CHRISTY LYNN PROUDLY poses for a selfie at the finish line of the TCS New York City marathon last Sunday, holding a picture of New Haven’s Mayven Kingman that she carried along the course. Kingman, who has Cystic Fibrosis and watched televised coverage of Lynn crossing the finish line in Central Park, served as a big motivation for Lynn.

This past Sunday, I accomplished one of my life goals. I ran the New York City marathon.

It was the culmination of four months of specific training, and a desire to return to my passion for running that had taken a back seat in my life for nearly a decade during which my husband and I bought and renovated a house, expanded our family, and established our careers and ourselves within the community we now call home. 

Before all that, I had been a “real” runner. I worked in the industry as a technical rep in Western Canada and before that, worked in specialty running retail in Brooklyn, N.Y., and Vancouver, B.C. During that chapter of my life, I considered running part of my job. I hosted run clinics; attended running races, expos and events; and ran in more races than I could count.

I fell in love with running and New York City simultaneously, in the year I lived there after graduating college. As a Vermonter wildly intimidated by the city, I found comfort in my capacity to run from my apartment in Brooklyn to far corners of the city, taking long tours at a pace slow enough to spectate but fast enough to gain an appreciation for the size, diversity and culture of the spaces around me. 

It was that year in NYC that I promised myself I would someday run the marathon. 

Sixteen years later, it was time.

My 40th birthday is in January and I decided my birthday present would be to run the NYC marathon. But the race can be quite challenging to get in; the odds of being accepted through the lottery process are around 5%. At the peak of my running life, I might have met speed standards to receive a guaranteed entry, but that wasn’t going to be my ticket this time. 

It wasn’t long before I found the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation’s charitable Breathe Team, and I was instantly inspired. My 5-year-old son, in his preschool years, formed a friendship with a child with CF and who has given him an opportunity to learn more about what it means to live with a chronic illness. Over the years he has watched with curiosity the modified routines, diet, and schedule that his friend and her family developed. He asks about what it is and what it means and why she has to deal with this condition, recognizing the inherent unfairness and grappling with his relative privilege in having a healthy and strong body. 

I reached out to the Breathe Team organizers last March, inquiring how to apply. They had ONE SPOT left on that year’s team — if I wanted it, I was in. 

The commitment to be a “Breathie” involved raising a minimum of $5,000 for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, so I established a profile on their official charity fundraising page online and started sending emails to friends and family and posting on social media. 

I started formal training in mid-July, following a 16-week training schedule. I invested in a fancy running watch to help track my progress, show my distance, speed and heart rate. I bought new shoes and colorful tights to inspire me and committed to doing it right. 

As a mother of 2- and 5-year-olds, a demanding job and a tendency to volunteer too much of my time, I quickly recognized the burden that marathon training was going to impose on my life and the lives closest to mine. I leaned heavily on my already overburdened husband, and my generous mom, sister, co-workers and friends. I practiced putting myself and this totally unnecessary goal in front of other needs. It was hard, but a powerful reminder to myself that it’s OK to ask for help and make space for me. 

Some runs were great, others were hard. I struggled through some uncomfortable digestive issues and experimented with diet and nutrition and fueling until I found a workable protocol. I thought of my son’s friend when I started dipping into a state of discouragement, inspired by the courage and fight she wakes up with every single day. It inspired me to reconsider my temporary discomfort and continue onward.

I didn’t sleep much the night before the race. I can pretend that it had anything to do with staying in a hotel room in the middle of Times Square and the accompanying noise of the city, but truth be told, I was just nervous. 

My alarm went off at 4:30 a.m. I got up and forced down a couple hard boiled eggs, ginger tea and clementines before gearing up and heading to the lobby to meet the rest of the team. It was about 40 degrees outside, so we each had layers of discardable clothes over our race gear as we walked together the seven or eight blocks to the charity bus zone in the dark. We boarded the bus and watched out the windows as dawn broke over the city and we wove our way to Staten Island. From the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge we could see the start village below, filling with tens of thousands of other runners congregating to finalize the end of their marathon journey. 

LOGISTICS, COORDINATION

With 55,522 participants in this year’s event and an estimated 2 million spectators throughout the city, the level of coordination, planning and logistics involved by race organizers was staggering to consider. New York Road Runners reported more than 10,000 volunteers were involved along the course, along with heavy NYPD and security presence on the ground and in the air with helicopters working to ensure safety and peace along the course.

It all was seamless.

They had bagels and coffee for participants waiting in the start village. Numerous start waves and corrals preventing overcrowding at the start. Three divergent courses at the start helped the racers spread out before coming together around mile 4. There were no lines for porta potties, aid stations were stocked and easy to maneuver. Racers could be tracked live through an app so fans could find and follow them along the way — this proved very helpful for my family looking to cheer me on at several spots along the 26.2-mile course.

The smoothness of the operation enabled participants to relax and feel supported and focused on their goals rather than worried about the details. I was immensely grateful.

We arrived to “Charity Village” around 7:45 a.m. and settled into a tent reserved for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. Our team of 100 runners sat in folding chairs, enacting our pre-race fueling plans with food and drinks carefully packed and prepared. We chatted about our marathon journeys and inspiration to join the Breathe Team. Most were running in honor of a close friend or family member with CF. A few of our teammates had CF themselves. One woman was a pediatrician from Oregon who specializes in CF. Each story was inspiring and added to my sense of pride for being a part of it all. 

