies to anyone caught in the taper cross-hairs! But not terrified like I was heading into Mountain Lakes. I wanted this finish line as badly as I wanted Mountain Lakes, understand that my hearts desire to do well was exactly the same. But the fear was more a deep and wide level of respect for this distance and the challenge instead of stark terror of the unknown.

Spare headlamp. ALWAYS pack the spare headlamp.

Double shot espresso at 4 am is like liquid gold.

Brushing your teeth after the race feels the best.

Showering after the race is where you discover all the chafe and sunburn you didn’t know you had.

Speaking of showering… There is NO SMELL on earth like that of an ultra runner. We should bottle it up. It would sell. Maybe. Maybe not. Ok… Forget that whole idea. Who are we kidding? Spencer and Matt wrapped me in a blanket and rolled the windows down on the car on the ride back to our house. And then I was ordered straight into the shower – clothes and all. And handed a garbage bag to put my clothes in. HA!

Walking off the course. (Spencer, Hannah. Picture Credit goes to Matt.)

I walked off the course, instead of across the finish line. This was a long road to walk, but I walked it with friends by my side. Hannah was with me when I broke down and understood meeting the cutoff was not going to happen despite every single thing she and Spencer and Matt had done to get me there. Spencer and Matt walked up the road to meet us not knowing what they would find… I cried. A lot. I was crushed by the idea that I was disappointing my crew and hadn’t done what I set out to do. They hugged me a lot. And then we walked, as a tribe, back to the car.

This picture means the world to me because of the people in it and the friend who is out of the frame capturing the moment for all of us to remember…

A picture is worth a 1,000 words.

And this one captures my entire heart.

Fear.

March 13, 2017March 14, 2017 ~ betsyhartley392 ~ 6 Comments

Perched on the edge of the monolith that is Angels Landing, Zion National Park. Pictured with Cary Stephens. Cary is an accomplished ultra runner who bravely and patiently spent the weekend legging out the mileage with me that I needed in my last big training block.

For me there is a rush in facing off against a fear.

There is a rush, a feeling fully alive moment, a thrill. Maybe it is just INTENSE relief when you are safely on the other side of your fears. But there is no denying that you ‘feel’ something big and profound and unforgettable as you dive head first into something you are afraid of.

And get to the other side.

I never thought I was afraid of heights.

I have a healthy respect for heights. Or more accurately, a healthy fear of falling. I can go to the top of tall buildings and enjoy the view, climbs ladders and scramble onto the rooftop, ride a Ferris wheel, run (carefully) along a mountainside with a cliff on one edge. I’ve always figured I wasn’t really afraid of heights.

This weekend I was doing one of my last training blocks for a race. I met up with a friend in Southern Utah who had volunteered to play trail guide and preview part of the course with me. We took one day away from the course and ran in Zion National Park.

JAW DROPPING!

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Holy smokes is that place stunning!

Eloquent orators and authors have carefully picked the perfect words to attempt to describe this amazing spot. I ran out of good words really fast. I mostly stopped and uttered ‘wow! ‘about a 1,000 times. 🙂 Sheer walls, views in all directions and colors and shapes that simply don’t seem to belong together in nature. Yet are entirely nature in all her perfect glory.

There’s a hike to a popular spot called Angels Landing.

My friend Cary and I opted to go in to Zion National Park and hit two of their big climbs in the same day. Observation Point and Angels Landing. At the end of the day we had over 24ish miles and about 5,000 feet of vertical. (GPS doesn’t work well in those rock canyons so the vertical is a close guess.)

It was an incredible training day!

Here’s a shortened/edited version of their description to park visitors about Angels Landing:

‘The Angels Landing Trail is one of the most famous and thrilling hikes in the national park system. Zion’s pride and joy runs along a narrow rock fin with dizzying drop-offs on both sides. The trail culminates at a lofty perch, boasting magnificent views in every direction… Narrow ridges with deep chasms on each of its flanks. Hikers pull themselves up by chains. The last half-mile is across a narrow sandstone ridge, anchored with support chains attached along some sections of the sheer, narrow fin.’

I read that and went ‘AMAZING! Let’s go! I have to see this!’

We hiked and ran Observation Point (wow!) and then headed over to Angels Landing. We climbed for about 3 miles up switchbacks and fairly smooth, well-traveled, but steep and stunningly scenic terrain. We get all the way to the top where it narrows down to go out on the ‘fin’ and it is at this point that the words I read earlier began to get real…

It really is a little, thin, bony, spiny back of a fin from one monolith top to another. With anchored chains. Like… The ‘fin’ is not even ONE PERSON wide in some spots. There are rock chasms you have to shimmy though to higher ledges. More narrow than the opening of an typical escalator — with a 1,500 foot drop to the canyon floor on either side if you miss a step.

I did a lot of self-coaching on that fin.

