Chasing the Unseen

Running and trying for a baby are strangely similar in that you are always chasing something you can’t see.  When the journey of the latter becomes too long, lonely, and fruitless, running can provide a casket of treasures to keep you teetering above the abyss.  

However, it can also create an internal conflict which can pull you in opposing directions.  When you love running and lean on it as your mental crutch to help you navigate the undulating voyage of life, it can be difficult to be forced into evaluating its impact on your body.  

“How much is too much?” 

“Am I affecting my chances of conceiving by pushing myself on a hard session or running a certain number of miles?”

With the conflicting feelings, stress levels can be ejected into space, in what is already an extremely emotionally fraught time.  Which running could help with……if you knew it wasn’t going to affect your chances of making a baby that is. 

“It was like existing in no man’s land; living month to month, a slave to the 5-day fertility window”

When at 31, my husband and I had ‘the chat’ about babies, I didn’t realise that I would be nearly 35 before I held my baby in my arms for the first time.  

Rather embarrassingly, I wasn’t aware at the time that women are only fertile for around 5 days each month. I genuinely thought that it could happen anywhere, anytime. How naïve was I?! 

Truth is, making another human is a miraculous feat. I researched it with excruciating detail, studying every shred of evidence I could find about what could affect the implantation of a fertilised egg.  

Running was one of the topics I would routinely read up on, but the findings were inconclusive. 

One study would give words of encouragement, with another slightly to the contrary.  Pre-baby making I was running 50 miles a week consistently, but during my time on the “baby making train” I lost all focus on races and training. I did a few races here and there, and often dialled back my training in the 2 weeks prior to my period when implantation might take place.  It was like existing in no man’s land; living month to month, a slave to the 5-day fertility window; updating apps; peeing on sticks, and facing crushing disappointment when that familiar crampy feeling appeared along with the pre-period splodge of discharge.

And breathe… 

I felt like a failure.  

I cursed my incompetent body and inhospitable womb.  

Why was I incapable of this?  

What was wrong with me?  

This is the ONE thing that, as a woman, I should be able to JUST DO!  

The irony is after months of persecution and fighting an internal battle over how much to run, my moment of clarity came when I was running.

I know that my body is wonderful and capable.  It can take me miles away from home on just my feet alone.   My body is strong.  My womb isn’t an empty, dried up husk, incompetent and unable to grow and carry my baby.  I am not defined by my capacity to create new life.

So, I stopped worrying about how running might be affecting my fertility. I had tried everything anyway; running the same mileage, including hard sessions, dialling back the miles and pace, not running at all.  Nothing had changed the result.  My concern about running perished like the last snowdrop of the winter. Running gave me a focus from the constant disappointments, a chance to prove that my body was capable of more than what my mind concluded it was worth.  

Why would I shut this out of my life at a time that I needed it more than ever?

We have now been on the baby making train for almost 6 and a half years. We’ve been through some dark tunnels and have been completely derailed by losses. But, with the help of IVF we gave birth to our beautiful baby daughter in 2018. She is more than enough, but we would love to have a brother or sister for her. So, we continue this journey. However, the train is running out of steam.

“I am not defined by my capacity to create new life.”

I always thought the hardest decision would be when to jump off and relinquish the chase, but the resolution to get off at the next stop has presented itself without an elaborate entrance or an emotional anthem. It silently snuck in like a whisper in the wind. And I’m ok with that.

I finally feel that no matter what awaits us at the end of the line, I will be happy and content in the belief that the destination was mapped out for us from the start.  And running will be there every step of the way.