A new year began. The holidays were bittersweet. As Christmas passed, Elan thought of all the future holidays that she wanted to share with her own children. As today began a new year, Elan was less sad about the miscarriage. She still felt lost and wondered what the future held, but she did not feel the same despair. She thought hopeful about the future for the first time in awhile. Although bouts of sadness, regret, and anger would still come and go, it did not seem to consume Elan’s daily existence. Elan bought several books about adoption. The first one was Chicken Soup for the Adopted Soul and Twenty Things Adopted Kids Wish Their Adoptive Parents Knew. Elan was a researcher. Before she began her first 5K, half-marathon, and marathon training programs, she read all about running and training. She did the same thing before completing her first triathlon. Even though reading and researching did not replace the training and hard work that went into accomplishing those races, it made Elan feel more prepared. Buying and reading books about adoption, helps Elan learn about what she may want for the future and feel more prepared. Elan felt scared when pregnant about having a child. Some say it is normal, but she was excited but scared about the future. She always understood the weight of bringing a child in the world and being responsible for their wellbeing. Elan felt this responsibility more than others because of her childhood. Although Elan was happy that she was born and happy to exist, she often felt that he parents should not have had children. As Elan became an adult and looked upon the past of her childhood, it was clear her mother had issues that she never dealt with before having children. Her mother’s attraction to alcoholics and dangerous men stemmed from something she had not resolved in her own life. Elan was always terrified she would adversely affect a child and maybe that is why Elan waited so long to commit to having children. Now, Elan no longer had the choice of having children. That choice was gone. The only choice remaining was whether she wanted to raise children and that answer was an astounding, “Yes!” This year, Elan would begin the journey of adoption. Elan would take her time, work on her own health and recovery, read about adoption, and then find out how to proceed along this new journey. In the commitment Elan made to herself to start on this path, she felt hope. Elan had no idea whether her children would be male or female or what race they would be. Elan felt that whatever child God decided to grace Elan with would be hers, and Elan could still build the family she had always dreamed of. Like her friend Beth has said, this family would just look different than Elan had imagined. Elan knew in her heart that future holidays could still be filled with the laughter and happiness of her children.

The holidays were approaching, and Elan was just not in the mood. There were constant reminders of the pregnancy and loss. It seemed Facebook mocked her with ads of maternity clothes. Pinterest sent reminders of the sea turtle and manatee themed nursery she had been planning. The worst reminder was the first period after the miscarriage. It seemed to last forever and was very painful. Elan felt like every time she took a step forward something mocked or reminded her of the loss. She tried to take comfort in the IVF treatment finally being over. The treatment had drained her of everything. But Elan did not know what her life would look like now. She felt lost.

Elan had been excited to celebrate her last childless Christmas with her husband James. The following year, she was supposed to celebrate her baby’s first Christmas. She had planned on purchasing the Lennox specialty rocking horse ornament with the words “Baby’s First Christmas” engraved. This Christmas was no longer celebrating the monumental change of a future baby but instead would be the same as all future Christmases.  Elan usually spent every weekend leading up to Christmas baking chocolate crinkle and gingerbread cookies. She took care in packaging the cookies individually in holiday themed bags and decorative tins. She would then take several trips in the weeks leading up to the holiday to the local UPS store to mail the cookies to friends and family member. This year, she had no interest in baking. All she could think about was that there would be no children in her life to teach these recipes too. When she thought about her life, she could not imagine living to eighty years-old and not ever raising children. Elan struggled with managing this sadness and fear.

The week of the loss, she watched the movie Instant Family starring Rose Byrne and Mark Wahlberg about a couple in their early forties that adopt three children from foster care. The first time she watched the movie after her loss, Elan cried during the whole movie because she was grieving. She tried watching the movie several weeks later as Christmas approached. Although she did not cry throughout the whole movie, she felt sadness. She felt there was a part of life that she would never experience but desperately wanted to. Elan struggled with knowing the life she wanted to lead but being unable to attain it. She could not make her body produce healthy eggs that would fertilize and properly embed and grow in her uterus. This was outside her control, and Elan never felt more powerless. The odd thing about this loss is it somehow made her revisit the trauma of her childhood. Although she was not in physical danger, this experience reminded her that she could not control her own destiny. As much as she prepared for, tried to be a good person, and do the right thing, she could not prevent the miscarriage. This powerlessness reminded her of her childhood. It did not matter how much she stayed out of the way or excelled in school, she could not change her mother or her mother’s boyfriend. As a child, Elan could not control or protect her mother or herself from abuse. Some how this miscarriage reminded her that although she tried to eat right, exercise, changed her life to prepare for motherhood, and spent thousands upon thousands of dollars to obtain the dream of motherhood, she could not will it into existence. Elan’s body, God, or fate did not want Elan to have children. It made her think about why she could not have children. Was there something wrong with her? Maybe she would be a terrible mother? Elan thought she had come so far from her past and gained so much stability in her life that this could not be true. When the insecurity and anxiety of a childless future crept into her mind, Elan ran. Running provided a release from the fear and required her to focus on the present. After her runs, Elan tried to pull herself together and concentrate on what gifts to buy for family for the holidays.

