Strong Women

I went running last night (surprise surprise) but if you knew how tired I was, how much I have been struggling with breathing in the heavily pollinated air thick and muggy over our beautifully hot weekend, and that I had just returned home from a BBQ where my friends generously supplied me with amazing food and beer...you would understand why last night was such a struggle to lace up my shoes.  But inspiration comes in the funniest forms some days. 

So as I started my run and immediately knew that my workout from the day before and being on my feet all day had left my legs stiff and heavy, I knew I wasn't going to get far.  I actually almost admitted defeat immediately.  Thinking that my couch looked so much more appealing now than it ever did.  I kept moving forward though, not letting myself turn around saying...I will just go to the pool and back, then, I will just go to the turnabout and back, and then as I neared the turnabout I felt something loosen in my legs and it was like my stride came back.  My breathing relaxed, my muscles felt long again, and my resolve grew stronger.

And there was a moment when I knew what I was thinking about that kept me going.  The women in my family.  Specifically my Aunt Diane and my Grandma Marie.  You see, they might might not like that I write this but the truth is that they have struggled with obesity for as many years as I have known them.  I personally don't ever remember them not being overweight.  I haven't seen my aunt in years face to face but I grew up living a portion of my life with my grandmother.  She is so very dear to me.  She taught me to love food, gardening, birds, nature, beaches, books, and math.  Yep, I learned to love math from a woman in my family who grew up with a generation where girls were too 'stupid' to get math.  Talk about an amazing role model to grow up with.  She can literally walk into a store with $20 and walk out with enough stuff to cook meals for a week.  I don't know how she does it but she knows how to work with very little.  I guess growing up pretty much near the poverty line, getting pregnant early and people judging her, and all the hardships in her life and coming out on this side as one of the most kind hearted giving individuals, she is who I strive to be like every day.

But I thought about her and my aunt in a different way last night as I ran thinking of all sorts of struggles that they exemplify in all women I know.   They put their families first and foremost taking care of their children to the best of their ability.  You want to know the measure of a great woman, just check out her kids and you will know that they are a direct reflection on their parent.  Both my mother and her sister are smart, kind, would give you the shirt off their back if you needed it.  And They both have put others first in their lives before their own health. 

And now I worry about all three of those women.  I want my girls to grow up knowing such amazing women in their lives.  Strong and smart and different than what the world told them to be.  And in a funny way, it was through their struggle that I decided to make the choice to take care of my body now.  While I ran last night and thought about that 8 lbs that I want to lose so badly, I thought about all the pain my body has to go through and how hard it is just to lose 8 lbs.  And that is what triggered the thoughts of my grandmother and aunt.  They are 20-40 years older than myself, their bodies already struggling to let them exercise, bad eating habits over decades, and they have much more weight to lose than I do.  I felt selfish struggling with my 8 lbs and thinking how I wanted just to skip the rest of my run and go home and eat some chocolate and realized, I wonder how many times they feel like this.  This is just too hard, I might as well just go home and eat dinner/snack.  And yet, I know that recently they have taken their first steps to start taking care of themselves. 

I see posts and updates from my aunt now on facebook talking about her swimming and elliptical that she is training on.  I think about how hard it has to be to take those first steps and then keep moving forward.  I have friends all the time that start workout plans, ideas but eventually let them fall to the way side for partying, drinking, kids, work, life in general.  And I keep hoping that my family will not let that happen to them.  I am their number one cheerleader in their corner.  Screaming as loud as I can, "You CAN do this".  Do you know how amazing that would be to show my daughters how the women in my family just don't accept defeat. 

So I finished my run last night and was walking my cool down home through the path near my house and the song came on my ipod.  Shake it Off by Florence and the Machine.  And at that moment I got to see the entire footpath sparkle with first fire flies of summer and I thought to myself ...I can go just a little bit further and started running again and listening and enjoying the moment and thinking, I hope the women in my family achieve their goals for a healthier life.  I hope they see that they inspire me to do so much of what I do so that my girls will have a strong role model too.  And I hope they know how much their children appreciate that sacrifices they made in their lives for us (I am sure my siblings and cousins would agree) and that we all just want them to be healthy and happy.

