How one couple trained to run a marathon

This story was originally titled "Two for the Road" in the May 2009 issue. Subscribe to Canadian Living today and never miss an issue!

In the spring of 2001, my husband, Al, and I were driving home in the unforgiving, teeming rain – typical for a winter night on Vancouver Island – when I spotted her. She was a woman in her early thirties, about my age, out for her nightly jog and completely unfazed by the harsh weather. She looked like a gazelle, her long, trim legs rhythmically sailing along the pavement as we drove past her. "Look at that lady," I said. "She's got to be crazy. But boy, does she ever look good."

The image of that woman, soaked to the bone and still enjoying every stride of her run, stayed with me long after we got home that night. I could fill a book with all the excuses I used for not getting fit over the years: I was a busy wife and mom to my daughter, Emily; the weather was too cold or too hot or too rainy; I didn't have the time; weight loss was too much of a commitment. But that woman out running on a rainy night made me realize that I could surely do something, too. I didn't have to set huge goals; I just had to start somewhere.

A couch potato lifestyle
Al and I were couch potatoes and routinely ate unhealthily, dining out at fast-food restaurants several times a week. Our portion control was, well, out of control. After our usual Friday night movie at home, our couch looked like a junk-food graveyard, scattered with empty pizza boxes, chip bags and pop bottles.

At five foot two and 165 pounds, I was overweight and seriously out of shape. I was also chronically tired. At my annual checkup about 10 years ago, I had complained to my doctor that I was lethargic almost every day. She looked me square in the eyes and said bluntly, "You're overweight, Rose."

That should have been my wake-up call, but it took a stranger running in the rain a few years later to open my eyes and make me envision the woman I could become.

After that evening, I was so inspired that I was soon reading everything about healthy living I could get my hands on. I bought low-fat recipe books, downloaded Eating Well with Canada's Food Guide and subscribed to piles of magazines for busy, active women (including the one you're reading right now).

I didn't want to diet; I had seen the stress it caused my friends. No, I was after a longer-term solution to finally kick the old me in the butt.

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