Meet Emily K.

This week’s Fit Mama is Emily K, who definitely proves it is possible to choose a healthy lifestyle despite any and all obstacles. Emily reached out to me after a mutual friend contacted her about the Fit Mama Friday series. Our friend had noticed that Emily made fitness an important priority in her life and knew she had overcome a lot to do so. When I read Emily’s story, my son was napping, so I was trying to cry quietly. Rather than go back and forth and interview her further, I decided if what she had written affected me so much, I should leave it as is and share with you, my readers, her story in only her words:

“I wasn’t in particularly good shape when I first got pregnant and I certainly wasn’t an athlete. Years before I had been a dancer. Until I was 20, I danced hours every day and while I never had the ideal dancer body, I was strong and in good shape. But once I quit, I largely stopped exercising, then suffered with a chronic illness in my 30’s. By the time I became pregnant at 35, I did maybe an hour of Pilates a week, but I had little in the way of cardiovascular health and I rarely pushed myself.

Pregnancy was hard and I craved sweets and carbs. I gained 55 lbs without even blinking. Although I started to try and exercise after giving birth, within a year I was struck by the beginning of what would become chronic migraines. The first one lasted two weeks and the doctor gave me steroids to try and break it. The second one came on a month later. It lasted three months. I was on round after round of steroids, and at one point my doctor suggested I enter the hospital for IV steroids, which I refused to do, worried that they were taking an enormous toll on me both physically and emotionally. This one never fully broke, but after three months it faded to a more manageable but constant dull ache.

Three years later, and I deal with chronic daily headaches 3-4 days a week.

For the first two years I tried dozens of medications, acupuncture, acupressure, gluten free diets, chiropractors and numerous other western and eastern treatments. Because I was in academia, I had some flexibility in my schedule, but as a new mother, there was only so much I could retreat from the world or devote to managing the pain. After two years, I at least had some pain medication that helped keep the pain at bay, although nothing could alleviate it completely. My energy was increasingly depleted and I was depressed at the thought that at the age of 39, I was able to do so little. Twice, vomiting from the migraines made me so dehydrated I ended up in the hospital. I worried endlessly that I wouldn’t be able to take care of my son, that I wouldn’t be able to do the job that I loved, that my friends and husband would become weary of hearing about the daily pain.

Finally, a friend from high school posted on Facebook that she was going to do a Couch to 5K program. Although exercise had consistently seemed to bring on a migraine, for no logical reason I can recall beyond sheer jealousy at the idea of engaging in a physical goal and frustration over my own body’s limitations, I decided that I was going to do it as well. At the time I could barely walk on the treadmill for more than 20 minutes without becoming exhausted, but I knew that my headaches were better in the mornings so I decided to try and exercise then.

I began. Slowly at first, repeating each week  of the program twice. Often I needed to take my migraine medication after exercising. But over time I noticed interestingly that while the walking and running didn’t make my migraines better, it also didn’t make it noticeably worse. As well, I felt my body returning to me for the first time in years.

The first time I ran 3 miles I cried.

A year ago I ran my first 5k and I have run two others since then. On Thanksgiving I ran a 5 mile race, and I’m currently training for my first 10k. My progress is slow. My pace is more of a plod than even a jog, and for longer runs I never manage more than a 12 minute mile. Last summer, I began working with a trainer and doing weight training twice a week as well as running 2 to 3 times a week.  This summer I’m hoping to add at least one yoga class a week.

I have never lost all the weight of pregnancy. I don’t look much like an “athlete” and I am often frustrated that I don’t seem to get stronger and faster as quickly as others. I have ulcers on my larynx and stomach as a side effect from the medications I am on, and my medication has other side effects that can be hard on my language recall, my weight, and my energy. But for the past year I have managed to exercise 3-5 times a week every week for the entire year for first time since I was 20 years old. My pain and I have come to some sort of a truce.  I have better months and worse and while I continue to experiment with diet, medications, and alternative therapies, I truly believe that running has done more to reduce the frequency and pain of my migraines than anything else I have done over the last three years.

The investment of time and energy is sometimes bewildering to others and people wonder how I find the time given my work and my son. I have often begged off a meeting saying I have “physical therapy” and while I know that running may not technically qualify as “physical therapy” I believe that for me – it is.  Sometimes I know it is a little insane to put on my running shoes instead of getting into bed when a migraine is coming on. And sometimes I do pay for that decision, but at the end of the day, I almost never regret it.

My body is my own again. And for that I am grateful. Every day.”

Thank you so much, Emily, for sharing your story with us. You are truly an athlete to work through the chronic pain and side effects of your medication and you are an inspiration!!