So as I watched the path twinkle and will hold onto the peaceful moment forever, and listening to a song that I am sure the women in my family could truly appreciate in their current quest, I hope that each day brings us all closer to the day when I can take my grandmother on her life long dream to hike the Appalachian trail.  Something I have wanted to do with her since she told me at 10 years old that it is a dream of hers. 

So Aunt Diane, Grandma, and Mom, this song goes out to you in hopes that when it really is hard and you want to quit, that you know I find so much inspiration in you. 

Celebrate!

“The more you praise and celebrate your life, the more there is in life to celebrate.” ~~Oprah Winfrey

You know in life we will encounter hardships, hard times financially, stress from work and family, and loss of people important to us.  Sunday I went to a funeral for a mentor of mine Mark Tise.  It was probably one of the most emotional good byes I have ever had to make.  He was one of those people that you wished you could be, with the most amazing heart.  He was always on the go, always with his family, and always volunteering time to activities that touched his heart.  A few years back he gave me a job and during that time he didn't just treat me like an employee, I felt more like family.  He has kept in touch and followed my life since I left the job he gave me.  He gave glowing recommendations to future employers, never begrudging me for moving forward in my life.  Maybe that is where I get the drive to keep moving forward to this day.  From him sitting me down on my last day at work telling me never to get stuck, but to use all of life's gifts as stepping off points for something bigger and better.

So Mark, this post goes out to you and primarily your family as they now cope with the heartbreaking loss of a wonderful father and husband. 

Monday is the final day for Girls on the Run.  Last week we did a Community service project.  The girls wrote letters to people that had great effect on their lives and collected can goods for a food drive.  I will be taking a nice size box of goods to the Howard County Food bank with a card my daughter is helping me to make this week.

The thing they were most excited about was the end of year celebration.  Its exciting because some of the girls are moving on to middle school next year!  So I tried to make it something special.  As the girls' parents filtered into the room, we held a circle much like how we started the year.  Listening to the girls say something they now knew about their teammate that they didn't know before the season started.  You heard about new friendships, personality traits, and characteristics that I don't think the girls always recognized about themselves.  I loved watching the girls as they light up in response to their friends talking about them.  I loved hearing the one girl say she had made a best friend and the other girl just lighting up as they started talking about each other naming off a million things they had learned.

Then we did a little awards ceremony since many of the parents had arrived.  The 3rd and 4th graders got to go first, getting their team picture and a little something nice said about them from me.  I loved letting them each be recognized and clapped for in the front of the room. 

Then the one's that leave me, I decided to do something special.  I got them each a Girls on the Run necklace with a little silver coin on the runner Adelaide engraved-The GotR Trademark Logo.  I think what was really cute was how the rest of the group got so excited for them, but also hearing them say, they would never quit GotR now.  My evil plan worked to encourage ongoing registration!  Actually what really won everyone over was something special that I have been planning all season. 

On of the originals, a girl who has been with Girls on the Run since it started in Howard County, bringing out new girls every season, and always coming ready to be on the team.  And in the past year since I met her she has opened up, become a leader and really exemplified why this program works and is so amazing.  While many of her lessons were similar over the years, she made it a priority to learn as much as she could every practice, to be in the right state of mind and always work hard. Her mom also a huge supporter of the program since it began has been great at being at every event that the girls have.  It was really great to get to so something special for her so I put together a nice frame with a picture of her mom, myself, and her all on our 5k day in matching colored shirts (I dont even think her mom could have planned that better), and a team picture, and her certificate all framed for her to proudly display for the years to come.  I wish I could have done so much more but as with kids, they are easily pleased with even the simplest of gestures.  My own daughter was excited to see the face of our runner when she got her gift. 

And the many oohs and ahs really meant a lot from the kids.  Oh, I have set the bar now, don't worry, I am aware that all the girls that have been here every season are excited to hopefully get something similar next season.  I am sure I will maintain my own standards.  But it was something I did for the fact that she has been probably the first one signed up every single season since it was made available to her.  And not because her mom told her she had to do it, but because she truly enjoyed it. 

