On Saturday, I took part with my darling daughter, Ondine, 11, in the Bristol Race for Life organised by the charity Cancer Research UK. Last week-end Cancer Research UK organised three races, two 5Ks and one 10K and these events raised already a GBP 902,000 towards research for cancer. I made it to the finish in 40 minutes, but this is really almost irrelevant, because I run 5K twice a week and sometimes three times a week every week now. This used to not be the case. This time last year, I would not even run to catch a bus even if my life depended on it. I hated running, or so I thought. My only experience of running had been humiliating events in school sports day where I finished last on the track, red, bothered and humiliated. What fun could that ever be?
If you don’t mind me going a bit back in time to last September, I will tell you what made me change from someone hostile to running to someone who now loves doing it. The only reason I am telling my story is to inspire you to get your running shoes on and get started. I hated running. My partner is a runner and we have been together for over eight years and it never crossed my mind to run. A very close friend of mine asked me this time last year, as I was looking to get fitter, “why don’t you come running with me” and I am not even sure I bothered to answer her question. That is how bad I was. But one day, I think it was the 4th September, I sat down on my bed and just before going to bed, I asked the angels (I do believe in angels and they always answer my prayers) to help me find a way to keep fit. I felt I was reaching a plateau on my slimming journey and needed an extra “quick”. I had not exercised at all except a bit of belly dancing up to then. I went to bed and the next morning, I woke up knowing I had become a runner. How did I know that? Just because I couldn’t wait to go for a run. It was suddenly the most exciting thing that could ever happen in my life. When my ex-husband heard through the children that I took up running, apparently, his jaws dropped.
To get back to that day, I gathered a pair of old trainers, and a pair of shorts, a tee-shirt and my son donated to me his sports watch that his Dad bought him and nagged my partner to go for a run. It was Saturday, and we wanted to go for a walk on the sea front in Weston Super Mare so we decided to go all as a family and I would try my new running enthusiasm whilst Daniel and the children would make sand castles. Daniel told me I looked great. Something inside of me felt like an impostor, looking the part so well. But I did it anyway. That day, I ran five minutes one way then five minutes back and I never knew I had it in me. Daniel has wisely advised me not to push it too much and to take it really easy. But to me, a ten minute run was a miracle and it was so amazingly enjoyable (apart from my mind that kept on telling me I was making a terrible mistake and that I would make a total fool of myself when I couldn’t get up the next morning – kssss… that reptilian brain of mine is sometimes a real pain). I felt so light and so able. I almost wanted to run longer. It was only the first minute or so that was a bit challenging but I have come to learn that this is the threshold that all runners must go past to enter the pleasure zone. And it is literally like a rush of wellbeing. I had never heard of the runner’s high but boy was that amazing. And the next morning, I felt divine.
To cut a long story short, from then on, I build up in an incredibly quick amount of time (my running friend couldn’t believe how fast given I am twenty years older than her and had never run before in my life) from ten minutes twice a week to now 50 minutes three times a week, rain or shine. I ran through my first winter and kept it up. And it gave me a sense of … competency. I never knew I had it in me. And so the most natural thing to do was to sign up for a charity event. And with so many people battling with cancer, the Race for Life was a natural choice. Between the time I signed up for the Race and the time I ran it, sadly, one of my favourite aunts died of cancer leaving me feeling very raw and vulnerable. I had not seen her in a long time but it’s all the memories that flooded back. And the reason why I had not seen her in a long time is because we live in different countries. And believe me, when you hear that someone you love has cancer and you live thousands of miles away it is something very difficult to get through. Because people you love need you to drop by, they need you to cook for them, they need you to be there but when you are thousands of miles away and you have three young children and you are broke, that doesn’t leave many options, does it? Well I did what I thought I could do, I sang her name every day in my shower (which is a form of healing I developped) and I send her reiki and prayers and I also sent her a birthday card (as my sister pointed out, probably the only one she received that year as no one had the gut to send her one) but I didn’t have the courage to call her. My heart was breaking out inside and I couldn’t guarantee that I could hold it together. Isn’t it the hardest thing to do to suss out what you can do to help someone who goes through something as difficult as that. And in my family, they don’t believe in what I do: the healing, the reiki… they might just about accept prayers, and I know that my aunt was a very devot Christian. In fact, she had retired in an old people’s home run by nuns and she loved them. She had lived most of her life like a nun herself. But for my kind, reiki and healing is almost the stuff of the devil.
