What do you do when your body seems to work against you?
For me, the answer became clear one step at a time. You walk! You walk with purpose, with others, and with hope. This is the story of how I hiked a full marathon, not to prove anything, but to walk in quiet partnership with a body I once thought had failed me. It became a lesson in quiet strength, the kind you only find when you move slowly and keep going.
“You’re Doing What?”
When I told my husband I planned to hike a full marathon, 26.2 miles in a single day, he raised an eyebrow and lovingly dubbed it “Cristina’s Crazy Walk.” He wasn’t wrong.
He’d seen what most people hadn’t. The days I couldn’t walk across a room without pain, the moments I’d collapsed from muscle spasms, and the long stretches when recovery looked more like surrender than progress.
We both know that my body has buckled under far less stress. So, the idea of hiking an entire marathon didn’t just sound hard. It sounded risky.
Still, he didn’t try to stop me. He just walked beside me, literally and figuratively, as I prepared for something that felt both impossible and necessary.
The Why Behind the Walk
This hike wasn’t about medals or milestones. It was about something quiet that had been with me for years. Not a race. Not a goal with a deadline. Just something meaningful I needed to do.
Running has never been an option. The impact sends shockwaves through my joints, triggers spasms, and awakens pain that lingers for weeks. But walking, walking is my companion. It isn’t always easy, and it certainly isn’t pain-free. But it’s steady. It keeps me outside, connected, and moving.
So, we planned our own marathon. No race bibs, no crowds, no impressive finish line. Just us.
Planning a Marathon for My Body
“We” was my crew: friends forged through years of scouting trips, shared trails, and inside jokes. People who knew both my limits and determination.
We chose a quiet Monday at a state park we love and planned a route that began with rolling flatlands and climbed into rockier terrain. We avoided crowds, scheduled breaks to stretch and refuel, and designed a course that offered a solid warm-up before leading into more demanding terrain.
Because I know this body well, we’ve been through a lot together.
The Turning Point
I was a teenager when everything changed. One day, I was water skiing with my brother on Lake Erie. The next, I was fevered and aching, and the pain left me unable to walk or move.
After two hospital stays and a long string of specialists, the diagnosis finally came. They called it Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis. Today, it’s more often known as autoimmune or idiopathic arthritis, a condition where the immune system mistakenly attacks the joints.
Whatever the name, the reality was clear. My life had split in two — before illness, and after.
I’d lost my freshman year to a haze of absences, relentless exhaustion, and the daily challenge of navigating a school not built for a body in pain. Just getting from class to class was an ordeal. Typing on a manual typewriter sent sharp pain through my fingers, each keystroke like a jolt that traveled up my arms.
Even walking was challenging; lifting my feet took effort, and I had tripped up the stairs more times than I could count.
But the hardest part wasn’t what I missed in class. It was everything I missed outside of it. The world moved on, and I felt stuck on pause, trapped in a body I couldn’t negotiate with, relentless in its pain and unresponsive to my needs.
Losing — and Rebuilding — My Identity
Movement had been part of my identity. Growing up in a big, active family, we biked, swam, played sports, and stayed in constant motion.
After getting sick, the family pace didn’t slow; but I could no longer keep up.
The disease didn’t just change my body. It fractured how I saw myself.
Learning to Work with My Body, Not Against It
For years after the diagnosis, I saw my body as the enemy. It betrayed me, held me back, made promises it couldn’t keep. Every flare-up seemed like proof I was broken.
But slowly, I started to notice something else. Its resilience, its quiet strength. The strength that doesn’t shout, doesn’t win medals, but shows up anyway, especially on the hard days.
Despite everything, this body has carried me through challenges doctors had once thought were beyond me. This body, with all its complications, still wakes up. Yes, it wakes up sore and stiff, but it wakes up. It moves. It adapts. It tries. It keeps going.
My body wasn’t failing me. It was fighting for me.