So we did our final cheer for the end of the year and I looked down at their little faces and though, the years go by so fast that my own daughter will be doing this with me in no time at all.  Soon, I will be sending her off to middle school myself.  Oh...I can't believe she is going into second grade already!

The girls parents stayed around with the girls snacking on all the goodies we brought in.  Being the coach I did my job to bring them healthy foods-veggie sticks, light dip, 100% juice, watermelon, and pineapple slices.  My own daughters had a blast playing with all the kids, eating junk food by the mounds, and I enjoyed getting to see all the girls hang out with their friends and the parents getting to finally hang out and chat with each other.  Usually pick ups everyone is in such a hurry they don't get to talk to the other parents or myself.  I think some of the parents probably think I am crazy now because I couldn't eat anything yesterday and was beside myself on medication because of the searing pain shooting through my jaw.  I will say though, I have kept my promise-sick, hurt, or just busy I have never missed a practice for those girls.  Which has been wonderful. 

The nice thing was how helpful the parents were at picking up with me, helping me load my car, and chatting with me.  I honestly am always a little more overwhelmed than I think I ever let on so it is always appreciated when they go out of their way to give me an extra hand.  And it was nice to get to chat with some of them about their daughters and even about my own kids.  Many of them don't realize that I am a single parent or when they do I think they all believe my kids must be older.  When you see that I have a 2 year old (she is nearly 3) and a 7 year old you realize what exactly I am going through some days.

So the season has come to a close, my tears have been shed.  I now will focus on training for the Iron Girl Triathlon for August so stay tuned to the blog for my random life of training, and waiting for the fall season to start.  In the mean time -Keep Moving Foward!

I am Famous ;-)

Saturday night I ran the Warrior Dash with a group of amazing women from my gym: http://88bjj.com/  .  Seriously, this group has been wonderful supporting me when I am so new there and coming out to support my little team.  So the least I could do was go have a good time with them at the Warrior Dash. 

For those of you who don't know the Warrior Dash (not to be confused with the Tough Mudder which i plan on doing soon too) is a 5k Obstacle course.  You can find videos of it everywhere. 

Anyways, after driving for two hours and rushing to get our race bibs we we super excited to run our course partnering up with someone at a similar skill level.  At the end you have you have to crawl through a mud pit for about 15 yards (that is 45 feet of basically swimming through mud).  This might not sound like much but we were covered from head to toe in MUD.  It was awesome getting a team picture with the people that all completed the course.  And as we walked off to get hosed off, a woman stopped me.

Woman:  I am sorry, but are you a Girls on the Run coach?

Me: um, Yes, How did you know that.  (checks myself to see if I am wearing any GotR logo gear, I do on occasion)

Woman: My daughter, Ally, the little girl over there (a little girl of about 6-7 years old playing with a ball of mud that I had just had a conversation with looks over at me bashfully) recognized you. 

Me: wow!  She did, but she isn't even old enough to be on a team? 

Alright, we could go through this whole conversation but short end of the story, the girl had come to the spring 5k with her sister and mother and recognized me because of me wearing a tutu at the event.  I was so amazed, I felt famous because not only was I two hours away from home, they had come from even further since they are from one of the schools in the neighboring county that just joined our Chapter of GotR. 

So here I was, covered in mud beyond recognition in my opinion, over two hours from home, wearing absolutely nothing relating to my team or to GotR in general and a little girl out of a huge crowd recognized me! 

I definitely went back up to her and chatted with her for a little bit.  But seriously, it was so cool that I had to share with everyone. 

Final 5K day!!!!!

This wasn't to be the last time I see the girls like last season, this is just our district's 5k.  They pushed it up a week and pushed back the community service project by a week, which I loved actually. 

So in tradition I took my daughter to have pizza and ice cream the night before.  We sort of have a little tradition of spending the night together prepping for the next day.  basically I spoil her rotten and then she passes out from a sugar crash and I stay up will 2 am making sure I have absolutely everything I need. Yep, I am that girl with the OCD about planning.

