InspiredToRun.co.uk

I wasn't much looking forward to the new millennium. I'd been tired, irritable, in pain and losing weight rapidly, only to be told yet again that it was gasteroenteritis (longest case ever, I was beginning to believe). Of course, this carried on, resulting in an endless cycle of visits to the doctor followed by a diagnosis of upset stomach. Until one day I went to the bathroom at 8.00 in the morning and woke up on the living room floor at twelve with no recollection of how I had got there and with the most awful stomach pain imaginable. Not a good start to the year but finally I had a diagnosis: Crohn's disease.

I thought this would be a turning point, as now that I knew what was wrong I could do something about it. Not quite.I had always been relatively fit until I started to feel ill. I played basketball and hockey at university and went for the odd run to and from lectures. Now the only running I did was to the loo, which is an unfortunate symptom of Crohn's. Unfortunately, despite the medication and examinations I underwent, I got steadily worse and became housebound for three months. I lost a lot of weight and dropped to 9 stone, not a good look when you are 5ft 8in. I stayed in the house, bored and fed up; I hated not having control over my illness and therefore my body.

I was incapable of doing anything, constantly in pain and without any strength. I became very depressed and the implications of my illness dawned on me; things were starting to get serious and I was getting more and more ill. Hospitalisation (and worse) was becoming a real possibility. I would dwell on all the things I couldn't do. If I couldn't leave the house I definitely couldn't go running.And then it happened, an advertisement for Race for Life, a 5K for cancer research. I burst into tears, knowing that I could never do it. I had always been strong before, emotionally and physically, but this wasn't fair. Why me, why was this beating me? And then my stubborn streak kicked in. Other people's Crohn's went into remission, and so would mine. I began with little things like lifting tins of beans as weights and doing step-ups on the bottom stairs. It was tiring and I could only manage five slow, rather unproductive minutes at first and always within easy stumbling distance of the loo. Then I did a bit more the next day and the next day, and after a few weeks I started to notice that I was in less pain and wasn't having to run to the loo quite as often.

I decided that I would walk to the shop at the end of the road. I was terrified, but I did it and that was that, a breakthrough -nothing could stop me now. Slowly my confidence increased and I could spend longer out of the house. So I did. I had a few embarrassing moments but you have to get over them and you check your dignity in at the front door when you are diagnosed with Crohn's anyway. I gradually increased my activity until THE FIRST RUN (well, gentle trot). This was it, I was off. So after 300m I sat on the wall outside the Job Centre waiting to be picked up, wondering if my lungs would burst. But they didn't and I tried again and again and each time I got a bit further and each week I felt a bit better and each check-up amazed the doctors.

I ran that 5K and it took me 45 minutes, but I was so proud of myself that I thought I might burst. I still wasn't in remission but I was a different person from the girl stuck in the house for three months. I knew there had to be a connection between my recovery and the running so this inspired me to carry on. As I crossed the line after my first half-marathon I cried and cried. A year previously there had been a real possibility that I wouldn't even be here, let alone running 13.1 miles around Leeds. I'm not like lightning but I did this year's Race for Life in 23:40. I lift weights, do spinning, yoga and Pilates and have been fully in remission now for two years. Running has changed my life - it quite possibly saved it.