This morning I did my first ever 10km run. It wasn’t pretty. I was sluggish and I kind of walked/shuffled for a very small section of it but my watch beeped at 10km as I ran in the front gate of my house. This is a huge achievement for me, not only because it's the furthest I’ve run but because I absolutely could not be bothered getting out of bed at 6 am to do it.
Last night Matt and I had our first ever spontaneous night of no children at home. Alice had a planned sleep over at a girlfriends house and Frank got a last minute invite so ended up at a buddies for the night as well. It all happened so fast that it took us both a moment to realise the gravity of the situation - we had a kid free night! Normally this situation is a planned sleep over at grandma’s that we’ve had to wait weeks to arrive. It was unexpected and we were unprepared. We also discovered that we really needed it.
The build up to Christmas feels like running 10km. It’s just constant. All the things that get squeezed into the last few weeks of the year and then it’s Christmas and in our case we headed straight down to the beach - which sounds relaxing… There were moments of calm reflection but there were also moments of yelling at the kids to go to bed or getting Frank to put sunscreen on. The kids are also fighting more than they ever have before with both testing each other's limits along with ours.
It’s all quality family time and it's just how we live but it's also loud and exhausting so having a spontaneous night off was pretty special. Luckily Matt had got a gift voucher for dinner from his secret santa so we turned this opportunity into a free, fancy meal out.
It's been a minute since we’ve both been able to relax and speak freely. We’re still in the middle of a liquidation trying our absolute best to make the holidays joyful for the kids and it's hard. So many things have changed in our lives in the last few months that we need to check in on each other more than we have been. It's easy to assume that you know what someone is feeling when you spend so much time together.
You can’t have these conversations while the kids are fighting to the death on the trampoline. They need their own space and unfortunately with 6 weeks of school holidays, that space is hard to find so I feel incredibly lucky that last night happened. Last night also made getting up this morning to run incredibly difficult. A sleep in would’ve been decadent as I’ve come to believe that going to bed early is the only real way I’ll ever get a sleep in.
I also believe that being able to run is a privilege. I started running in 2020 when I realised that the kids were going to outrun me and when my therapist at the time said that I needed to find an activity for myself. Running is free and useful as a parenting tool so I started. I wore my PJ top and my New Balance 574’s and just started running around the neighbourhood. I struck gold having great bush tracks in my backyard.
Running is such a great analogy for life. I still find it so hard but it's the act of doing something that is so challenging and surviving that makes it so powerful. My lungs hurt, I can barely breathe but my legs keep pulling me forwards. All I have to do is keep showing up. I know that the benefits will outweigh any excuse I can think of to not do it. Even when I’m doing it I have to remind myself why. I often think of it as putting on my oxygen mask before putting a mask on the kids as the plane plummets to earth.
If you truly believe that you have to live each day as if it's your last, which I do, then physically challenging yourself before breakfast sets you up for whatever the day may bring. Exercise is the number one recommended activity to manage stress and anxiety. Any aerobic activity increases levels of endocannabinoids in the bloodstream and promotes short-term psychoactive effects such as reduced anxiety and feelings of calm.
If it means getting up an hour earlier so I can squeeze it in before the chaos of breakfast time then it's a small price to pay for the overwhelming benefits I receive. To have run 10km this morning is testament to the power of simply showing up and how in doing so, it creates opportunities out of thin air. It creates a space where I can challenge myself physically and mentally whilst improving my overall mood. Gratitude is best practised in nature and it doesn’t get much better than running through the bush with all the little fairy whens and bird song.
If this was my last day alive then I’ve started well. In 2025 I want to be able to hold each day with the same level of conviction. The same level of wonder and awe that we’re even here at all. That we have these fleshy bodies that can move and squeeze the ones we love. I want to seize all the opportunities that float by like Matt and I did last night. I don’t want to wait for things to get better because they’re already magnificent. We already have everything we could ever want right now. I hope you do too. Happy 2025!