My goodness I got a tutu made, I got all the girls' gear ready, I made signs, I got my clothes and my daughter's clothes ready, music, backpack, socks, first aid kit, snacks/drinks for my daughter, camera, phone....it goes on. We wake up at 530 am and pack up the car, get dressed, try to shove something down our sleep deprived faces, and by 630 we are on the road to head to the race course and start putting up signs. 

Then we arrive and that is madness.  Girls are everywhere and no where to be found.  I have a group of girls that runs off to go to the bathroom just as we are gathering for a team picture.  We have girls freaking out because their running buddy isn't there yet.  We have girls overly peppy and some that look like they could just curl up and go to sleep in the grass. 

It is a beautiful day for running and let me tell you the things that go wrong first-
WATER!!!!  They usually have more than enough water for our events but unfortunately the group is growing at such a rate and our volunteers are not coming out of the woodwork as quickly.  Next season I am hoping we can make fliers for the teachers to volunteer to support their students.  And trying to get a hold of a few local sponsors to come out and do water tables.  Let me tell you how much it sucks when you have little girls running and it creeps up to near 80 degrees by the time they are done running. 

And let me put this out there now-all you selfish adults that could have waited till the end of the race or when you got home to get a drink, screw you for making some of those little girls suffer.  I saw you getting your second cup of water as the supply slowly dwindled.  I have no shame in taking that cup from your hand and giving it to a little girl near tears because she is sweating and exhausted, her short little legs trying to keep up with you and you are chugging water like you are dying in front of her.  yep, I said it. 

My daughter and her friend Gianna (my assistant coach's daughter) were kind enough when they saw one of the girls on my team and they were drinking their water, they combined what they had left and gave her a full cup of water on the course knowing full well there would be no water when she got to the water stop.  THAT is what adults should be doing and it took two seven year olds, both not even a part of this organization and smaller than most anyone else out there, to give up their water to help out another girl.  I am so proud of my daughter and her friend for that.  Trust me, I rewarded them well at the end of the course. 

Now, as a coach I can't divulage personal information about girls and their disabilities or gifts even.  But I have each season been given the gift of a girl with challenges. And each season I am proud to say that my entire team finished the entire course.  And as I watched the most amazing thing, all my tired girls from the team rallying to cheer on my daughter and their final team mates and joining them at the end so that they would run strong and with their head held high across that finish line, it took everything to hold back tears.  All you coaches out there can think you have the best team ever-but my girls were out there cheering even for your girls as they finished until every single girl came across that line.  I can't say that there are a lot of people out there cheering when they hit that hour mark.  And I am so proud that they do that on their own.  I don't think my parents even know, I never ever told my team to do that, I have never asked such a thing from them.  Yet I stand there surrounded by most of my team and they dragged their tired parents along and tell them to cheer. 

I have the BEST TEAM ever.  Cause they know that in the end what matters is getting everyone across that line and never letting them quit. 

I will call out my team mates from Crazy 88! You guys made my heart soar as I saw you out there with your own children.  Making your way through the course, cheering on kids that you have never met. You all have known me for only a few short months and you took time off your saturday morning to share this experience and understand why I am the weirdo that loves running so much.  I can't wait to see you all at training and our own events coming up.  (and as thanks for all the support through fb, twitter, and your physical presences I post a link to the gym's site: http://88bjj.com/)


And for those people who think I am crazy for wearing a tutu when I run, or carrying a backpack of gear while I run-I do it for the kids.  Maybe that is why I see all of them cross the finish line is because I am willing to go any distance to encourage them and keep them safe.  And by the way, the first aid kit that I carried came in quite helpful on the course.  I am so happy that I made sure to bring it with me for those girls that took a fall while running.  And the music-I have to say my favorite song right now for running with the girls is Beyonce's  Run the World (Girls).  Seriously a fierce song and I realize the lyrics very closely touch the border where I have to be careful about playing it for kids but I gotta say, that my 7 year old gave approval and she yelled along while running-Who runs the world?  GIRLS!!! 