This is what also happened with my Dad when he was diagnosed with a brain tumour three years ago. He swears by doctors, being one himself, and he will only worship the medical altar. Well, OK, that’s not completely true, he is also a devout Christian. So that makes two of them. And my other auntie, who is fiercely battling her third bout of cancer and who is my favourite aunt in the world is also pretty hostile to what I do. She will accept prayers because that “cannot hurt” but that’s how far she will go.
Anyway, to go back to the Race, for me taking part in the Race was more than just running five kilometers. It was the bit I wanted to do for cancer when my relatives affected by it won’t let me in to help. And so, if I can’t help them, I’ll help myself by taking my help elsewhere. And I also trained with the Penny Brohn Cancer Care and I remember when I did that three years ago when my father was diagnosed with his brain tumour (which he survived), my auntie who is now battling her third bout of cancer said to me she was concerned about me working with people with cancer and how that might affect me. Training with the Penny Brohn Cancer helped me more than anyone else. It helped me be there even when my help wasn’t wanted. It helped me put aside what I wanted to give and just ask my father, my aunt… what they would want, and not to feel hurt by their rejection. It made me understand that it was their illness and there was nothing I could do to help them deal with it. They had to do it their own way. So in a way, my family helped me love them unconditionally, however hard that was on me. And I am grateful to them for that.
Taking part in the Race for Life was something I did for me, to help me cope and make sense of the death of my aunt Marguerite. She refused treatment. She upset many people around her because of that, not the least my father and mother. But I respected her. And Penny Brohn and all my years of training as a healer and therapist helped me for that. Running for life helped me cry over her death and how much I love her and miss her. But I started missing her long before she was ill, long before she died. I just hadn’t noticed because life was so busy just living.
Taking part in an event like this is breath taking. It is not a race, it is a bonding experience. The diversity of the women who took place, and the reasons why, was humbling. It almost made me feel that crying over the death of my aunt was a bit of a selfish and self centered thing to do. I saw a couple of ladies who run “for everyone who has cancer” or “for the world” and it made me want to write on my back “I run for peace” and I probably will next year. I don’t want to have to run next year in loving memory of my favourite aunty. Not again. But if I have, there is nothing I can do.
There was one minute of silence before the race where we all remembered why we were here. It took us away from the stage and the pompom dancers and the balloons… my daughter was by my side, she could see the tears streaming down my face, she held me and told me how much she loved me and how beautiful I am and it made my heart sing but it also made me feel more emotional. But tears are good.
I pulled myself together and I remembered that I was here for a reason and not only to feel sorry for myself. I remembered that I was a channel for divine light and that I had a chance to touch energetically thousands of life in one go. And just as sometimes, when I feel vibrant, I walk into supermarkets to shower my unconditional love and reiki onto everyone there… I had vowed to send love and healing to everyone taking place in this race and to all the loved ones of those runnners (or walkers) and so, during that minute of silence, I send out the healing. I imagined that I was a hundred metres high and that I showered everyone with love and healing and peaceful energy. And when I was running, I directed prayers to every single person whose name I could see written on the back of my co-runners in addition to the runners themselves. And suddenly this race all started to make a lot more sense to me. I now understood why the angels had put wings on my feet back on that 5th September 2009… why they enrolled me to run for them. It all fell into place.
I understood why the next day I felt so tired. Much more tired than for a normal run of 5k. And that is fine too. I wanted to give. I wanted to share the love. I wanted to reach out and touch so many people’s lives. And I will never know what difference I have made on Saturday and it doesn’t matter. I didn’t do it to receive thanks. I was just part of a group of amazing 10,000 women who wanted to make a difference. And I know some of them had cancer too.
You can still donate for the Race for Life here: http://www.raceforlifesponsorme.org/agnesvermorel
Blessings to you
Anges de Lumiere
