How Injury Recovery Taught Me the Power of Gratitude Miles

I found trail running about 8 years ago living in the suburbs of Denver, Colorado. I saw a sign for a 12k trail race in the foothills and, as an avid road runner always looking for something new, I recruited a friend and we signed up. We left the start line with a whistle blow, shared high fives with strangers as we circumvented rock structures and explored new trails, and came through the finish to a pancake party breakfast for everyone that competed. My mind was blown and I never really looked back. Under a year later, we picked up and moved our family to Bozeman, Montana and the doors and possibilities of trail running only continued to expand. The adventures seemed endless and I wanted to take part in all of them. As a mom of three kids, the timing of this discovery also aligned with another transition out of the sleepless nights of parenting young children. My youngest daughter was just about to turn three and with that came another type of freedom. The mountains, big views and trail community were calling and my gusto to explore new trails, test limits and hop in on as many new adventures was off the charts. 

After my first year of exploring the trails and dipping my toe in the community race scene in Bozeman, I started to scale up my scheming. Starting off the next year, I had exciting plans for some new races and big adventures with friends. The calendar for the year ahead was full and I couldn’t have been more excited.  

That all changed abruptly, though, on a February afternoon at Bridger Bowl, our local ski area. Three turns into my last run of the day, I caught an edge, tumbled over my skis and felt a big pop. In that instant all my adventure plans for that year were shot (just like all the ligaments in my left knee).

I now can put this incident in perspective and, in the bigger scheme of things, be grateful for my health and my body and the magic of modern medicine. In that moment, though (and a lot of the moments that followed) it felt pretty dark. I was devastated by the short term limitations that this setback created and I grappled with the reality that for the foreseen future instead of running and chasing fast friends I’d be sitting on the couch with a big brace on my knee. I had been an athlete all through college and was lucky to have never really dealt with any big injuries and no doubt had taken for granted what my body had allowed me to do. The process of a recovery at this point seemed daunting.

As a middle-age mom of three trying to maintain the balancing act of it all, I was devastated that this event was not only going to keep me from big mountain goals, but potentially serve as a barrier keeping me from the running community all together. As a parent, trail running had become not just a mode of fitness over the past few years for me, but also an outlet; an opportunity for self care and moving meditation as well as a vehicle to share time and space with others. I was nervous about not only what a recovery could look like, but how I would be able to cope without a piece of my routine that not only served as part of my identity but also filled my daily cup. Along with that I was struggling with the reality of not being as elastic as I once was and how that would affect a rebound.

Despite all the unknowns ahead, I worked hard to take a proactive role in my recovery and control what I could and lean into the rest. I put trust in my body and just kept pushing forward, always trying to visualize the resilience bucket I was filling up (even though there were many days when I just wanted to kick the dang bucket over). I made a conscious decision, though, to use the energy I would normally put into running and put it into the things I could do. I took on my PT with intense enthusiasm. I kept asking my friends to take me to the gym with them and I would just modify and change exercises as needed. I found I actually really liked being around all the active people. Instead of taking it as an opportunity to feel sorry for myself, I tried to take everyone else’s energy, soak it in, bottle it up, and visualize storing it up for later. I also let myself start looking ahead and thinking about what goals I could set for myself back on the trail as well as how I could stay involved with the running community until that point. 

I wasn’t always able to maintain the outlook curated through my self-created rose colored glasses as I hobbled around, but I tried my darndest to focus on the fact that I got a recovery from my injury. As a not so young athlete watching friends and other community members deal with much more substantial life challenges, the reality of having to take a pause but still have an opportunity to come back was a gift in itself and something to hold on to. I took this mindset and all that bottled up stoke that I’d been gathering from those around me and channeled it into the stepping stones that were part of my road back. The milestones were small at first, but they were starting to accumulate. The first time I got to take a walk without crutches. The first time I was able to get on a bike and ride far enough down the road that I couldn’t see my house anymore. The first time I got to run (for only 2 minute stretches, but still!) on a trail. I celebrated each one of these moments. I set up some community goals for myself too. I hiked ice and water up to a local ridgeline to create a makeshift aid station during a race and enthusiastically passed out water and high fives and cheered my head off for every runner that passed through. I volunteered to drive friends to a race out of town with a 4 am start (that I was supposed to be competing in before I hurt my knee) and even ran out the first few miles of the trail with them (and sobbed big wet tears as I turned back on my own alone). These experiences all started to fill back up my bucket and accumulated as fuel for the fire of potential energy building inside me. They also helped me identify a new motivational “why”; one that I will forever keep in my back pocket and continues to drive me today.

As I was able to slowly ramp back up my training, every step I got to take felt like a true celebration of strong and resilient bodies and the gift that is putting one foot in front of the other.

I have taken this mindset and run with it (pun intended…) pushing limits and scheming adventures with a smile and immeasurable amounts of joy. I ran my first 100 miler two years ago in the Crazy Mountains of Montana. I designed a hat that I wore for this race that reads “Suffer Better”. It has become a staple in my running wardrobe. It is a reminder that running doesn’t always feel good and suffering is often part of the process, but every step you get to take on a trail is a gift and you have a choice to see it as such. 

Five years out from my knee injury now, I have enough distance to reflect back and see that this injury pause was an opportunity to redefine my why, build up my resilience source and allow me to reframe running adventures through a lens of gratitude and the mantra “because I can”. It has also helped me endure and experience more than I ever imagined I could with a big grin on my face. 

Smile miles are the best miles.  

Often in races I get comments like “how are you still smiling?” or “you are the happiest one out here” and every time I hear it, my fire burns a little more and my gait gets a little faster. My injury experience sparked a joy that has become a lasting flame of roaring stoke- allowing me to never take a mile- or a pancake party finish line breakfast- for granted.
When you’re deep in the pain cave, or suffering through rain, snow, mud or whatever other horrible weather condition you might get to endure, or just lacking a little motivation to get out the door for your run that day, I would challenge you to take a pause and try it out. Say it out loud or just keep it to yourself, “How lucky am I?!?” And if you’re in the depths of an injury recovery, keep building up that potential energy one foundational block at a time. Bottle it up so when you get back out on the trails, you can use gratitude miles as your superpower too.