Running, fundraising, and insecurity issues.

I finally got to meet some of my team mates this past weekend. We had our first team training run on Saturday. I'll admit, I started out feeling pretty embarrassed and kind of pathetic, but by the end they had all put me at ease that I was on the right track. I realized as excited as I am about this event and opportunity, it has the unique side-affect of bringing out some of my less than stellar self-confidence issues.

When I signed up for this event I was all confidence on the outside. I've raised over $2500 for charity events before, $3800 shouldn't be a problem. Then I had my first official week of fundraising, sent out a bunch of e-mails and such, and as of the morning of my first team run I had a measly $25 in donations. When other people there started talking about their fundraising and one had over $900 and another $1250, I started to panic. And to be honest, I haven't really stopped panicking yet. But what kind of surprised me is the mental conversations that I go through trying to figure out what I'm doing 'wrong'. You'd think the fact that I've only been fundraising for a week, I'd be a little easier on myself. Goodness knows, the other team members were understanding and the coaches and mentors keep telling me not to panic, but it's hard. The questions come up in the dark of night. What could I do differently, does the fact that I don't share a personal story of cancer hurt my fundraising, did I word my e-mail badly, and my personal favorite of 'doesn't anybody like me enough to donate'. How's that for a crisis of confidence for ya, huh? In my mind I know that things will pick up and that this goal is achievable, but that doesn't stop the fear in my heart that I will be waving good-by to the rest of the team as they head to New Orleans and I'm stuck in Madison because I couldn't meet my goal. (I told you this wouldn't be an all 'warm and fuzzy' blog, didn't I :) )

I'd like to give personal thanks for a very generous donation from my in-laws, my donation total is now at $125.00, which is helping to give me another wind. Dano (another team member/mentor) recommended that if I try to mail at least 50 actually fundraising letters to people, which puts me in an interesting position since I don't even typically send out holiday cards. I've gotta actually track down mailing addresses for people. Luckily my brother got married a couple weeks ago (congratulations Jason and Kim) so I figure I can hit him up for his address list for all those cousins I only see at weddings and funerals. Thank goodness for printers, I don't even want to consider having to hand-write that many letters. I'm pretty sure no-body could read my handwriting anyway...

I was also a little dismayed at first to find out that I was the only one there running a half-marathon, everybody else was doing the full 26.2 miles. So while they were all running between 6 and 8 miles that morning, I was doing a measly 3. How sad is that, right? But our coach, Art, was really supportive. How did he put it again...oh yeah...something like 'Jo, a full marathon is 3 times the distance of a half, and you'll actually be able to walk the next day, unlike the rest of us.' They were all quick to point out that a half-marathon is still a goodly distance. How many other people do you know that have ever run 13 miles in one shot? To be fair, there are all ranges of abilities on the team, and there are several other people running half-marathons, they just didn't happen to be at my first team run. We even have someone who is walking an entire marathon (that's approximately 7 hours of walking!). On the plus side, I ended up actually running 4 miles instead of 3, but that was mostly because I got a little lost and missed my turn around point. I sure hope they have people to directe us in New Orleans, or I may end up in Omaha before I know what happened! Directions are not my forte.

This week is going to be busy and full of Team in Training (TNT) activities. I've got a fundraising clinic/brainstorm session on Wednesday, selling coupon books for donations at Boston Store on Friday, volunteering at a charity run on Saturday, and running in a team 15K relay on Sunday (5K each member). Next week I'm working with several team members at the concession stand for some concerts locally and we get a portion of the profits as donations. And of course, I've gotta keep up with my schoolwork and my training schedule in all of this as well. Ah yes, and sleep and eat a decent meal once in a while as well! Speaking of which, I've got a paper to finish writing, so...


I'll 'see' you all next time!

Jo