Sorry I’m a day late this week! Mind you, I was a day early last week so hopefully the Substack universe has found its balance. I, of course, have not.
The sign read: Athlete’s Check-in.
I let out a little laugh – that’s silly, I thought. I’m not an athlete.
The next sign: Warm-up Area – Athletes Only.
A quick eye-roll – Who’s this ‘athlete’ they keep referring to? ‘Cos it’s not me!
Walking into Hyrox in Málaga a couple of months ago, I was (literally) scoffing at the notion that I could be called an athlete. I’m not super skinny, or visibly muscular. I run a perilously slow kilometre and most worryingly of all, I am not in any way affiliated with MyProtein. How – how?? – could that term possibly refer to me?
But when everyone I spoke to about doing it congratulated me (called me a mad woman, a crazy person, a headcase) on competing and completing it as a solo competitor, and when people gawped at the idea that I’d voluntarily entered the race, I realised: I might not fit the typical athlete profile, but that doesn’t mean I’m not one. And that made me weirdly uncomfortable, instead of proud. So I did what any writer would do when they have A Feeling. I examined it and mined it for content! Wahey.
I’ve never thought of myself as sporty, beyond the obvious and vital 1990s Spice Girl context that I found myself in during my childhood and tweenage years. I danced, I did PE in school, but outside that, no sports. I therefore defined myself as ‘not sporty’ and leaned into that for essentially my whole life.
My upbringing was very much library-centric – I was a bookworm, a quiet and introspective child and a good student, therefore the notion of playing sport didn’t feel very much ‘in my lane’. I remember wanting to be indoors, comfortably dreaming about setting up the inaugural Irish Babysitter’s Club branch, rather than outside running around after any kind of ball. It felt safer than jumping into a realm unfamiliar, and it felt natural and less risky to stick to what I knew.
That self-perception was already shaping my identity more than I even realised at the time.
You might look back and realise a part of you that came to be based upon nothing other than your own self-imposed directive – were you a quiet child therefore became a shy adult? Were you a ‘tomboy’ as a kid, then became an adult woman who related more to stereotypically male activities? Were you a little rebel who grew up to be, well, a big rebel?
I was a self-described overachiever (nerd?!) in school. I got the best Leaving Cert results in the school, I was on the student council, I won awards every year. It meant little, of course, but it shaped my idea of myself. I went on to achieve a decidedly average amount in university, which confused me: Wasn’t I supposed to excel? Wasn’t I supposed to top the class? I felt like a massive failure in university as a result, even though I wasn’t failing at all by most standards.
I remember being nominated for Best New Beauty Journalist when I was about 23, heading to London for the fancy ceremony, not certain I’d win but kind of expecting to. I lost to a (very talented) girl from ELLE UK, and I realised then that my high-achieving wasn’t something that just happened, but it was something I had to really work for and earn. Self-perception, again, was hindering me.
Fast forward a decade and a bit, and I had fully accepted myself as who I was. Average and doing fine and with privileges not afforded to many. Not sporty, still.
Then I had my daughter. My whole life was turned on its head – becoming a mother for the first time will do that to you. I didn’t know who I was anymore, and although I didn’t realise I was doing it at the time, I set about rebuilding a new version of myself.