My legs feel electric.   My thighs are burning, my knees grow weaker by the minute.  There is sweat on my face, in my hair, running down the length of my spine.  My heart is beating, hard and fast.   I feel as strong as I've felt in what seems like forever.    I am on mile four of this run, 33 minutes in and almost done.  And I am so focused on these moments, the difficult day I've had seems faded and far, far away.  I am grateful.

Grateful for my legs, carrying me, letting me run. 

Grateful for my lungs and my heart, keeping pace with this challenging workout. 

Grateful for my aching muscles.

Grateful for the strong will that carries me through, even when I think I can't do something.  

Grateful for a mind spurred on by a workout like this. 

I realize that I've come a long way in the past four years.  The gym was once a place I couldn't stand to spend time.  I'm not sure why but, even after I had lost some of the weight I needed to lose, at the gym, I always felt slothish and slow and out of shape.   I spent a lot of time looking at bodies I thought were beautiful, bodies that seemed to function so perfectly, and feeling envious.    Envious of their shapes, their muscles, but even more envious of their ability to exercise without testing - without worry. 

Those days seem over now.  I recognized just how over yesterday, my legs and face burning with exertion.  I was so taken up in the intensity of my run that I had no time to consider how I compared to others. 

At the gym at least, I've stopped looking at myself and measuring my abilities against others.  Managing workouts with diabetes is still a challenge; much more of a challenge now because I push harder than I have in the past.  But I know that every time I face a diabetes management and exercise challenge, I learn something I can use.  And though I sometimes end up too high or too low because somehow I've miscalculated my food or insulin, it happens less  frequently and the swings are not nearly as dramatic as they were in the past. 

I get so much out of exercise. 

I've achieved weight loss. I managed to quit smoking without gaining any weight back.    But what I've really gained is the amazing realization about the things I can do.  I run, I rock climb.  I do yoga and pilates.  I can do legitimate push-ups and even a couple of pull-ups.  And I feel pretty confident there's no sport I'd be reluctant to try - and there's no sport I wouldn't be pretty good at if I did try.

I am an exercise convert.  Moreover, I am an athlete. 

And that's something I never thought I'd say.