A lot.

I ended the day with a re-defined respect for heights.

You use this anchored chain to hold on at the super narrow parts. It turns out I man-handled every single link on every single yard of that chain for the .5 mile out and the .5 mile back. I was terrified to let go of that chain. I did really graceful and elegant things like plopping down on my butt and schooching with my body stretched out on the ground toward the next chain post to hook my foot for safety. I groped total strangers who wouldn’t let go of the chain, while I was focused on doing the same… NOT LETTING GO of that damn chain while still trying to keep moving. It’s sandstone – and super ‘sticky’. You have GREAT traction on your feet in the dry weather.

No matter. Didn’t care how good the footing was. I was terrified for a full mile — which took an hour — to get out to that landing and back.

There are some small chasms within this fin that you have to basically shimmy into for a bit and then climb up, out and over.

Enter the OLD fear that I did not expect to encounter… Real-life, experience-based fear of being the fat girl who can’t ‘fit’ in something. (A chair, a car, a doorway, a freaking-rock-chasm-on-top-of-a-rock-monoltih.)

Beyond being afraid of the dizzying heights I had several paralyzing moments where I looked at the width of the opening in the rocks, the narrowness of the passage with two people on a ‘ledge’ and thought ‘I AM NOT GOING TO FIT.’

Actually the thought in my head was…

‘HOLY CRAP. I am NOT going to fit, I’m too fat. I’m going to get my fat ass stuck in (not ON) this rock, block traffic, have to be rescued and cut out of a cliff and ruin a National Monument…’

The chasms were tall, narrow and you eventually have to work yourself up and over the chasm to the next layer of ledge. There were points of narrowness where someone larger than a healthy weight wouldn’t fit. They just wouldn’t. I saw it play out several times in the span of about .25 of a mile.

I’m balancing what I see happening to others with the messages firing from my brain who still sees me as 400 pounds at this moment in time.

I am well aware that once upon a time I would have been the women that would have had to turn around before the summit because I wouldn’t have fit on that trail.

Deep breath.

Check in on THAT moment and the reality in front of me and only that.

Push the fear aside and stare down the facts…

I fit!

And bonus? I have upper body strength to hoist myself up to the ledge (thank you Jordan, strength coach!)

Repeat. 🙂

I climbed that fin, shimmied up chasms, walked out on the monolith. Found ways around and up and over. So did almost everyone else.

And it was wonderful…

FREAKING EPIC!!!

Once we were back to the initial landing I realized I felt exhausted, depleted from spending an hour with FEAR. And we still had about 3 hours to run. 🙂

I felt ‘fully alive’.

However I remember with the most satisfaction the feeling of quieting my brain and not quitting. For going on even when I was afraid. For breathing and pausing and problem solving and for getting my brain to shut up long enough for me to decide where to place my foot in the next step.

I didn’t let fear win this time.

It got me thinking deeply about fears.

And how we allow them to limit us.

Often I believe we either assume we can’t do something or simply let fear shut the door in our face and accept it. I’m not talking about phobias or fears born of hard or life-changing experiences that leave us scarred. I get those and I get why those can’t be ‘worked’ around.

I’m talking about the more mundane/normal/regular fears that we accept as facts in our lives.

We have to respect fear for our own survival, I mean it’s there to protect us on several levels.

Fear is: An anxious feeling, caused by our anticipation of some imagined event or experience. — Psychology Today

I’m talking about the fears that we haven’t fully explored, the ones we just kind of blindly accept. Or the ones that crop up unexpectedly even. The ones that perhaps rob us of some of life’s defining moments and treasures.

There is joy in being fully alive.

There is blessing in staying alive because you respected that warning shot of fear.

But are all of my/your fears legit?

Are you limiting yourself because you’re afraid? Am I?

I did a lot of things this weekend that I normally categorize – big and small – in my brain as ‘being afraid’ of…

It’s Monday and here I am after a good day of work and normal routines. 🙂 I survived my fear(s) this weekend. Hell, I not only survived, I thrived, I lived, I conquered!

I’m feeling like a happy, tired, fear-facing, adventure girl at this moment in time. 🙂

Lifestyle changes are fraught with fears. I know most of them well. Really well. And I know that most of the time the things we are afraid of aren’t really real. They aren’t the true foe.

Sometimes those fears are deep and true and were learned with hard experiences and upon closer inspection/introspection we may simply have to respect them for what they are.

But…

But what if being afraid is simply our own choice to stand still and choose to accept a closed door because we’re too afraid to open the damn door?

That’s no way to see the world or enjoy life or grow or LIVE.

I’m challenging you – just as I challenged myself this weekend – to think about what you fear and consider, just for a moment, for a single moment, what would happen if you were to reach out, open the door and JUST SEE what happens.