What once felt like failure was a deeper strength worth honoring.
Training, One Step at a Time
There were no dramatic gym sessions. I slipped a walking pad under my desk and took Zoom meetings in motion. I invited coworkers to walk loops around the parking lot at lunch.
My husband and I turned quiet miles into time together in the evenings. On weekends, I hiked longer routes with friends — sometimes focused on pace, sometimes just listening to my body.
Progress wasn’t linear, but it was real.
The People Make the Difference
The plan mattered, but the people mattered more.
My husband. My hiking crew. The friends who showed up in walking shoes.
They didn’t need to understand every part of my journey. They simply chose to walk beside me. That quiet support was enough.
Their steady presence turned effort into encouragement.
Each step felt lighter, not because the path was easy, but because we walked it together.
Recovery as Respect
Recovery became its own practice, with nightly stretching to maintain mobility, intentional rest, and medication to keep inflammation in check.
Fueling my body well was just as important as moving it. Eating nourishing foods and staying hydrated weren’t just habits; they were ways to care for my body’s needs and gave it the energy to keep putting one foot in front of the other.
This time, I didn’t see recovery as weakness. I saw it as quiet strength in action, a way of respecting the work my body was doing and honoring the effort it took to keep going.
Recovery was also a space to feel everything—gratitude, frustration, pride, exhaustion, doubt, and hope.
Making room for both joy and struggle was part of healing.
Taming the Inner Critic
Mentally, I had to quiet my inner critic. Chronic illness teaches you to fear failure. One misstep can feel like undoing weeks of progress.
The voice in my head was loud, quick to point out every slip and weakness.
So, we reframed the story. When I fell, we called it a “snack break.” When I stumbled, it was a “balance check – passed.”
These small reframes might sound silly, but they made room for grace.
Living the Mission
Professionally, I serve as the Director of Education for HEAL United (Healthy Eating Active Living), a nonprofit that equips children and families to eat well, move more, and live a healthy life, especially in communities facing health inequities.
I believe deeply in the mission. I try to live it, not as a model of perfection, but as someone who keeps showing up, imperfectly, persistently. Trusting that small steps can lead to real change, and that consistency, not perfection, is what moves us forward.
A Sacred Middle Mile
Hiking a marathon wasn’t about conquering illness. It was about partnering with my body for one long, deliberate day and trusting it to carry me with the quiet strength that shows up gently when I need grace, and fiercely when I need grit.
Somewhere in the middle miles, when the trail was most challenging and my body was aching, I began praying for the people I love and the teens and young adults in my church’s youth ministry.
I pictured their faces, and called them each by name.
Focusing on their needs pulled me out of my own discomfort, steadied me, and reminded me that the best way to move through your own struggle is to walk alongside someone else in theirs.
My pain didn’t disappear. But it gave me perspective.
What I Learned
Strength isn’t always loud or visible. Sometimes it’s quiet. The kind that shows up gently, chooses patience, and keeps going even when it hurts.
For me, strength meant knowing which limits mattered and which ones I could push.
It meant walking with my body instead of against it. It meant leaning on my people and my faith.
And yes, I’d do it again. With people I trust. At a pace that fits. For reasons that matter.
Keep Walking
In the end, it wasn’t the mileage or the mountains that made this marathon matter. It was the people. The ones who walked beside me, step by step.
Their steady presence reminded me that we’re not meant to do hard things alone.
If you’re walking through something hard, I hope this story reminds you:
You don’t have to be fast or fierce. Just keep moving, slowly, steadily.
Begin right where you are.
Your version of movement matters. Your pace is enough.
And when you stumble, take a breath. Share a snack. Say a prayer. Then keep going, with people who care beside you, and the quiet strength inside you.
Your quiet strength matters.
Showing up, step by step, is how we move forward. Not just for ourselves, but for those walking beside us.
So, let’s keep walking, with purpose, with faith, and with the strength we carry quietly, every day.