Running from…to Running to…

So I am challenging myself as we know to do one thing each day that scare me.   Todays feat was just that…I did something today I never thought I would be able to do.  I ran a 10 km run in about 1 hour. 

Someone jokingly said to me a week ago that they thought I might just be running to get away from my kids.  And yes,  there are somedays I do feel this way.   What exactly am I running from?  

In a way I have avoided many things in my life,  because of fears that are very difficult for me to explain. 

I thought about this today as I was running through Stratford.   Stratford is very much like home for me.  For the first 8 years of my life,  I lived in a Hamlet just North of Stratford called Sebringville.   I came “home” to Stratford many times to visit my father as I grew as my parents divorced when I was 8 and we moved many miles away.   I remember fairly clearly taking the VIA train into Stratford with my sister.

Then later when I was older,  I remember visiting my father on my own when my sister chose to be estranged from him.   My father had many issues, the biggest issue I think he struggled with to his dying day was that he still loved my mother,  and had many regrets.  I remember him telling me this many times when I went to visit him.   Yes, he suffered from alcoholism,  and later what reports outlined as “cognitive distortion”,  and I highly suspect some mental illness as it was his combination of drugs,  alcohol and valium that I believe sent him over the edge and caused much of his destructive behavior.    My father was abusive.  But in the end before he died, he truly had nothing. 

He was a fairly successful man in his day, but whether he was punishing himself for his past mistakes, he dug himself into an abyss of sorts.   He lost his successful job, with this,  he became poor,  and in the end worked odd jobs,  in which he barely was able to forge an existence.   He was diagnosed with throat Cancer over 12 years ago,  and had a tracheotomy.   He later was diagnosed with lung cancer and died during a special chemo treatment.   

What does this have to do with running from?   Well I believe all my life I believed very strongly that I Wanted to avoid the kind of relationship that my mother and father had together.  I purposely chose a partner that didn’t drink at all.  After all at that time I didn’t drink either.  It made perfect sense.   I believe that subconsciously I also picked a partner that I felt I could have a sense of control over the relationship, and ironically I feel I have very little control.   No I am not saying I am in an abusive relationship,  but I do acknowledge there are elements of control in this relationship that aren’t healthy for either one of us,  or our children for that matter.  Its mainly the patterns of tension and avoidance.  I am endevouring to change the aspects of this that I do have control over through seeking counselling.

So in a matter of speaking I ran to something similar to what I may have been running from. 

I would like to think my running today, physically  has nothing to do with running from anything.   I believe I am running towards my goals.  

But there again…while I was running in Stratford I felt propelled back to the memory of my father’s dying wish.   His dying wish involved a coercive request in letter form stating that he would haunt me and my sister if we did not follow this wish.  So we followed through with this dying wish.   And the irony of it is I feel I am haunted by this.  We buried his ashes where he requested we do so…and as I ran past the area I felt propelled to run faster.   This very thing helped me achieve my goal of running this race in the 1 hour I had set as a goal. 

Challenging myself to do one thing that SCARES me each day,  is a way to help me run past,  and through those difficult fears so I no longer have to be a prisoner of my fears.