When women run alone, an uncomfortable topic

The murder of three women that had been out on runs just a few weeks ago seems to have created a flurry of discussions on the subject. There are so many different opinions on it and no matter what stance you have, you will have a large group of people strongly disagreeing with you so please realize this is MY opinion based on my own personal experiences and I don't in any way want to upset someone or tell another woman how they should go forward with their running, this is simply my view.

 Sadly, women being murdered while out running is not something unheard of. Just follow the news around the country and you will hear of it, maybe not often, but often enough for me. When I was nine years old, I was very close to being kidnapped while out riding my bike, with a friend, in broad daylight, in a highly populated neighborhood. Had I not had the good sense to listen to the voice within me that told me I was not going to make it to my apartment building and instead ran into a random person's yard and onto their front porch, I feel pretty certain that I would be dead.

  I basically blocked this from my memory for many years, my mom not taking me all that seriously when I told her the story once I got home and I think my child's mind just accepted my mom's theory and I shut it out. It wasn't until I was significantly older and replayed it that I saw how very close I was to being gone.

 I don't remember exactly what age I was when catcalling and whistling began if I was walking home from the school bus, or out jogging, but it basically became something that I accepted as a way of life. I would roll my eyes and avoid eye contact with whomever did it, I really didn't care. It wasn't something that made me fearful and I figured they thought they were complimenting me so whatever.

  When I ran in highly populated areas, I would occasionally have men run alongside me and try to chat. One came right out and told me he would meet me there at the same place the following day to run with me. No "hi, how you doing?" Just sort of a command.

 I gave him an "are you nuts?" expression and moved along. Oh, I guess I failed to mention that several of these incidents, including the last mentioned one, I was newly married so sporting a wedding ring quite clearly on my left hand.

 It wasn't until I had had two kids, and was still being hollered at whenever my husband wasn't running with me, that I became angry about it.

 One particular day when I was running with my husband and pushing both of my boys in the jogging stroller, my husband sprinted ahead for the last stretch of our run while I just jogged slowly along, when a van pulled up alongside of me and my boys, a teenage boy jumped out, another sat in the back with a video camera, while a third teen was driving. "wanna race?" the boy shouted as he ran alongside of me, apparently to capture this on video. I looked towards my husband, who was quite a ways of ahead of us but had just turned around and the teens saw him at that very moment. "Get in the van!" the driver shouted, seeing that there was a man in the vicinity, and off they took.

 Yes, it was harmless, but it was disconcerting to me, a mom that just wanted to push her kids in a stroller along the beach and had that been my boys, I would have been furious. The fact that they thought it was fine to harass me, until they caught sight of my husband and realized he was with us, also made me upset. If I am with my sons, now that they are older, or my husband, nothing. If my husband and sons are outrunning me, a car passes them without a word and I get hollered at.

 I have been followed out of my neighborhood on the one and only nearly dark run I ever went on alone and had a man expose himself to me on a long desolate stretch of road. Several people, mostly women oddly enough, thought it was funny. I wasn't one of them, and to this day I will not run in the dark alone again.

  I don't dress in an appealing fashion in any way shape or form, not even in tank tops. I think there are just men out there looking for an opportunity when it comes to situations like the flasher or the teenagers. Maybe also the catcallers. I think the only people ever saying that a female is asking for the attention because of the way she dresses are the actual perpetrators. No one in their right mind blames the woman and I do not believe we live in a world of "rape culture," the new buzz word, in this country What we do live in is a world where there are mentally ill and evil people out there and that is why I choose to run safe. Which for me means in well travelled areas when I am alone, out in the open where cars will be going by on a regular basis and never at night. I know that no matter what I wear, if there happens to be a sick individual out there, I am quite possibly a prime target based on the fact that I am female and he has an opportunity.

 I do teach my boys that catcalling and leering, hollering at a woman, is just completely unacceptable. It's harassment and disrespectful and all I can do is hope other parents choose to do the same but there will unfortunately always be mentally ill or just out right evil people living amongst us and we just never know when they will strike. I don't consider this living in fear, I just consider it living in (an unfortunate) reality.

