Heliophilia... is that really a thing?
/OK … confession… I think I have Heliophilia. Now you may not find that in the Webster’s dictionary, but it is alive and well in the Urban Dictionary. So no, it is not found in the psychology and science books of yesteryear, but it is just the beginning of making it’s mark, if not any where else, but right here. I guess you could say I suffer from heliophilitis (?)
Heliophilia: (N.) An addiction to the sun. Always needing it's rays to survive life. Needing summer all year round.
"Sammi has heliophilia;therefore, she lives at the beach,and is outside everyday"
"The sunflower needs the sun to survive as so does a person with heliophilia"#addiction#wanting#needing#craving#desire
-Urban Dictionary
Growing up in the South I remember sitting in my car, whose heater had just barely started really warming up by the time I got to school before looking at the overcast skies, rubbing my hands together as I would give myself a Grade A (professional, motivational speaker quality) pep talk to get out of the car and walk/run my freezing tail across the 100 yards it would take me to get from my car to the school. When we left California every summer.. tears.. actual embarrassing crocodile size baby tantrum tears rolled down my cheeks that I had to leave the land where the sun shown year round and the salty beach air was a daily option.
When I was 14 years old my sweet Great Grandma White passed away and my mom could take only one of us 8 kids across the country to the funeral, and I was the lucky one. It was January and this would be my first time going to California in the middle of winter. I knew it would not be anything close to the icy humid cold winters I was used to, so I didn’t even bother to bring a jacket, but I knew it was still winter and I was not going to be cold. So, Instead I prepared by bringing thick ribbed sweater tights, a wool plaid skirt, and a turtle neck (it was the nineties). I was a wreck, I sweat the entire time. Nighttime there was a reprove with the cool ocean air, but that sun beat down and I knew through the b.o. and self inflicted heat flashes, there was no where else I wanted to live. I committed again to find a way to settle down in Southern California.
Fast forward several years and all those hopes, dreams, wishes, and prayers came true as my husband, 9 month old daughter and I packed up into the car and U-haul and made our drive from Utah to California, a couple years later we were in our home and was not long before I couldn’t help but notice year round the bikers, runner, and every other form of fitness gurus flocking the streets and boardwalks, not just through the summer or beautiful springs and falls (if you can even call it fall), but YEAR ROUND! If I could be outside in the sun all day, I think I would be. I would join in and often find what I liked to do most for exercise was anything outside… which usually meant yoga in my yard or at the beach, or running outside, or hiking with my family. Then it happened.
It was the very beginning of May and I was at a local community pool helping my kids train for the Junior Lifeguard test. As I sat in a chair, barking orders to swim faster as I was eating gold fish and timing their swims, I noticed dozens of women coming and going from that same lap pool, happy, content with their workout. (Queue the entrance of my inner dialogue:)
“I want to do that…What? Swim? I don’t know how to swim. Remember how your husband always teases you how you look close to drowning when trying to swim fast? Yeah, that’s true, but they look so happy, so fit, and they had a workout out side in the… SUN. But you’ve tried swimming before, remember when you were injured? and you’ve never thought it did anything for you… that is true.. ok what what can I do that incorporates swimming… outside… for fitness……I know…..A TRIATHLON! I am going to do a triathlon.
Now it’s an important note here that: I am definitely NOT a biker, NOT a swimmer, and NOT a runner (well…at least never EVER anything above 3 miles.. and even then my pace was… slow… like you could walk as fast as I run slow). That’s not to say I don’t consider myself an athlete. I grew up playing competitive basketball and am currently a yoga instructor. If I had a day to myself I would love to spend a good portion of it working out… and eating brownies of course.. because who doesn’t love a good chocolate ghiradelli brownie? Great, now I am hungry.. but I digress… Any way- sure, I had been to a couple spin classes in my day, but I hadn’t rode an actual bike for exercise in my entire life. And for that matter, ride ON the road? That is just CRAZY! How many times have I looked over and thought those people were completely crazy to ride on the side of the road. They will get hit! They will die for sure!
Obviously there was only one thing to do… GO ALL IN. This was not possibly going to happen unless I fully and completely committed. So the investigation began, I had to find a bike, and a triathlon to be in, and clip in shoes, and a helmet, and running shoes, and padded shorts (padded shorts? It’s more like spandex with an adult diaper sown in), a swimsuit, goggles, swim cap, a training program that I could understand, multiple friends to teach me how to do normal things, dozens… no countless youtube tutorials on everything from how to ride a bike, to fix a tire, to put a chain on, to switch gears, to swim, to run with good form. I mean this became my free time obsession. Any spare moment I was reading, researching, purchasing. Like any new hobby I know nothing about, I have no idea how expensive everything ends up being until I’m neck deep already and there’s no turning back. So there I was, geared up, pumped up, and somewhat informed (so I thought).
The journey began. The running came, slowly but surely, through tears and agony, and even some knee pain, but it came. I was so excited. Nearly every day, all summer, I was outside training with my best friend, the sun.
