Race Director Cody Ford sent us this inspirational story from August's TriathaMom. As we all know, triathlon isn't just for the "elite," but is a sport for everyone. Please share with the beginner and future triathletes in your life!
I don’t look like a triathlete.
I’m overweight and out of shape. I’m a middle-aged mother of 4 teenagers. I am not the image in my head of what a triathlete is supposed to look like. I’m not tan and svelte. I’m freckled and kind of frumpy. I don’t look good in a swimming suit, I wobble when riding a bike, and I can only walk a marathon-not run one. I’m one of those people who the medics keep checking on during a race just to make sure they aren’t going to keel over and die. I’m not one of the “beautiful people” with the great body, long legs, gorgeous hair, and sexy voice. I’ve got the body of a Dachshund: half a person tall and two people wide. I have short, stocky legs, thick arms, and the voice of a 20 year smoker…even though I’ve never smoked in my life.
I am not what I picture a triathlete to be.
Of course my problem, since I was a teenager, has always been that what I picture in my head and what I see in the mirror have never added up. No dress size on a tag, no matter how small, could ever change the image in the mirror. I’ve given up on mirrors. I use them now just to make sure I don’t have lipstick on my teeth. The age old question “how do I look?” is just so that I know I haven’t got something tucked in where it shouldn’t be or untucked where it should. I’ve given up on my reflection showing me what I hope for, but it has never stopped the want for that image in my head to be the image in my mirror. I’ve wanted a strong, beautiful, confident person to look back at me out of the silvered glass.
Getting Mad
It’s been almost exactly a year since I looked in that mirror and got really mad at myself. I started talking to my husband one day and told him, “I’m sick of this. I’m sick of being fat. I’m sick of hurting every time I move. I’ve had it.”
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