Moving Out of The Comfort Zone

by Dana Birch

For me, it all started in January 2011. For many years I’ve been checking into AllEars.net for my Walt Disney World fix and information updates. One of my best buds, Sara, had just finally gotten her life back through running and had run in her first half marathon with Team AllEars. As I read her post-run blog, I sat at my computer crying uncontrollably. In the past few years since my wedding to my wonderful husband I hadn’t felt like the woman he had married. Life was comfortable, wonderful actually, but getting too comfortable. I needed a challenge just for me, something to get me out of my comfort zone. I figured with all the training and work that I’d have to undergo I would be forced to push myself in ways I had never done before.

Let me back this up a bit. I have NEVER been an athlete. In high school I was an athletic trainer, I taped ankles, and found ways to get out of running the presidential mile in gym class. In the years right before my husband and I got engaged, and married, I had lost a lot of weight and had been in the best shape of my life, to date, but running was still a nightmare for me. The thought of running a half marathon, or even a 5K was a joke. So here I was, almost four years into my marriage and completely out of shape, fat and happy. Yeah, that was me.

So I talked to Sara and my husband and they both encouraged me to go for it. In the process I not only made the decision to run a half marathon, but also to join up with Team AllEars. Both seemed so daunting. The half marathon seemed like an insane thing for me to do, especially given my history with running, but I figured if I was going to try this anywhere, Walt Disney World was the place to make this dream a reality. I secretly hoped that maybe a bit of pixie dust would rub off onto me and I’d somehow survive it. The other thing that seemed like a challenge was joining Team AllEars. I had never raised money for anything like this before. I mean, I had sold Girl Scout cookies, and worked retail before, but that was all together different. Up to this point, my family had been fortunate to not be touched by cancer. However, I had lost friends to different cancers and a couple of my co-workers had had either close family members have to fight cancer or have had to fight it themselves. It is not a nice disease, it doesn’t discriminate, and it doesn’t care who it hurts. But raising $500 in this economy seemed both possible, and yet impossible. Sara and I had teamed up to raise $1000 together as team Monorail Mavens. That seemed even more difficult, but in reality it was easy. A garage sale here, a cookie sale there, and some very gracious donors, it took the whole year, but by Christmas we were at the $1000 mark. Now all I had to do was run.

It was more than the fundraising though. Team AllEars was a family, a welcoming family, full of knowledge about running, the race I was going to run, and support. I had chosen a few 5Ks, and a 15K as milestones in my training. The 15K in November was really the turning point for me. Up to this point I had only been in talks with the other members over Facebook and e-mail. This was the first time I was going to be running as a team with Team AllEars members. I had never run that far, and knew I was going to be one of the last to come in. I finished the race, and Sara was there to cheer me on. We met up with the rest of the team members for lunch, and quickly strangers became friends. As I hobbled into the restaurant that day I got cheers and a round of applause, it was the best feeling in the world. I felt like I belonged, and when the topic of conversation at the table was both running and Disney related I knew I had found a group I definitely fit in with.

To be honest, throughout the year my main focus was on my training, I wanted to finish the race, that was the big goal, wasn’t it? Then summer came. My uncle got sick”¦.cancer, kidney to be exact, and to this day he is still fighting it. My focus changed. Not only did I want to finish this race, I had to, for him and for others like him. I had to run because they can’t, and I had to raise the money to fight cancer, to fight this horrible disease, to do my small part. It was no longer just about me, and my health, it was about the health of those around me and those I will never meet. So the training continued.

Injuries abound, leg, back, etc., but it was all a small price to pay. Then Christmas came, New Years and my 32nd birthday, and then we were on the plane to Orlando. I tried not to be nervous, but I couldn’t help it. I wanted to finish, I had to finish, and failure was not an option. So 3am on the morning of the race I was on a mostly empty monorail to EPCOT with my husband. We then met up with the Team for our picture and everyone was great, welcoming, and it was nice to finally meet people I had been in contact with for so long. The time had come, I kissed my hubby, and I stuck with some of the girls as we filed like cattle to the starting corrals. They had all done this before and it was nice to have someone show me the ropes even if we weren’t in the same start corral.

