Iron Man Insanity

Cannot wait to share this amazing story with you! A friend has written today's post to share her struggles of achieving her goals. Hopefully her story will touch you as it touched me. Granted my goals have never required so much physical and mental exertion but at the same time they have seemed just as unattainable.

As Spring approaches and the nice weather arrives we as mothers tend to get the itch to get outside and move! I have found as a mother of three it isn't always easy to get in the workouts that I would like to. So through the years I have had to come up with creative ideas to get the exercise I needed to stay healthy.

 Almost three years ago now I decided to do something very crazy. I decided I wanted to do an iron man! For those of you who do not know what that is. It is something only crazy people would do. It consists of a 2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike ride and a 26.2 mile run. So I started my training process... as you could imagine it takes many months and a whole lot of time away from your family to train for something like this.

Only a month into my training I was hit by a car on my bike. The extent of my injuries were severe. Coming within 1mm of taking my life. It took me a year to recover... and 4 surgeries. But through it all I continued to carry that dream of becoming an iron man. However, I learned a very important lesson from this unfortunate experience... that your children are only here with you for a short time. You never know when that time is going to be up.

 I decided I needed to find ways to include my children in some of this training. Not only would I be setting a good example for them but they would have the pleasure of helping their mom achieve her dream. So this past summer, we all did that! When I had 3.5 hour runs to do. My oldest would hop on his bike without a word of complaint and be my water boy. I am sure his quads did not enjoy the many hills (that he called mountains) that he had to climb with me. But he did it time and time again... with a smile on his face. When I did my short runs through the neighborhood during the week my two younger children would take their turn at being the water boy/ girl. We even bought my youngest an electric scooter that would go fast enough so he could keep up.

Spending 3-4 hours a day during the week training and 6+ hours on Saturdays was not easy on our family. But we all had a goal... to make mommy an iron man. To be creative my husband would take the kids to the lake where I would swim and bike and they would have fun swimming while I got my workouts in. After we would all have a big BBQ. Like I said, this was not the easiest thing to do with children. But we made it work.

The real reward came on September 11,2011 when I crossed the finish line of my iron man... with my children by my side. They were so proud of their mom, it was written all over their faces!

When you put your mind to something, like staying physically fit. You have to find a way to fulfil that commitment to yourself. Many things will come in the way, that is when you decide you are worth it... and make the time for you! Trust me, it will make you a better person and mother. There is nothing selfish about it.

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