The reason we race isn’t so much to beat each other… but to be with each other.
~Christopher McDougall, Born to Run
A little over three miles into the 2015 Los Angeles Marathon, my first-ever 26.2-mile adventure, I noticed a group of runners wearing Down syndrome awareness T-shirts. My little buddy Brianna, who “rocks an extra chromosome,” was my inspiration for running. We’d been paired together in 2013 through I Run 4, an organization that matches runners with people who have special needs, and we’ve supported one another through the miles and milestones ever since.
I always loved meeting other advocates, so I ran up alongside the group. A young girl turned to me with a big smile. Her familiar facial features caught me off-guard. “You’re doing great!” she said. The Brushfield spots in her almond-shaped eyes sparkled as she held out a hand for a high-five.
It was her first marathon, too, but she wasn’t worried about it. She and her friends were running as a team in a relay. Some of them had Down syndrome and others didn’t, but they were all in it together. I told her about Brianna, and that I hoped one day my little buddy and I could run this race together.
“Tell her she can do it!” she said, and I promised I would.
I’d always heard that the marathon was the great equalizer of races, the one that would test my limits and show me what I was really made of. But it wasn’t the distance that made Los Angeles so memorable. It was the other runners I met, and the limits and labels they challenged every step of the way to the finish line.
Everyone runs for a reason. Some of us run toward goals; others run to overcome obstacles. We run to prove others wrong, or to prove ourselves right. At times, I’ve run to clear my mind and forget; other times, I’ve run to remember. Some people, though my husband will argue this, run just because it’s fun. He runs only when the Air Force tells him he has to.
I’ve been in the Army National Guard for almost 20 years, and even though running has been a requirement for me for the past two decades, I haven’t always loved it. My frustrated podiatrist will agree that I was not born with a body that supports running, but the Army doesn’t believe in excuses like that. Luckily, I was born with stubborn pride and ferocious determination, and they were enough to keep me going.
Brianna gave me a renewed sense of purpose and a new way to define myself as a runner. She was just 11 months old when we were first matched. She hadn’t stood up or taken her first steps yet. I hadn’t run a full marathon yet, either.
But just because we hadn’t didn’t mean we wouldn’t. Children with Down syndrome are too often labeled as limited, simply because of their diagnosis. Brianna may have been born with an extra copy of her 21st chromosome, but she was born to a family that didn’t believe in limits or labels as much as they believed in her. Brianna would accomplish her goals in her own time, and I’d cross that marathon finish line in mine.
Runners, by nature, are a very positive and encouraging community. Tim Boyle did a great thing when he started I Run 4. A Facebook post from his buddy, Michael Wasserman, who has Down syndrome, inspired him to help others build similar friendships.
It’s absolutely amazing how much stronger and more capable I felt every morning when I woke up and posted photos and messages for Brianna. My days were made when her mom would share a video of my adorable little buddy. Our extended running family cheered together as Bri stood for the first time and spoke her first words. Hundreds of friends sent prayers when she was hospitalized with respiratory issues during a rough winter. Together, we were all stronger.
I mailed her my race medals, sent balloons for every birthday, and had a quilt made from our race T-shirts that she took with her on her very first day of kindergarten. Brianna and I met for the first time at a Down syndrome Buddy Walk in Texas, where she and her family lived. As fate would have it, a couple of years later, I ended up moving there, too. In 2017, she was the flower girl in my wedding.
Brianna just turned six, and she knows more sign language than I do. She can build towers of tiny blocks that end up taller than she is. She can recognize all the words in the children’s books I’ve written for her. She continues to accomplish her own goals on her own timeline. She can only be labeled as limitless. One day, if she wants to, I will happily return to Los Angeles to finish that marathon with her, in any way that works for us.
One of my former military commanders lived by the motto: “Life is a marathon, not a sprint.” Those 26.2 miles in Los Angeles brought new meaning to that phrase for me, and so did Brianna. We live in a fast-paced world where it’s easy to miss out on those big smiles and high-fives. But at the end of the race, those moments become the memories that make the ache worthwhile.
— Tammi Keen —