Mental Muscle

Although my kids have made me sit through countless episodes of SpongeBob over the years, there is one in particular that sticks with me. SpongeBob and Patrick are determined to get into the tough-guys hangout (Salty’s Spittoon) rather than their usual pretty-in-pink Weanie Hut General. The door man goes through a lengthy explanation of checking their toughness before they can enter. One requirement is having muscles on your eyeballs. In fact, they have to have muscles on their muscles (as the doorman’s eyeball muscles start popping out on top of each other, forming a muscle mountain). 

My kids and I have laughed about that episode many times. Who would have muscles on their eyeballs? But after attending an Ironman competition, I’m convinced those guys, especially the ones who can finish the race in less than 10 hours, have muscle mountains all over the place- most especially in their minds.

When I was a kid, my mom tried everything she could to make me comfortable with washing my hair. Every as-seen-on-TV crazy contraption entered our home and onto or around my head.  Being only 5-6 years old, I couldn’t quite articulate to her why I hated getting water on my head/face.  She thought it was my ears, so she bought this blue foam visor-looking thing that looked like a stretched-out accordion going all the way around my head. The hair was supposed to sit on top, while my ears, eyes and nose stayed out of the water. I’m sure I looked like some kind of scary sea creature, but alas, it didn’t work and I ultimately ended the shower in tears, just like everything else she’d tried.

From the time I was 5 until I was 10, I’d taken swim lessons 3-4 times. Each swimming lesson attempt ended with the same results. I could glide in the water, but only for a few seconds. As long as I could keep my face out of the water, I was fine. I grew to be incredibly scared of the water. Even I wasn’t sure why I couldn’t do it. I tried to do exactly what my teachers suggested, but each time, I got so scared I wanted to cry.

Over time, I was able to doggy paddle, and eventually I could even go off the diving board. But I couldn’t stick my face in the water. Being the Capricorn over-achiever type, water became the bain of my existence- something I both hated and feared.  

Into adult hood, I’ve been teased on a few occasions for plugging my nose when I’d jump in the water- especially when I started going wake boarding.  I shrugged it off and laughed along, but it kept eating at me.  What was wrong with me?  I even tried putting my face in the water without holding my nose when I’d take the kids to the pool, but each time, I’d come up gasping and choking from the water going up my nose and down my throat. Unlike almost everything else I’d tried and succeeded at in life, I hadn’t stuck with swimming lessons long enough to find the problem.  So, I got so frustrated, embarrassed, and afraid that I just couldn’t do it, I gave up trying. The problem was, no one had ever really taught me how to keep the water from going up my nose. I always heard, well, I just do it. Just don’t let it. That didn’t help me any. No one had ever explained to me that you blow out of your nose when you’re in the water, and keep blowing out until you are well out of the water. I had always stopped blowing out right as I got to the top, or was coming out of the water. That second too soon made all the difference in getting water in my nose and thinking I was about to drown for the hundredth time.

And then I went to an Ironman competition. Before I met Kermit, I’d heard of Ironman, but didn’t really know what it was, other than a race crazy people did that I would never be able to even dream of doing in a million years. I’d gone to a couple of triathlons with him, and he kept telling me that if I kept going, I’d want to do one too. Yeah right, I always said.  I can’t swim. Then came Ironman Kentucky 2012.  It’s been hard for me to express what I went through that day, so I’ll just share some things from my journal.

“Watching him (Kermit) struggle and press on through a 2.5 mile swim, 112 mile bike ride, and 26 mile run, through very hot temps, with the limitations on his body because of his gastric bypass, my heart was aching, my stomach in knots. I wanted to be superman and pick him up and carry him through it. I walked by his side encouraging him, desperately trying to find the right words to motivate him to keep going, wanting so badly to support him in any way I could. It was mentally, emotionally, and physically draining for me. I knew how much finishing meant to him and I wanted to see him succeed so bad!... my dad had been tracking him online helping me know where he was because with so many people getting hurt or sick, I was really worried… we were scared he wouldn’t make it in time. He was physically and mentally spent…my heart was breaking for him. At about 16 hours, I positioned myself on this bridge above the finish line. I kid you not the entire next 53 minutes I was praying and trying to mentally send encouragement to Kermit non-stop… I wish I could express the absolute joy I felt when I saw Kermit running towards the finish line. I was grateful beyond belief. I started yelling, screaming, and nearly crying. I couldn’t have been more proud. He had 6 minutes and 45 seconds to spare.”

I still can’t quite express what I felt that day.  Kermit and all the other athletes had  overcome so many challenges to reach the finish line.  Many didn’t make it.  I realized the most important thing in finishing an Ironman race isn’t the hours of training to build endurance. The most important thing was mental strength.  Kermit’s body was on the brink of shutting down.  He doubted he had the physical strength to finish it. What got him across the finish line was him making up his mind that not only could he finish, but that he would finish. 

I looked back over my life, at not just my failed attempts at swimming, but other times in my life where yes, I’d gotten through hard things- but all the while, I did it kicking and screaming in my head, letting that negative voice take charge, telling me I wasn’t strong enough to handle everything, wasn’t smart enough for grad school, or wasn’t pretty enough to find my future knight in shining armor.  And I decided right then at Ironman Kentucky that I was done with that.  I wanted what Kermit had found- the ability to dig deep, even in extreme physical and mental exhaustion, where you can tell yourself not only “I can do this”, but “I AM doing this”.  I decided I was sick of the mental battles I had each time I tried to accomplish something difficult.  And I knew that if I ever wanted to be with a man as strong and amazing as Kermit, I needed to cowboy up and develop my own mental muscles.  So I decided I was going to learn how to swim, and that I too, would be an Ironman.