Elan did something she had not done in years, she signed up for race. She registered for the Croom Zoom 25K in the Withlacoochee State Forest. The race was only a month away and she was only covering two miles in her run/walk training program, but she did not care. She needed something to look forward to and train for. The last time Elan run Croom Zoom in the Withlacoochee State Forest was eleven years ago when she attempted to complete the 100k race around her thirtieth birthday. Although it had been years since she had thought about that race, she remembered it clearly. It was a crisp thirty degree morning in Tampa. Elan dressed in her three-quarter length black exercise pants and a white long sleeved dry fit shirt with a dark pink short sleeved shirt over it. As James promised to drive her to the race, he woke up crankily to drive the hour and a half to the forest for check-in and prior to the 6:00a.m. start time. The forest was pitch black with only the headlights of vehicles arriving and the light of lanterns leading runners to the sign-in tables. Elan was ready with a mixture of excitement, anticipation, and nerves. She had never run that far but was excited for the challenge.

As the race started, Elan turned on her headlamp to guide her in the dark and to hopefully stay on the running path. Elan followed other runners and they all quickly realized that they had all missed the marked trail. They turned around and found the correct path. Early in the race, Elan tripped and fell over a tree root bruising her right knee. She kept going. One foot in front of the other powered by the music in her headphones. Some of her friends promised to attend the race to cheer her on. Of course, Elan did not expect anyone did get there at the start of the race. As Elan ran through the wooded dirt path that was a 10.5-mile loop with raised tree roots, over logs, and up and down hills, Elan felt comfort, peace, and complete presence in the task at hand. As Elan had finished her second loop, she saw Zeina and Andy. They cheered and waived her on as she started her third loop. The refreshment tables that were marked on various parts of the path were filed with decarbonated mountain dew, pretzels, and M&Ms. Unlike 5k and even marathon races that had water tables at every mile, ultrarunning refreshment tables were miles apart and filled with items that would keep cramps at bay and keep you energized for the Herculean task of truly long distance running. Elan also loved the quirky mix of people attracted to running these inconceivable distances.

As Elan progressed in the 100k race, her right knee began to swell from the earlier fall that occurred at the start of the race, and she compensated by putting more emphasis on her left leg. As the miles continued to pass by, her left ankle started to swell. By the end of the third loop, her body felt like it was falling apart. James and her friends knowing how much this race meant to her decided to join her on the fourth loop. Elan’s run had slowed into a sluggish walk. Her legs and body were seizing and there were points when Elan wanted to just curl up on the trail and fall asleep. She even thought it might be best if James and her friends just left her in the woods. She would just forage and build shelter while her body recovered. She thought about just starting a new life in the state forest at this moment. This was of course nonsense. Her friends helped keep her moving and slowed down to her pace that at times felt like she was moving in reverse. She felt so loved and supported during this loop, and she was so grateful.

When Elan had finished the fourth loop, she was done. She was an official DNF, “Did Not Finish.” This pained Elan, but her throbbing body just wanted to stop moving. She took in water and the warm broth that the race officials had prepared for the runners to keep them warm. Elan turned to her husband and said, “I failed.” James replied without missing a beat, “What are you talking about? How in the world do you consider that a failure? You went 42 miles on foot!” Elan thought to herself, “yeah, that is pretty cool.” She had previously researched that only one percent of runners in the world ever try to complete an ultramarathon. She previously completed a 50K race and tried to up the ante with this 100K race. The 100k race proved to be too much that day. After this race, Elan felt like her body had been hit by a truck. She could barely walk up and down stairs and the pain in recovery made it difficult to sleep. But she never felt more alive in pushing her body to its limits. At recommendation of her doctor, Elan moved into the triathlon world for a short period. She hung up her long distance running shoes and started biking and swimming, which was less impact on her recovering body.

Over the past five years, Elan’s focus was on fertility and the obsession with trying to become pregnant. She somehow lost the will to train and complete races during this time. Now that Elan was looking for new purpose in her life, she returned to a familiar friend, the road. Even though she no longer had the speed or endurance she once had, the road comforted her. Somehow, the thought of returning to the Withlacoochee State Forest for the Croom Zoom run excited her even through she was woefully unprepared.