So for mothers day, for all those mothers who came out, for all those girls who completed the 5k, for all those women who volunteered, for the women from my gym, and especially to my daughter who never ceases to amaze me in her 7 years of live...I give you

E-gads! The Wild Rompous ensues

The death of Maurice Sendrak definitely stood out recently to me.  I love the book Where the Wild Things Are.  It makes me think of my own children and all the children I encounter.  I like to remember what it was like to live in a world of imagination where monsters sometimes existed.  I kind of feel like a chapter just closed on my child hood with his passing.  But at least I have the children in my life to experience it through fresh new eyes. 

This week was a mixed bag.  I finally have come to be able to get the girls to listen when things are coming to an end.  Yep, the 5k is just a couple of days away and as always my heart is beating a million miles a minute as we approach.  What will I forget to bring, what do I need to do still, will I ever get sleep in the next few days?  I was recovering from running the Nut Job event at Fredrick Running festival which is a combination of a twilight 5k and then the half marathon the next morning.  Boy oh Boy, you really do have to be a nut job to finish both in less than 24 hours!  UGH.  I had huge blood blisters and achy legs as I walked into practice Monday.  Sometimes my girls are so sympathetic.  Today was one of those days.  Then again, when they see both your feet wrapped and you walking like your legs are made of wood, it's hard to not feel badly. 

Our final lesson-we were a day ahead of the schedule, is about tuning into the right message. And thankfully I was prepared for this one.  I have to work on the timing of it a little better.  the girls like this lesson but I think it is hard to fit it in and give them all a chance to say something.  I might go to having them write their answers on an index card and shuffling them up and reading them off for everyone. That seems to have worked in the past so maybe i will attempt that in future lessons.

I did manage to squeeze in some running.  Actually, I ended up giving the girls almost a full 30 minutes of running and then add in cool down and warm up they probably got close to 45 minutes.  I just had to do a quick wrap up at the end of the day.

And then Thursday-my final time to coach them technically before the season ending 5k.  I took the girls out to stretch their legs for a bit, a long bit of stretching and question answering.  Then the decorating of the 5k shirts. But lets back up a bit here. 

I know every coach struggles with the craziness. What do you do when your patience is short and the girls can tell that one or two specific girls are really grating on your nerves that day?  I have no clue yet but I am taking extra efforts to just take deep breaths and remain calm.  Trying to use positive statements to encourage the good behavior than the negative statements that makes the girl feel badly. 

Such is life I guess. 

The girls were wonderful though.  One girl didn't get a shirt in the pile.  I always always count everything when I get it and this season I was complacent.  Super fail.  So I gave the girl my shirt for decorating and got a new one from the director!  PS-the people who organize my districts Girls on the Run truly Rock.  Seriously, they all amaze me with all the hard work and effort they put into making sure the girls and coaches succeed.

So I guess I leave you to ponder whether or not I succeed in getting all my girls to show up for the event, to finish the event, for me to not lose my mind, and/or forget something (including my own daughter!) on saturday morning.  

Bullies vs Friends

“Bullies are always cowards at heart and may be credited with a pretty safe instinct in scenting their prey.” Anna Julia Cooper

 Oh those final weeks of coaching are bittersweet.  The head coaches or people who make it to every practice will understand this best.  It's not that I don't love every second of coaching, well OK, not every second but you get the idea.  It is more that when you have a day where you are sick, tired or sore and just want to go home that it takes a lot to remember why you signed up for this.  Lessons teaching kids about bullying is a great reason to keep coming back. I love that they save this for towards the end of the season so it keeps me coming every practice.

But we are hitting the end of my endurance.  Its like running a race and I am in that last mile where it is all about the make it or break it mentality.  This season is different too because it is also almost the end of the school year so I think the kids are anxious too about being done. 

Last season learning about bullying and choosing our own friends was sort of a hard concept for me to teach. Mostly because I get kind of emotional and learning to keep that in check so that I am focusing on the girls emotions was something I had to learn.  I handled it last season, this season I was good going in there.  Keeping the girls focused. 

