Could you tell me a time you felt like you were not enough?

Just over two years ago I ran from John O’ Groats to Land’s End completely unsupported. It was a thousand-mile journey that took me through the Scottish Highlands, along the familiar trails of the Pennine Way and beside the Atlantic Ocean on the arduous South West Coast Path. Around two years before I set off from John O’Groats was when I first began to run. I had struggled with a difficult breakup and one day, after recommending Murakami’s book ‘What I Talk About When I Talk About Running’ to a customer (I worked in a bookshop at the time), a voice within suggested I go for a run. I shrugged the thought away, but it stayed with me and eventually I did just that. I went for a run. After that first run, I kept on running, I ran my way back to confidence and happiness and a month before starting from John O’ Groats, I ran my first marathon. Looking back at this now, it seems ludicrous to have gone from one to a thousand in such a short space of time. To say that my run from the most northerly point of the country, to the most southerly point would be challenging would be an understatement. However, the most challenging part, has been the aftermath of that journey. 

When I eventually reached the sign at the most southerly point of the country, the sign that marked the end of my lengthy run, I was elated. Within minutes though I was confronted with the question, ‘so what is next?’, a question which I admit, I had asked myself before I had even set foot in Cornwall. Have you ever heard of that phrase, live in the now? It gets tossed around as if it is something easy to do. We are all guilty of not staying true to that phrase, we have all let the present slip by whilst being blinkered looking into the future. Throughout my entire run I was guilty of it. I always thought about the days ahead, what would be awaiting me after I had finished the task at hand. However, my thoughts were always idealistic and never quite realistic. With an idealistic mind I never truly thought about where this run would take me, realistically. So, when I finished and reality hit me hard in the face, it seemed to hit me a lot harder because my idealistic images were so far-fetched. I imagined running a lap around the world and in reality, I have actually struggled to run ever since which in turn has lead me to believe that I was not enough and that was difficult to overcome. 

The days that followed my run were full of joy and happiness that couldn’t be dulled by anything or anyone. As the weeks passed and I felt like I had enjoyed a well-deserved break from running, I got my trainers back on and forced myself out. I ran a mile and then felt my body slowing down to a walk. The same thing would happen the next day and the next day, and so forth. I soon learned that my body couldn’t handle the movement of running anymore, but still, I seemed to demand it to carry on. When my body refused and slowed down to that walking pace, I criticised myself. What is wrong with you? I would tell myself. You have just ran across the bloody country, why can’t you run a little more? The negative self-talk became abusive, it became all consuming, it buried itself deep inside me and created a black hole within me. A black hole where it decided to reside. It told me, every single day that my run wasn’t enough. That I wasn’t enough. That negativity got me nowhere. I ended up working back in a bookshop and then back in admin, again – this was not where I wanted to be. Negativity ruled my life. I became an angry person. A self-destructive person. Meanwhile, I was experiencing a decline in other relationships which left me feeling even worse about myself. It wasn’t a good time. It was an empty time. Nothing was ever enough. Nothing I did was enough. I wasn’t enough. 

My boyfriend (now fiancé) and one of my closest friends both encouraged me to see a therapist. After my first few sessions she suggested to get a blood test to check for any deficiencies. This was surprising to me as I would have never considered that how I felt was linked with what was going on in my body. My blood test came back to reveal that I had very low levels of iron which is what could have been causing the fatigue and also the anxiety, irritability as well as the depression that I felt myself slowly sinking into. After months of therapy, unwinding thought processes and digging up details of my past, I gained confidence in talking about my run and began to understand how it had affected me afterwards. I opened up about the unforeseen effect it had had on my mental health. When people approached me and said, ‘I want to do that, I am going to do what you did’ I would say, ‘great, brilliant, go for it, but also consider how it will affect you afterwards. Consider the aftermath. Prepare yourself for a fall. Be kind to yourself. To try is enough’. Only recently have I come to terms with the fact that what I did was actually MORE than enough. To have finished that first day would have been plenty. So the fact that I arrived at Land’s End safely and uninjured is actually a miracle. 

It took a long time and consistent work to fade out of that black hole within myself. I still feel it there sometimes. I remind myself everyday now to be kind to myself. When I start to speak negatively to myself, I stop, I remind myself that I am going to be with me for the rest of my life, so the least I can do is to be kind. I remind myself every day that I am enough. Everything I do is enough. To get out of bed is enough. I am enough for my fiancé, I am enough for my friends, my family, I am enough for myself. Now, I am actually telling myself that I am beyond enough. And you are too. You are enough.