When I was 19 I thought I met my soul mate. He was smart, beautiful, and he made me laugh. He was also a maladaptive narcissist who broke my heart multiple times each day. Despite that, I thought  he was my best friend, and I wanted nothing more than to spend the rest of my life with him. We lived 13 years, some happy and some truly awful, together until one day he told me he didn’t feel the same. I packed up and moved from my dream house back into the old starter house I had just barely vacated. My world was upended. I was broken. I ate a lot. I drank a lot. I cried A LOT.  It had been four months since I had major back surgery and I used it as an excuse to lay around and do nothing but wallow and pine away.

I went on a girls trip to Vegas three months later with my mom friends. They were all sporting bikinis on their two or three children bodies. I, who don’t have children, was the jolly fat one. Except, I wasn’t jolly; I was mourning. Seeing myself in that old lady one piece was what it took to fix things. I needed a change. I needed to get my life back. I needed to figure out who I was, this new me.

The next weekend 52 Hikes in 52 Weeks became a reality. Every Sunday, my sister and I hike. We hike for hours. We sweat. We laugh. We struggle, and we get fit. I love this new life. I wasn’t sure I would. I wasn’t sure I could make it. I can be quite dramatic and self-defeating. I’m really happy though, for the first time in years. I thought he was ruining my life when he gave up on us. Now I realize our relationship was ruining me, and this new me is so much better.