Just see what lies on the other side…

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Lost in the woods. (This isn’t a metaphor.)

January 4, 2017January 5, 2017 ~ betsyhartley392 ~ 3 Comments

12/31/2016

Dunn 50K ‘Fat Ass’. (Fun-group run, no awards, no bibs, no timing. Just a run with friends.)

Dunn is our local forest, tough terrain, and only a few really run in it regularly. For most of us, this was a chance to experience new territory!

Spencer designed the inaugural course with help from our friend Cary Stephens.

They’re diabolical dudes.

Course was WICKED hard.

Steep goat hills, bushwhacking, game trails, technical and jaw-dropping scenic views.

PERFECT stuff for an ultra to test limits and close out the year.

The course was impeccably mapped/marked. We were all given a turn-by-turn sheet with GPS mileage/flagging directions, overview map with elevation profile and detailed section maps.

We were set.

I ran the first part of it with a tribe of five women. We all run ultras, the distance wasn’t freaking us out. New terrain that isn’t super-well defined had us being cautious and sticking together.

The directions were precise and easily followed even if the course was ridiculously difficult. Flagging was perfect. We were all happy that Anne Miller was willing to navigate while we followed along.

At the half way point two of the women in our group were done.

Anne Miller was one of them. Fighting a cold for a few days, she told us before we ever started that morning, she was only going 15 miles.

At the only aid station/turn-around, Bonnie Wright, Rita Van Doren and I loaded up on water, chatted quickly with Spencer and Bonnie’s husband, Mark. Said good bye to Jen and Anne. Hugged the Miller clan and took off for the second half of the course.

Things were great for the three of us until we hit 20.62.

This is where we went wrong…

And I will say, for the record, that it’s not so much a ‘we’ went wrong.

I feel like this mistake was largely mine.

I was the one who convinced Bonnie and Rita to go with the mileage and visible ‘landmarks’ instead of the signage.

Our directions said to follow the sign and flagging and that we would be going up a steep bank and into the trees. We were to follow the green flagging up the side of the hill, bushwhacking. We saw a steep section of the bank that was pretty heavily torn up with what looked like shoe prints. No sign. No flagging.

But we were at the EXACT mileage marked on the directions.

We went past the section for about .2 of a mile looking for the sign or flagging. We didn’t see any. And NONE of the turns had been off by even .1 of a mile to this point. Figuring that the mileage had to be right – since it matched the physical description of what were looking for, we went back to the spot where the bank was torn up. We finally agreed that even without the signage, we should go up the bank and into the trees scouting for green flagging.

We knew we had to go .3 of a mile uphill once we were in the trees. (In this ultra designed by Spencer and Cary we quickly learned that given any vagueness about the intended direction; the answer was always GO UPHILL. Kind of kidding… Kind of not.)

At that .3 of a mile mark, we still have no flagging.

We’re totally bushwhacking on a forested canyon/side hill at this point.

We keep going, looking for flagging or a road.

We talk about going back or forging ahead to the road that HAS to be uphill from us and scouting for more flagging. We made the group decision to keep going up the hill. It was a SLOG. Downed trees, tall ferns, no trail, holes the size of truck tires… Not fun. Slow going. Yet totally in line with the rest of the course we had experienced.

We’re banking on the idea that at the top we’ll have been headed in roughly the right direction and be close enough to see familiar flagging.

Yet somewhere in this mess we begin to realize…

And actually admit…

We’re lost.

And we can’t backtrack.

We don’t even know how to backtrack at this point.

We’ve gone over the uphill mileage stated in the directions — and still have no road or flagging.

Somewhere in there we all agree that I need to call Spencer. I get voice-mail. I leave a detailed message telling him time, distance, where we think we are. I say that we’re together and staying together no matter what.

I state clearly in a back-up text at this point that we know we’re *&%$ing LOST.

Spencer is at the start area and there is NO cell reception.

With more climbing and guessing and bushwhacking we finally DO get to a road.

Hallelujah!

Short-lived happy dance!

We re-group. We each kind of grab an idea for problem solving, keep each other in sight and get to work. Bonnie and I go one direction looking for flagging or signage or intersecting trails or landmarks. The road dead ends. Rita was trying to harness technology to help us with GPS or maps. We didn’t have enough connectivity. We gather up again, and head down the road in the other direction looking for flagging or identifying marks of some sort.

We’re more than an hour lost at this point. Spencer has a voice message from us, but no one else knows we’re lost. Bonnie has also tried to call her husband, Mark.

Mark is with Spencer in cell-phone-no-man’s-land. And we have spotty/random reception at best.

Then it hits me.

ANNE MILLER.

She’s my friend. She ran with us. She knows the forest. And we can get calls out. Just not to the guys at the start line.

We call or text Anne. I don’t remember which we did first.

HERE enters our Guardian Angel.

