Let me share a story of perseverance...
Today my 10 year old ran in a cross country run and came in 134...probably out of 175 kids. Is she proud of herself....yes ma'am! Are we proud of her? YES MA'AM!!!
How the story of cross country running goes is that last year in her first race ever she came out running too fast, winded herself and couldn't recover. She made it about 500 m before she had to stop. We went the back way in the race to try and meet her to encourage her but she never came around. So then we were concerned! Needless to say when we did find her she was safe and sound with a race coordinator but all tears!!!! So as any good mom would do I cuddled her a bit, listened to her tell me what happened and how she felt and then made her finish the race...with me running with her of course. And if i remember it correctly we did walk most of it. 2 km is a long way you know...
This is us last year after running the 2 km together... she's a little unimpressed!
So this year I told her because last year wasn't a great experience, albeit a learning one, she had to do at least one cross country race. And so what did she do...she signed up for 4! So we trained a little bit (one day we ran in our neighbourhood) and she ran at school... and of course come the first race day she was SOOOO nervous.
She came out running, paced herself and finished. Oh....sweet redemption!!! Such a good feeling.
Right after the race finished she told me "Mom, I'm not doing any other races" through huffing and puffing. So like a good mom I told her that right then in the line probably wasn't a good time to make that decision. She agreed. And guess what? On the way home she told me "Mom, I did my one race that I was supposed to. I don't have to do anymore......but I want to".
Today she ran her 3rd race and we are as proud of her as ever!