Funnier is that I have come to tolerate less of the lack of listening.  I will ask a question and a girl will have her hand shoot up but then not know what I asked or she wants to answer this big long lecture.  I recognize the behavior as a way to earn positive comments from me but it was distracting and taking away from the girls getting to run and stretch.  So I had to put my foot down finally.  If within 2-3 words I can tell the girl is going to just start talking about her weekend, book she read or her sibling, I politely stop her and ask how she was relating that to the question.  She will answer, oh, it has nothing to do with the lesson, I just wanted to talk about .....fill in the blank....! 

I tell them that we can talk after practice if they have time but that we need to focus.  It seems to be working.  A few girls are catching on very quickly. 

You know, I wonder what the parents must think of me. Some of them have gotten to know me quite well and have heard my snarkiness that I usually hide from the kids.  Some parents I am just getting to know finally.  I know that most of them appreciate that I volunteer for this program. I know that when I started last season, one of the parents asked me how much I earned as a coach and I laughed.  Told them I was a volunteer. I get paid in smiles and watching the girls achieve something they never thought possible.

Anyways, it was great last week having cooler days for running. And as we get closer to the 5k (just a week away) you can see the focus in the girls' eyes.

The thing that made me happiest-girls speaking up that had been so quiet most of the season.  Girls making new friends and working together that didn't know each other that well before.  And some girls stepping up as leaders that weren't always before.

A little insight

We could never learn to be brave and patient if there were only joy in the world.

- Helen Keller

An early blog because my sister pointed out something that I had never really thought about until she got to see what a practice is like for me. It was wonderful that she could step in and be there when the assistant coach needed to stay home with her child.  She even brought my 4 year old niece who is such a little bundle of joy and loved all the attention.

The kids on the team are great in my opinion.  Then again I am oddly used to them.  I know a lot of their personalities well enough so that I adjust as best as I can.  I have my super happy positive girls that always want to keep things on the up and up.  I have a couple of girls who have hit the age of puberty and they get a little surly some days.  I have the girls who I swear have A.D.D or just have a diet high in sugar.  I have the quiet girls who rarely speak up so when they raise their hands I make it a point to give them a chance to say something to the group. I have girls that are peace keepers, fighters, and everything in between.  And my sister was stunned!

She came over to my house for dinner last night after practice and as we sat there eating she started commenting on how she didn't realize how patient I had to be some days.  You see, she got to see it all, when the girls were behaving and listening and participating to the opposite end where at one point I authoritatively said "one" really loudly.  I have a two year old and the "One, Two, Three" count is great for getting her to cooperate without having to yell constantly at her and gives her the indication that mommy is being serious now.  I laughed inside when I said "One" and the entire team went dead silent! 

It had to do with the fact that one of the groups was being extra chatty.  Granted I was really happy because it means the group was getting along.  But if you could have seen the looks on all the girls faces.  It was priceless. 

The funnier thing is I hadn't paid attention to how many times I might tell a girl to move, stop doing something or some how 'discipline' her and never lose track of what I was doing with the girls.  It goes something like this:

Coach Jillianne is teaching lesson....

Girl gets up and starts dancing around and singing (yes, this has really happened)

Teaching teaching *dancing Teaching

"Girl, Sit down next to me" Teaching teaching teaching.....no more dancing

I mean literally I will almost interrupt myself, say that short statement, and then keep going with the rest of the lesson.  Its sort of hilarious. 

But all in all, I guess I never realize how much more patient I have become, especially with my own kids at home.  It isn't to say I am some saint, far from it, I have days where I have to walk away for a second so that I can take a deep breath or I will talk to the assistant coach and just say, "Am I crazy or is 'Girl' being particularly difficult today?" .  I think just knowing that someone else recognizes my struggle makes it easier for me. 

But there definitely needs to be a big thanks to my assistant coaches who have given me immeasurable support in helping me to remain calm.

And a huge thanks for my sister for coming out and helping with the girls so they didn't have to have practice cancelled.