Why I'm Running the Half Marathon and Fundraising
Good morning, family & friends,
Today’s post is a longer one and different than my usual up-beat perky posts. Today’s post is very important to me, though, and explains WHY I’m asking YOU for your help in fundraising.
I could have cut straight to the chase, but decided to explain to you my path to becoming a runner (which I still don’t really consider myself to be one), the set backs, and the why’s to help you understand how I got to where I am today posting a post like this. It is a personal journey, but hopefully an enlightening one to understand not only a bit about me personally, but to understand how important this half marathon is to me.
If you’d like to skip ahead, just scroll down to the section labeled “When Everything Changed”.
How it all Began
Over a decade ago in 2012, the company I worked for proposed the idea that our office should sign up to fundraise for the Houston Area Women’s Shelter’s Race Against Violence 5k. At the time, I wasn’t able to run…at all. I had “exercise induced” asthma and cardio was not my friend. I struggled to breath, but refused to use a prescribed inhaler, so I had generally stayed clear of too much cardio. The idea of running this 5k was laughable to me, but with the encouragement of my colleagues, work friends, and best friend, Rachel, we signed up anyway. I began practicing running at the gym, and at first I couldn’t even run one song duration without stopping. That was where my cardio fitness was at. I had been dedicated to working out with strength training, so I was “fit” in a different way, not cardiovascular fit.
This started my journey in running.
I worked up to running one song at a time, slowly increasing my duration song by song until I could run nine songs – and essentially that was 3 miles (or a 5k). We ran the HAWC’s RAV 5k that in March 2012, and I cannot find any of the pictures from that event!
Somehow I began to love running because I chanced taking a photocopied chapter of a book with me to the gym one day. It turned out that I could read and run at the same time! This was and is something my “highly functioning self” reallllly loved. Soon enough I was integrating in a 3 mile run into every work out with weights following.
The progression
As time proceeded, we signed up for the Rebel Race where you run a 5k through a mud obstacle course. We had hopes of a sprint triathlon, but my various health issues set me back from being able to bike. Then, Rachel and I had this grand idea that we would push ourselves to run a half marathon and began running longer and longer outside to train. I really enjoyed running outside but as you all know it can be hot in Houston and so if it is above 72 degrees, chances are I’m not out there running. Anyway, we started running outside and had signed up for a half marathon in Sugarland for February 2013.
The Rebel Race in June 2012 (below)
As the date approached for the Sugarland Half, I was scheduled for surgery a couple of weeks before it and I couldn’t run it with her after all (due to healing). I felt so terrible about that, and went to watch her run. It was so inspiring!
HAWC - Race Against Violence 5K in 2013 (below)
The year went on and we were hooked on the idea so we signed up for the Aramco Half (Houston Marathon) in 2014. For this race, we signed up to fundraise for a charity (HSPCA) and it was an amazing feeling being out there with the REAL marathoners (the fast people) and being cheered on by friends and all of the random people along the way who so graciously yell encouragingly by calling your (bib) name.
It was an amazing feeling of accomplishment, a thrill like nothing I had experienced before because I never thought I would ever be able to run ONE mile.
Aramco Houston Half Marathon 2014 (below)
HAWC - Race Against Violence 5K in 2014 (below)
So, I signed up for the next Aramco Half in 2015 and ran it as well (below).
I don’t remember what schedule conflict overlapped the time of the Aramco Half in 2016, but I couldn’t run it and had to defer my race spot to 2017.
HAWC - Race Against Violence 5K in 2016 (below)
In 2017, I raced my last half marathon and it was a doozy. I had been eating Whole 30 for months and it was a HOT and HUMID day. Race days had been cold before, so this was not only tough for me with the humid heat, but also because I had ran out of energy during the last 4 miles or so. I managed to continue running and finished the half, but it left a bad taste in my mouth with the weather…awakening the reality that just because the race is in January doesn’t mean it will be cold. In Houston, any given day can pivot from 30 degrees to 75 with 197% humidity.
running into a problem
Unfortunately, 2017 tackled me with Hashimotos Thyroiditis as well and I went from healthy, fit, and energetic to gaining weight rapidly, bloated, and lethargic. I didn’t know that was what I had for two years and 7 seven doctors later, HOWEVER, it was as if a mac-truck bulldozed me overnight. My energy tanked and tanked and my ability to exercise slowly declined. I kept trying to work out – that I never stopped. However, I couldn’t push myself like I used to. My stamina and durations waned.
I spent the next four years struggling to even walk an incline sometimes, to run a mile, to get out of bed. To say it humiliated me and trashed my ego is an understatement. Couple the physical set backs with diagnosed depression and we were in for a good time. LOL.
Nonetheless, I kept trying to push myself. In 2022 I had managed to slowly get back up to running 3-5 miles at a pace about 2 minutes per mile SLOWER than I used to. But, slow and steady wins the race, right?
