Runner vs Mom on the D-Day

A Race day is for the Runner as D-day is for the Mother

In the third trimester of my first pregnancy, I was sitting in the Lamaze class for new moms.

The instructor told us, “Childbirth experience is like running a marathon”. I didn’t have a clue then about what a marathon felt like.

My pregnancy mind interpreted: “Both involve enduring long hours without food.”

A little shy of two years after my first kid, I was expecting my half-marathon in a few days.

I was also trying to get pregnant with my second kid but I wanted to finish my race first. So I was debating with my younger sister about this urge to run a race at such an inappropriate time.

She could not get it. She was neither a runner nor a mother at that time.

So I explained to her the Lamaze class analogy. Childbirth is like running a marathon. You need to keep going for long hours until the baby is out.

She nodded and I continued: Likewise when you have trained so hard for a race, you should show up for a race as a runner. You have to finish what you started!

Let me rephrase it for you:

Running a race is like giving birth! You can’t quit!

She was speechless.

End of the debate.

A childbirth experience is a given. But the Marathon experience is only for the driven!

That’s how I became a Runner Mom 🤩

Please share your experience with childbirth or race or both in the comments.

© Tamil

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This story was inspired by Dina Alexander’s story below, where she compares writing a thesis to running a marathon. It resonated with my draft sitting idle. No better time to hit publish!

A shout-out to Sebastian Wolf’s article about why we feel powerless. And what to do about it. I enjoyed his flow of writing with little gold nuggets for the mind!