Me? An Athlete? LOL.

If you asked me to describe myself at any point in my life, I would have rattled off a list with zero hesitation:

Book nerd.
History nerd.
Band geek.
Cancer survivor.

None of these labels bothered me. I wore them proudly. (Especially that last one.)

Athlete, though? Absolutely not. Years ago, I went to Russia on a mission trip and helped run a sports camp. When I returned home, people kept saying, “Wait… you did a sports camp?” And I would clarify, very politely, that while I was not particularly skilled at sports, I would have made an excellent blooper reel.

So yeah. I was never what you’d call athletic.

Fast forward to a year or two ago. I reached out to my friend—an athletic trainer—to figure out why my hamstring was behaving like a rebellious teenager. She told me I was her favorite athlete because she knew I’d actually do what she told me to do.

My immediate response was something along the lines of:
“Well, yes. Your athletes are 16. I am old enough to be their mother. I follow instructions so I don’t break myself permanently.”

But later, a tiny brain cell piped up:
She called me an athlete.

Me? No. I mean, yeah, I run. I even finished a marathon. But that doesn’t make me an athlete.

Does it?

Cue me, standing in my kitchen, asking Google the hard-hitting questions.

To my surprise (and slight horror), the internet informed me that I did, in fact, meet the definition of an athlete.

And that’s when things got complicated. Because it’s one thing for Google to say it, and quite another for my brain to believe it.

Could I see myself that way?
Could I wrap my mind around it?

Eventually, I landed on a simple truth:

Yes. I am an athlete.

I pursue consistent training—running and cross training—with actual goals in mind.

Admittedly, my goals for my first marathon were:

1. Finish the race.
   
   

2. Have fun.
   
   

3. Stay alive.
   
   

So not exactly Olympic-level aspirations, but honestly? I think they were perfect.

I used to get tangled up in pace charts and time goals. I still set goals, and sometimes I even achieve them, but I’m no longer strangled by them. When I focused on running for fun again—on joy, not judgment—something wild happened:

My training became more consistent.
My pace improved.
I stopped skipping runs because I actually enjoyed them.

These are not the goals of a professional athlete, but they are the goals of an okayest runner.

And honestly? I’ve decided that if showing up, doing the work, and occasionally ugly-crying into my hydration pack counts as being an athlete…

Then yeah. I’m an athlete.

I may not be breaking records, but I’m breaking old beliefs about who gets to use that word.

And spoiler: it turns out the answer is me.