When everything changed
All of this came to a screeching halt by late November 2022 when we learned my father was ill with “too many tumors to count” and everything stopped. I flew out to Knoxville to be with him. On Nov. 29th we met his oncologist for the first time. On Dec. 6th he had a CT guided biopsy. On Dec. 9th we learned he had metastatic colon cancer that had spread to his liver and his liver was completely full of tumors. The doctors said there was nothing they could do to help him, his body was too far gone and too weak for treatments. My siblings and I did everything we could around the clock as his health declined rapidly, every minute was pure chaos and terror, not knowing what to do to make anything better. He passed away early morning on Dec. 26th, less than a month after being diagnosed.
Tragedy and trauma are frequently wrapped up into one nightmarish bundle, gift wrapped and delivered on your doorstep without a card. It is never convenient and it certainly doesn’t feel good. Grief ensues and if you’re anything like me you avoid mourning because life doesn’t give you the opportunity or safe space to do so. This is toxic to the body and to oneself and eventually to everyone around you. But, that’s what I’ve done because I cannot handle this reality that my strong and brilliant father suffered and succumbed to cancer the way he did.
I have tried to avoid thinking about it and in doing so I focused on reading and running to keep my mind occupied on anything other than my life. I switched from self help books to fiction because my mind drifted too easily to him and I would start sobbing while I was running. Grief is suffocating and haunting.
As the months grew on I added a mile in here and there so that by the time we moved homes in May I was running 5 miles again. I spent countless hours unboxing and cleaning and organizing in the midst of ongoing home renovations and it finally clicked to me that I needed to put myself first, before the house projects or I was going to go insane being in own head all day while working on things around the house.
So that’s what I did.
As I ran and read the easy, “happy” fiction books I started to challenge myself to add in another mile each week. I didn’t intend to run long distances each time I exercised, I just thought I’d do one long run each week. But, as grief continued to haunt me I kept running more and more to stay out of my thoughts.
I know avoidance isn’t healthy, and I attend therapy weekly. I just have not been ready to embrace mourning my father and have desperately tried to focus on all of the other life issues that I need to work through (including but not limited to mourning the deaths of my step mom, grandmother, and great aunt in 2021). I’ll save my writing on mental health and grief for another blog post, but just so you understand how I got to where I am today.
why I’m running& Fundraising
When our previous home sold in August, our agent, Tim Surratt (who was WONDERFUL by the way) encouraged me to sign up to run a half marathon with him in October. We had frequently bantered about running as he’s also a runner so he knew I was increasing my mileage. Unfortunately, the dates for October half marathon didn’t work my schedule (and it will probably be HOT!), but it got my mind going. Maybe I should challenge myself again…and if I did, I would definitely want to fundraise for cancer.
I sat on the idea for a while because what if* I can’t run the full thing and have to walk some of it, what if* it’s hot that day, what if* I’m an emotional mess while running*, what if* I have a knee injury leading up to the half, what if* what if* what if*. But, this isn’t really about me anymore. It feels BIGGER than me.
This year, it’s personal. This year, it’s about my dad.
I researched CanCare and immediately knew I had found my charity. Here’s why:
1. They match cancer survivors and caregivers to cancer patients diagnosed with the same types of cancer so that the patient has a truly empathetic confidant to go through the journey with so that they’re comfortable expressing their feelings (fears) and have support from someone who has been through it.
2. I always look at the annual reports to get a gauge of the operating expenses to asses if they’re focusing their money where their “mouth is”, and they are.
3. I noticed that not only to they work closely with Memorial Hermann Hospital, but that MD Anderson AND Methodist Hospital have both donated to CanCare.
4. I also noticed other well known names in Houston have donated to CanCare.
5. The founder of CanCare is a stage 4 colorectal cancer metastasized to the liver SURVIVOR. She beat the exact same cancer diagnosis my dad had and founded this organization in 1990.
6. A friend of ours in on the board of Memorial Hermann and was highly encouraging of them being a great charity to fundraise for.
All signs pointed to yes.
I wish to God that my dad had more time on this earth and that he had had someone/something like this to help him during his decline. He didn’t want us to be sad. He didn’t want us to be afraid. He reassured us he was not afraid of dying and that he’d “had a good, full life”. But, we’ll never know the hurt and fear he may have had in his heart. Only God knows, and I pray he was comforted by Him.
So what I’m asking you now is to please consider donating to CanCare not only to help my fundraising efforts but to give to a good cause that helps cancer patients in memory of my father, GEORGE BRITTAIN III.
He is why I’m running this year. I want others to get the opportunity that he didn’t have the time left in his life to have. The support, the encouragement, and the hope for remission.
If you would like to donate to MY FUNDRAISING PAGE - please click here:
XOXO