Week 8, and all the fun things that come with running longer distances

Week eight wasn't as smooth as the prior weeks and I was stressing. Looking at that number on the Higdon schedule, staring back at me like a mountain peak to be climbed. It seemed impossible, especially after the disastrous short run of only 4 and a half miles two days earlier.

 I didn't wake up early enough to get a run in so I waited until evening when it looked like a storm was looming off in the distance and I was thinking cloud cover would make my run a little more bearable. Typically, clouds and the storms that seem to roll in on a bi weekly basis come in fast but it was just my luck and the clouds offered me no cover.

 After only one mile an odd tingling came down my arms, and into my hands. I felt light headed and had to take several walk breaks. How in the heck was I was suppose to make it 8 miles in just two days?

  I thought about my day, I had consumed more sugar than I typically did, I had barely drank any water, and it was just too hot than what I was used to, in hind sight it made sense that my run sucked.

 Saturday night I made sure to drink plenty of water, I set my alarm for 6:15 so I could beat the heat, okay I actually got out of bed at almost seven but it was better than an evening run. I made sure to take a bottle of water, with my weird chia seeds that my family teases me about, and I just made myself do it.

  I had read a short article by Scott Jurek about setting little goals throughout the run (okay, the article was about 100 mile runs but essentially this was like a 100 mile run for me right? so the same psychology would work) so I told myself there would be no walking but I would stop every mile to drink my water.

  There is absolutely no shade on the path I run except for an old grain mile only a mile from my house that I can about five seconds out of the sun but that is it. I did manage to lean against a phone for a second while I took a drink wondering what in the heck had ever possessed me to believe that living on the prairie would be something I would even remotely like doing, but I digress.

  Five miles seems to be the distance where if I can get there, my brain flips a switch and says "oh, so this is what we are doing. Fine, I will stop trying to convince the body it is going to die and needs to stop running RIGHT NOW." My body resigns itself to its situation and trudges onwards.

 Five miles also seems to be the distance where chaffing begins to catch up with me. Who would have thought the wrong kind of underwear could create such an unpleasant topic of discussion when your husband asks how your run went.

 Onward I went, and that last quarter of a mile down that miserable gravel road greeted me. I stared at the road, staying on the path worn by truck tires where the rocks weren't sticking up every which way. I focused on my breathing pattern and sang a song in my head, anything to focus on NOT looking at the house, which seemed so far away but I did it, I reached our driveway, 8 miles complete!

Week 7 and a trip home

We made a whirlwind trip to Washington to visit family and do a few fun things that we can't experience living out on the high prairie. I only made it on one run over the four days we were gone, a four and a half mile trek through a tree lined neighborhood in Bellingham.

 Being back near the water and the trees and the beautiful green everywhere was very soul renewing. I wish running had been something I had been able to do more of as the amount of trails to run are endless.  I would have had to find a running partner beyond my husband with the kids being young and unable to be left home alone so that is something that was prohibitive, and I guess I was just not miserable enough there as I am here to find a distraction, ha!

  Hopefully our days here are growing shorter, whether we go back to Washington, we don't know yet but at this point I will happy anywhere with a bigger population and the things to do that our family has become accustom to. Goodbye crappy neighbors that drive by and spit in my yard and flip off my children, goodbye water being delivered by truck to my house, endless casinos and bars and hello to organic food stores and weather that will make life outdoors a little more tolerable. Yes, I am looking forward to the big day!

  Since we drove home on Sunday, the day that was supposed to be my long run, I had to wait until Monday and I made it the seven miles pretty easily, this week it mores right up to eight miles, no seven mile repeat, and I think it should be okay.

 My running pal met up with me the following day when I was supposed to run a four and a half but I ended up running six instead. I felt good until the next morning when my body said not to get out of bed until nearly nine o'clock. Okay, fine. I guess I need to rest!