The unknown abyss…
Last year on the eve of my first Olympic triathlon, I wrote to someone very special to me. I wrote to her about how my mother’s illness had advanced over the last several months and how often times I wondered if she was taking a piece of me with her. When I first mentioned this to her seven months before writing to her, I was already feeling overwhelmed by that feeling. [You can imagine how it must feel almost a year later.] I wrote then about how watching my mom slowly and cruelly lose her mind had me feeling like I too was disappearing, but that even with that reservoir of sadness within me, I still found myself wanting to fight against those feelings. I had to do something. I had to put that grief somewhere. She was the first person I told about wanting to carve a new path using triathlon. Since then I have continued to use training and racing as a way to lean into life. To feel alive. Free. And now here I am again…this time on the eve of my first half Ironman, continuing to face this incredible void, and choose joy and meaning through this mechanism.
I am trying to take as much of this experience in and thinking about both of my parents a lot. I know I will be thinking of them constantly tomorrow as I dig deep to get to that finish line. I will carry them with me as I do with all those I cherish most. The race tomorrow is my reminder that I am here. Right here in this moment. I am not leaving. Even as my mother’s light continues to fade, and her memories of me fade, I am still here. I am not leaving. I am arriving.
I will give my all to achieve the euphoria that will come on the other side of that line. In that moment I will have a potency that many others will never acquire. I will never be more alive.
Free.
And so with that, as I stand on the edge of yet another unknown abyss, I’m praying for strength, resilence, and for a wicked fierceness to hit me like a ton of bricks as I set on my Ironman journey tomorrow. But above all, I will carry so much love with me. It’s the most meaningful and significant part of this whole experience. Ik houd van je.