The first start cannon went off at 8 a.m., with the wheelchair division. Then the elites followed. The first of the “mortal” runner waves started at 9:05. I was in the second wave, corral B, orange course, with a start time of 9:45 a.m. The corrals were split by ropes and fences, which effectively guided us like sheep toward the starting area. Final bathroom breaks. Final clothes layers stripped off. It was surreal as we lined up at the base of the Verrazano bridge, framing the course we were about to face. We turned and faced the announcer to listen as the Star Spangled Banner was sung, then a wave of cheers as excited, shivering runners jumped anxiously in their places. Thousands of people held up cell phones to record the moment the cannon blasted and the wave started inching forward. It only took about 15 or 20 seconds before I felt the wave myself, and my feet started moving.

The bridge spans nearly two miles before touching down in Brooklyn, where the first crowds were there to meet runners. I had written my name in big and bold letters on the front of my shirt, which meant spectators could address me by name along the course. Fans lined every mile of the way, holding signs, pumping music out of loud stereo systems, blowing bubbles, offering sliced oranges, tissues, water, ice pops, beer, and most other things you can imagine. 

“Rats don’t run NYC, you do!”

“If only Kamala could run like you!”

“You think you’re tired, my arms are killing me!”

A classy older gentleman sitting in a plush armchair caught my eye with a sign that said “Pace yo self.” I ran right by him and he called out, somehow calmly but with wise confidence: “Pace yo self, Christy.”

Maybe I should have listened. 

Everyone said the energy in Brooklyn is impossible to resist; you’ll want to go out fast; be prepared; be modest. But I took the bait, tempted by the energy and stored inertia of the moment. My watch revealed I was off at a pace nearly a mile a minute faster than most of my training runs had been. 

I didn’t care. 

I wanted to be swept in that moment and wanted to leave it all out there on that course. So I held strong and borrowed energy from the thousands of strangers calling encouragement and the signs with Mario booster icons to “Power up!”

MEET THE FAMILY

Just before mile 8 was the first planned location my family and friends had planned to be. I hugged the side and started scanning the crowds for them a couple blocks early and was surprised to see an old friend from high school, who now lives in Brooklyn. A pause for a bouncy and elated hug and I was rolling again, only to find my family hanging over the side barricades a block later, clapping cymbals and waving the goofy fatheads my darling besties had printed for the occasion. My husband was there with our two kiddos, my mother-in-law, father-in-law and sister-in-law. My two sisters were there, along with my two best friends from home and their two kids. 

Those were my first tears of the day, as I jumped wildly into their arms, finding fuel in their presence and immense pride in fulfilling this dream that they had each helped make possible.

Then onward I went, finishing the first half of the course while still in Brooklyn and crossing the next bridge into a small corner of Queens before heading over the Queensboro Bridge between miles 15 and 16. 

That was the first major reality check, with the bridge incline stressing my pace and forcing me to face the fact that I had 10 miles still to go and I was starting to fade. 

I found my family again at mile 16, fit carefully into a corner of the course where they somehow stuck out in the crowd. I hugged my son quickly as he said, “Go, Mama, go!” 

IT GETS MORE DIFFICULT

By most accounts, the second half of the NYC marathon is considerably harder than the first. Perhaps it’s the bridges, or the long straightaways up 1st Avenue into the Bronx, or back down toward Central Park. There’s a moderate but noticeable uphill grade, and a headwind. The crowds are still thick and I’m sure they were as energetic as they were at mile 5, but I hit a point of oversaturation with the stimulus and found myself retreating to the center of the pack where fewer people called my name directly and I could dip into more of a blank zone.

I allowed myself to pull back on the pace and reminded myself that I was still well within my optimistic finish goal and that I had long before passed the pace team that was five minutes faster than my goal time. My hip flexors were screaming as I ran over the bridge to the Bronx at mile 20, but I promised myself that it was temporary and reminded myself of those people I was running for whose pain and hardship wouldn’t cease at the finish line. 

I wanted badly to ramp the pace back up for the last five miles, but my body said no. Take what you can get, don’t be greedy. Hold on, don’t pass out. Finish happy.

YES I CAN!

The last four miles seemed like they would never end, but just before mile 25 at the base of Central Park I caught sight of Sam, my devoted husband, who had ditched the rest of the crew to make it to the final stage of the course in time. 

I needed that hug, and it reminded me that, “Si, se puede” — Yes, you can — as so many signs had done that day. 

I rounded the curve toward Columbus Circle and just before returning into the park for the final stretch I caught sight of Elsie and Polly, my two unrivaled sisters, who had monkeyed their way up a lamp post so as to rise above the rest of the crowd, waving and cheering ferociously. 

I blew them kisses and cheered back as I turned toward the last half mile of the course, expending every last ounce of effort I could muster. I crossed the finish line with a wide smile on my face in 3 hours and 27 minutes, just beating my optimistic goal of 3:30. 

I thought I was going to be a weeping mess at the finish, but I don’t think I even had the energy left to cry. Instead, I robotically followed the directions from the hundreds of volunteers who ushered racers out of the finish chute and along the road for the three-quarter-mile walkout. Along the way I was handed a finisher bag with snacks and a bright orange poncho and flowed along with the sea of finishers staggering through the park. I asked the burly black man who hung the heavy finisher medal around my neck for a hug; he gracefully obliged. 

After pausing for a moment to reflect, I exited the runner zone, found my family and regained the strength to cry. I had done it. It was an immense effort which forced almost every other thing in my life to the side for months. It took all of my physical and emotional strength, but in doing so, proved to myself what that strength is and how to summon it. 

In addition to meeting my finishing goals for the marathon itself, I also surpassed my Breathe Team fundraising goal, raising $5,250 for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation’s cause. The window to donate doesn’t close for another month, so additional donations may still be made through my portal at fundraisers.nyrr.org/christylynn.

The New York City Marathon motto is “It will move you.” 

So moved.