I didn’t dare try my new to me, but used bike I had bought off craigslist outside for the first couple weeks. I was terrified. I had tried to use it in my drive way multiple times. Clipping in and clipping out with my new clip-in shoes. I had enough scratches, bruises, cuts on my body and scuffs on my shoes that you would think I had gotten in a street fight with a pack of coyotes before I had even seen a foot of actual road pavement beneath me. I finally worked up my courage and picked the least dangerous path to take around a small community with limited traffic and wide streets. Every biking day was riddled with falls, chains coming lose, flat tires, and completely not understanding how I was supposed to change gears. In fact for the first month I put it in the hardest gear going up the hardest hills and vice-versa for the down hills. It made no sense but I had nothing to compare it to. I was lost.
I continued watching youtube tutorials and visiting the bike store, where they began to know me very well. Actually, 2 different times I sat on the side of the road with blood on my legs, and chain grease on my hands watching tutorials on the proper way to shift gears. The problem was I did not understand their terminology. I didn’t know which way was a higher gear and a lower gear, little chain, big chain and when to go to which. thereby getting my chains crossed, the chain coming off the spokes, followed by me not being able to clip out correctly and fall like a wall right over to my side, and what the heck was a ‘cassette’. I had no business being on that bike and much more being on the road at all. It was worthy of any comedic reality series. I was a mess. It really should not have been so complicated and in hind sight I see it’s really not, but it was like a foreign language to me. I was determined though. A triathlon was in my future and I would do anything to get there. So every time, every wound, every fall was followed by me back on that bike with tiny thin tires trudging up and down the hills.
The hills… the hills were the worst. Every new hill was followed by me not being able to go all the way up in one shot. I had to stop, breath (more like I’m dying kind of breathing), and get water, and try again… which, for the record, is really hard to do. What do I mean? Clipping back into biking pedals on a uphill slope was my nemesis. To this day, it is still not my forte. I also have accidentally stopped in the middle of intersections and had to hurry and run my bike (with my tail between my padded diaper legs) out of the way before the light turned green to crossing traffic. My kids would wait for me to get home every time to hear the stories of the adventures of mom looking like a fool. It was really fun. I actually mean that. It was so hard, and so challenging, and so so fun. I did eventually get out on much more open roads, bigger hills, and longer rides. My family and my desire kept me going, the goal kept me pushing, and the sun kept me smiling.
I had a friend watch me swim and give me pointers until I actually discovered they offer local adult swim classes, it’s true, they do. All over San Diego county they have something called Masters classes. I mean I did not look like a master at all, it was more like training a 2 year old to pat her head and rub her belly. The techniques to where the arms should enter the water to prevent shoulder pain, body position, hip rotation, reaching, breathing, kicking, alignment, etc, etc. If my body positioning was right I forgot to breath and if I was breathing my body positioning was all off. It took me weeks just look like a belonged in the lap pool at all. Then the ocean, the ocean, with it’s unidentified creatures, and unpredictable currents, and cold temperatures. I didn’t own a wetsuit or know the first thing about ocean swimming, which is much different then pool swimming. The first big ocean swim I did was with the Optimist Race off of San Diego’s Coronado Island in late July. There were three buoys to swim around then back to the shore. It was a 1 mile swim. I had gotten to the point where I could swim 1 mile in the pool and borrowed a wetsuit from a friend. I was nervous but ready. I ran in as fast as I can and the water began seeping in to my wetsuit every bit of shocking cold taking my already short breath away. By the time I go to the first buoy I was in a full blown anxiety attack. How do you take deep breaths when swimming in ocean water. I was losing control of my mind and thoughts. I rolled on to my back with tears in my eyes and just tried to float and take deep deep breaths even as the salt water splashed onto my face and up my nose. I eventually used some combination of doggy paddle and breast stroke to the second buoy and as I turned the corner was the first time, after everything I had been through, the money invested and the 3 months of training 6 days a week, I told myself… “I can’t do this, this was a mistake, I will never make it… it’s over… and what if I do survive the swim I would then have to bike 25 miles and run 6.2 miles… It’s over… do I wave for a lifeguard now and call it quits?” I felt tears burning in my eyes. I went to my back one more time took a couple deep breaths and thought “just finish this swim”. By the time I got to the 3rd buoy I was back and I was all in. I found my stroke, I found my groove, the water felt fresh and I was determined to not let the last 4 people behind me pass me. I finished the 1 mile swim and felt amazing, honestly, surprisingly amazing. I just did one of the hardest physically athletic challenges I had ever tried. Truth: about 100 people raced that morning and I finished about 95th, but I did get an awesome participation medal and my hope was restored. I was back on track and ready to keep trying for the triathlon.
Now to end the suspense… I did it. I completed the Nautica Malibu Olympic triathlon on September 10, 2018. The sun, my sun, was shining from the early hours of morning. The waves were bigger and the current stronger than the event coordinator had ever seen in the last 32 years. So much so, they cancelled the last 2 legs of swimmers to enter the water. The bike was beautiful, truly stunning up and down the Malibu coastline. The run was long, long and hot and hard, but I finished and I felt great! I felt amazing, I every leg faster than I had done before in conditioning. I wanted to do it again right away. I was hooked. Every day I am now outside training as winter approaches and the sun is shining I think how there’s no where else I would want to live than where the sun shines year long, feeding my very scientifically self-diagnosed Heliophilia. I love San Diego, I love Southern California, I love that we get to help others find homes in the place I love so much and now get to call home for the last 12 years.