For the next 3+ hours we either text or call Anne and she would try to helps figure our location, collect and get information to Spencer. She leaves her house, brings her son Andrew and they head back to the staging area. (Andrew knows the Dunn as well as Spencer and Cary and had JUST run the 50K course earlier that day.)

She texts us at one point when we admit that we’re pretty damn scared…

“We will not abandon you!”

And not to spoil the ending of the story; but she didn’t.

Neither did Spencer or Andrew.

Knowing we were ultimately trying to navigate to a peak to get back on course or get to a recognizable spot, we opt to go uphill on the roads when we get to a ‘Y’.

After a few other turns and decisions – aiming to keep climbing up hill – we eventually hit a road with RACE FLAGGING. RELIEF!!! I think Bonnie and Rita would agree with me — this was a moment of profound relief.

As we start following the flagging it occurs to us — this race is loosely an unconnected, 2-loop course. We don’t know if we’re on the first loop, the second loop — or if we’re headed to the start or back to the half-way point.

We’re still kinda lost.

BUT we have flagging to follow.

We follow the flagging looking for landmarks that match our turn by turn sheet. We can’t quite get what we are seeing and what’s printed in the directions to line up enough to help us figure out where we are.

We’re getting text messages/calls out to Anne as we have service and/or landmarks to report.

We had made it clear that the three of us were sticking together and following the flagging even if we were going the wrong direction or on the wrong ‘loop’.

Details get hazy at this point, but we kept moving and communicating. We eventually get to a spot where I can get a call out to Spencer/Anne. And this time we have clear enough landmarks, details of where we are and what we’ve traveled through…

They know where we are!

They’re sending Andrew up to rescue and guide us in. I’m told that he will be coming from our backs.

We are told to keep moving, keep following the flagging.

It’s starting to snow.

It’s getting dark.

Even with headlamps we’re having a LOT of trouble finding the flagging until we’re right on top of it.

We start this routine where Bonnie scouts for flagging, Rita stays about 1/2 way between the two of us and I stay by the last known flagging. Bonnie would find the next flagging. Rita would call back to me and I’d move to catch Rita. I’d park by the new flagging while Bonnie searched ahead.

Without even talking about how to make it work… We just worked out how to make things work… TEAM WORK.

I realized on that side-hill that this was TEAM WORK in all its gut-clenching, hard-working, glory. I remembered thinking these were woman — very much including Anne — that I would now do anything for…

Anything.

Anne, Spencer and Andrew all knew we were safe at this point. And it turns out we were on the last 5 – 6 miles and headed in the right direction

But the three of us sure didn’t feel safe just yet.

We felt lost and scared. We were getting cold and we can’t see the flagging which we’re supposed to be following so we don’t get LOST again…

We’re scrambling up this horrendous, ridiculous, face of a mountain — when I look back down the climb and see a headlamp. I BELLOWED out Andrew’s name. I didn’t know I could yell that loudly. I’m pretty sure Corvallis, 20 miles away, heard me.

Andrew reaches us.

This 20-something young man, who has now run this ridiculously steep grade TWICE in a single day, arrives on the side of the hill to find 3 crying, exhausted, cold, GRATEFUL middle-age women waiting to be rescued. He calmly asked if we all had good batteries in our headlamps, if we were warm enough or needed gloves/coats and tells us that we were going to keep moving. He asks me to text his mom, because his mom would be worried about him. I do just that.

Efficient, calm and we are on the way to the finish line following Andrew’s lead.

So much relief.

Andrew ran with us, walked with us. Chatted to us. Listened to our rambling/frantic re-cap of the day’s adventure. He even helped Rita re-tie her shoe when her laces came undone and her hands were simply too cold to function.

We ran a bit of a short cut just to get back to the start area and end this epic adventure. We were greeted with fierce hugs and a warm fire. And Mark’s hot chocolate!

I hugged Anne like my life depended on it. At that moment in time that was exactly how I felt.

The three strongest feelings that day?

My gut when I KNEW we were lost.

My head when they said they knew exactly where we were.

My heart and soul flooding with gratitude for my friends.

Two days later Bonnie, Rita, Anne and I were texting about the fact that we’re still emotional about it all. It could have had a different ending. And we all know that.

There is an incredible gift in these uniquely strong and fire-tested friendships that are built on and around the trail running community.

I’ve never experienced anything like it in my life.

Rita, Bonnie and I ran just short of 30 miles, so we didn’t officially do the 50K.

We managed to climb 7,100 feet of vertical gain.

Lost. Found. Friendships. Teamwork. Problem solving. Logical thinking. Communication. Battling fear. Fighting for others. Selflessly helping others. Sometimes this ultra running thing has very little to do with actual running.

Thank you Anne, Andrew, Spencer for getting us off the mountain and to the finish line.

Bonnie and Rita… Thank you.