For a long time I stood there in the start corral alone in the crowd and then out of the blue some other first time Team AllEars ladies walked by and I joined them for the start of the race. We all had the jitters and then it was our turn. It was all so exciting and all so dark in those early morning hours, but my adrenaline was pumping, and I was feeling good. I knew the route well, having spent so many years traveling the road between EPCOT and Magic Kingdom, and the hotels that surround the Seven Seas Lagoon. I knew how far it was, and I had to keep pushing it out of my mind for the first few miles. With my iPod pumping the new mix I had just created especially for this race with a few Disney tunes sprinkled in, I headed for the Magic Kingdom. As I passed the first monorail beam on my route, Monorail Red traveled overhead.

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Now I have to explain here that for some reason I have an obsession/connection with this monorail train and hadn’t seen it on any of the lines until just that moment, mind you we had been there two whole days by then. We had a family friend who was a fellow Disney fanatic and teacher pass away a few years ago, and when I saw that train as I passed under it I felt like it was his way of cheering me on. We ran past familiar landmarks, the main gate, the Ticket and Transportation Center (TTC) where, again, Monorail Red was there to greet me, past the Contemporary, and then into the Magic Kingdom.

I was fine until I heard a cheering cast member call out to me and others, “Welcome to the Magic Kingdom!” I lost it, tears streaming down my face and smiling ear to ear as I ran up Main Street. I was able to wipe them away as I rounded the bridge to Tomorrowland where my husband had joined the Team AllCheers group to cheer all of the runners on. Running through the park was so emotional and fun,and by this point, mile 6, I was feeling great.

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Then we headed out past the hotels and back towards EPCOT. By this point I wasn’t worried about my time and I had taken some pictures with some characters, and was really enjoying the entire experience, until mile 10.

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This was the furthest I had gone until now, and I still had roughly a 5K to go. It was then that it became a mental game. Monorail Red passed me again and that gave me a boost. I rounded the overpass to EPCOT, looked down World Drive and saw the dreaded sweeper busses about a mile or so back. I looked ahead and saw EPCOT’s entrance, I couldn’t come this close and not finish. I pushed, through the pain in my hip and feet and found the strength to get to mile 12, with more Team AllCheers people among others cheering us all on. I knew I was home free. I shed a few more tears as I headed into EPCOT, saw Monorail Red pass over me one more time, heard the choir sing, and saw my husband as I headed into the last .1 miles of the race. He was standing there taking pictures with the group of Team AllCheers folks that were standing near the finish area, he snapped the picture and I ran up and kissed him and then headed in for the finish. I had done it! I grabbed my medal and again began to cry, I had succeeded. My husband met me and he helped me hobble back to the monorail station to head back to our hotel. I was in such pain that the monorail operator at the TTC even felt compelled to put the handicap ramp down for me to get into the resort monorail. Yes, that was a bit embarrassing but I didn’t care I had a medal around my neck and no one could take that accomplishment away from me.

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A bit of a rest and then it was off to the official Team AllEars meet-up and hugs all around. Sara was so proud that I finished and it was so great to get to meet everyone again. There were a few speeches, but two things really stuck out during this meet-up, first it was the $67,000+ that we had raised as a group, and more importantly it was the personal stories that a few brave souls shared about why they “Run with Purpose” for Team AllEars. There wasn’t a dry eye in the house and, while I couldn’t bring myself to share, I connected with everyone in that room. We were all there to run for those who couldn’t and to run for those we knew, and those we would never meet. It was a great end to a great year with Team AllEars. It was also the beginning of my year of no excuses. I may not have lost all the weight I had planned to loose, but I was able to do something I had never done before, and that has been enough to spur me on further this year. I have an 8K, two to three 5Ks, a 10K, and another half marathon in Disneyland to earn my Coast to Coast medal all lined up for this year. This experience has been nothing but wonderful. It is a wonderful cause, a spectacular group of people, and definitely a magical milestone for me. I look forward to supporting Team AllEars for years to come.

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