Running during Lockdown Saved this Woman’s Life.
How Sim Faulkiner ran her pain away.
When your best friend dies, when you are in so much pain you don’t think you will survive, what do you do?
And what if there was also a worldwide pandemic, your city was in lockdown and you were trapped in your one-bedroom apartment? Sim Faulkner chose to run. She ran a marathon.
Sim and Robby found each other the summer they were thirteen. They were both spending the holidays in Merimbula, a small beach town on the far southern coast of New South Wales. Two sweet teens kicking their feet in the sand as the long, hot days drew to a close. When they realised that they both lived in the Melbourne suburb of Mount Waverley, that was it, they were inseparable, friends forever.
When Sim was a child, she had a dream that she was looking down on herself as a baby. She was in a room alone and had straps on her arms. Later, Sim asked her mother about it, and was told it had actually happened to her. When Sim was born the nurses noticed that she was “all scratched up”. It was the seventies, and we all know things were very different back then. The doctors thought Sim’s mother was scratching her, so they took Sim away and cut her mother’s nails. But it kept happening and soon the medical staff realised that she was doing it to herself. For four months, little baby Sim had her arms strapped so she couldn’t scratch herself. The scratching — which was a physical manifestation of her emotional pain — continued up until the age of twenty:
“I would have blood pouring down my face, my parents could not keep my hands off my face because I was too strong.”
Robby was always supportive, she just had to call him up and he’d be there in a second. He’d turn up in some kind of convertible vintage car, throw her over his shoulder and take her out. They just adored each other.
At the age of six, Sim remembers telling her Mum that something was wrong with her brain, she always knew she was different and eventually she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. At twenty-two she tried to take her own life and ended up in a mental health facility for a short time. After her release, she was driving down the road, intentionally heading towards a pole, when an ad came on the radio; flights to London for three-hundred dollars.
“I literally just turned the wheel, headed straight for a travel agent, bought a one-way ticket to London and left two weeks later. I just left everything behind.”
Travelling saved Sim’s life. She had no idea what she was doing at first, but she got a job and made friends that she still has to this day. After two years away, she came back to Melbourne to look after her adored grandmother. When she was able, she took off overseas again. Sim landed a job as a nanny for a wealthy family in Los Angeles and travelled the world in private jets, visiting over forty countries.
“Travelling really helped with my bipolar. I got really strong and then came back home, bought a flat and started my own business — something people had said I would never be able to do”
While Sim was gallivanting about overseas, Robby got married and had two children. But they were always in touch, always a big part of each other’s lives, supporting each other from a distance.
One day Sim got a call from Robby, he wanted to have a chat, face to face. He had cancer. The news was devastating to Sim and the rest of his family and friends, but he got through it. Then, almost five years later, the cancer returned. This time it was terminal.
Robby’s wife raised money through a fundraising page so he and his family could go to Boston in the US for stem cell treatment. Unfortunately, the treatment didn’t work, and they returned to Australia. The first time Sim saw Robby when he returned in 2019, she was shocked; he was in a wheelchair, paralysed and ‘half blind’. Her instinct was to just laugh and joke like they always did, it was all she could do.
Sim lost her father to cancer on her birthday three years prior to this, it was understandably very sad, but when she received the phone call that Robby died, she was heartbroken.
“I couldn’t cry, I couldn’t breathe. It just wasn’t real. I lost my best mate and there was nothing I could have done to save him”
After Robby’s death, Sim was swamped with grief and self-loathing, her bipolar brain told her she was useless and that she ‘couldn’t even save my fucking best friend’. The pain was so intense she was drinking too much and wanted to end her life.
By early 2020, Sim had just left a toxic relationship when Covid-19 struck, she was in a bad way, crying all the time and having panic attacks when she left the house. Being in lockdown forced her to look at herself.
“There was no running, there’s no going to bars to hide. I had to face it. I realised I was being a victim and I hate that, that’s one of my biggest drivers. I don’t want anyone to feel sorry for me.”
Sim gave up drinking and smoking and started running, gradually her mental health improved, and she started to feel well again, but she was still angry–in fact, furious–that Robby had died. Furious that she had been wasting her own life; Robby was the victim, not her. When an opportunity to run a marathon came up, Sim jumped at the chance.
“People self-abuse because you can’t see why you feel suicidal, so you make a cut and see blood and you go, okay, well, that’s why I feel shit, ’cause my arms are bleeding. If you see a physical wound, it justifies the depression. So, if I could physically put myself through one quarter of what Robby had gone through, he’d be so proud of me. And if I could raise money, that’s even better.”
With the help and support of her friends and community, Sim ran all forty-two kilometers of the 2020 Virtual London Marathon in five hours, three minutes and fifty-seven seconds. Because Melbourne was in a very severe Covid-19 lockdown, she ran solo and and had to stay within a five kilometer radius from her home. When Sim crossed the finish line, she was crying from exhaustion and pain, but also pride. A musician friend was playing I am Woman on the saxophone. Her friends and supporters cheered and whooped.
“Maybe loving myself a little bit more from doing this marathon might help me to forgive myself for not saving Robby”
Whatever you do, do not call Sim Faulkner a victim, she she hates that. There is no doubt life has been bumpy and sticky, but she is resilient and emotionally intelligent and chooses to keep pulling herself up. She has been tested in every way you can imagine but she will not lay down.
Robby would be so proud of her.
Lindy Ralph is a fifty-two-year-old Australian writer living in Melbourne where she is a Professional Writing and Editing student. She writes honest stories about her life with the aim of helping other women to feel seen.
Lindy is the mother of a kind young man, a partner, friend, foodie, and fatty.
She/Her Lives on Bunurong Boon Wurrung and Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung land.