40 Someday

Hi, my name is Jennifer Palaske.  My Twitter bio (@jennlpal) tells you some things about me; Marketing Consultant, Community Garden Organizer, Wife, Mother, Coffee Junkie, Novice Triathlete in Training.  The things it doesn’t tell you; my two teenagers and one pre-teen are involved in sports, church and school. I recently took a new position as a Marketing Director for a larger company.  My husband is a full-time nursing student who also works nearly full-time.  Like so many people, I am busy!

Busy has defined my reasons NOT to exercise seriously for many years.   It’s not that I didn’t want to be healthy, I didn’t have the time.   It is not that I have been a couch potato.  I walked the dog with the neighbor ladies; I biked with my kids, played recreational softball, but never could find the time or make the effort to be in shape.

Then a few things happened.  First, two years ago my daughter, who was in 3^rd grade at the time, decided to join a running team at school.  Running?  Seriously?  Running was always something I joked about, that “I would only run if being chased by a person with a knife”.  Her running club needed parents to run with the kids and the goal was to complete the Calvin Classic 5k that spring.  A 5k?  Seriously?  But as parents do for their children, I said I would, and secretly thought I would die.  The race was rough, but we finished.  That felt good!  I learned I wouldn’t die and agreed to run the 5/3 Riverbank 5k with a friend that year as well.   I ran periodically the rest of that summer, and last summer ran a little more frequently and completed five 5k races in 2010.

And then something else happened.  I had my 39^th birthday.

This really hit me.  Instead of being “40 someday”, I will be 40 THIS year!  As I thought about this when it happened in November, I looked at my life and assessed where I was.   Even though I run occasionally, I am 30 pounds overweight.  I am sore when I get up in the morning from lack of physical activity.  I am tired.  Just because I can run a 5K, very slowly I might add, doesn’t mean I am in shape.  So I decided it was time to stop making excuses and really make a change.  To do this though, I knew I needed a goal to push myself.   So I did what any (un)reasonable person would do…I decided to sign up for a sprint triathlon.  (I will be competing in the Tri Del Sol on July 16, 2011.)

I love the comments I hear from people when they learn I am doing this.

“I would never have enough time to train for something like that.”

“I could never swim that far.  Run that far.  Bike that far.”

“I hate cardio.”

“Why would you want to do that?”

All things I would have said just a couple of years ago.

So January 13^th I began.  I am swimming three mornings a week.  I am in spin class or riding outside three days a week.  I run two or three days a week and do circuit training with weights.   I have lost 12 pounds.  How busy I am hasn’t changed.  My choices have.  I decided that this is a priority.  I am doing it for my health.  I am doing it for my kids.  I am doing it to grow old with my husband.   I am doing it for my someday grandkids.  I AM DOING IT FOR ME.

When I saw the tweet about applying for the Priority Health team, and clicked the link to check it out, I thought this is something I would really like to do!  Why?  Because I am average.   I am just a busy woman who decided to make a change, not a natural athlete training for the next race.  I want to show other people that think they “could never run that far”, that they can.

I have a ways to go to be ready for race day, but as my training partner says each day is “better, faster, stronger!”