Q&A: Alexandra Heminsley

You talk about not being ‘sporty’, or ‘able to run’. But you’ve now run marathons and written a book about running. What got you started?

I’m the nerdy brainy one — not the sporty one. I was clumsy — although I’m less clumsy now because exercising has given me much more physical awareness. And that was self-perpetuating. I thought my body was crap. But I had a really specific moment that clicked for me.

I’d had my first book published about heartbreak — it was a really big summer, coupled with the crash of summer 2007, and everything felt very depressing. My parents had moved house, and we were helping them unpack. My brother was talking about running the London marathon and I said “I wish I could run”. My dad got a cup from the top corner cupboard to make a coffee, so his voice went into the corner and boomed back out. “It’s not that you can’t, it’s that you don’t,” he said. It was a semantic revelation that you think you can’t do it until you try and do it. It’s so easy to dismiss your own capabilities because you haven’t tried. Trying to start something new is admitting that you haven’t done it before. It’s intimidating. Asking for help can be really overwhelming. I had that sudden little click of “oh — no-one else cares.”

How do you explain to people that think that sport is all about physical health that it has a massive impact on mental wellbeing too?

It’s so important to separate it from either weight loss or being a massive cure-all for mental health. It sits somewhere between the two; you can be more well and you might lose some weight. The chances are it will help you with your mental health — but I want people to understand that it’s of value for its own sake.

You can go for a run and enjoy the experience of how it makes you feel. You need to untether it from an app on your phone telling you how much you weigh, and obsessing about “am I better?” Enjoy it for its own sake. When I started there weren’t even iPhones, so I didn’t really know how fast I could run. Because we can constantly quantify ourselves, it’s very hard to not judge ourselves against a dream potential future you — or a longed-for ex-you.

It’s OK to run 3k round the park and look at the leaves. It doesn’t mean you’re a crappy part time runner. A lot of people don’t feel confident in that. I always get asked how much you have to do to be a swimmer or a runner — it’s like there’s a golden gate that you have to pass through. There isn’t.

What are the rewards it gives you?

There are so many. It taught me that I can stick to a challenge — I can make a decision to learn to swim or do a marathon or be a runner. Making the decision is a huge part of the process — you’re so far down the road when you’ve made that commitment. And that’s the same for writing books and IVF, and other difficult things in my life where I’ve doubted myself. I have that in the bank. I know that I’ve got more grit than I dreamt of ten years ago. You give yourself the confidence that you can achieve things you never though was possible.

And then there’s the animal part of exercise. I like the feeling of when my blood has all moved around my body — I feel refreshed and can feel that it’s good for me. I love a shower after a cold swim or sweaty run, where my skin feels activated by having to work a bit harder. I’ve made friends and strengthened existing connections and I’ve been all over the world because of it. I know people I wouldn’t have ever come across.

It’s opened up windows on the world that I would never have had if I hadn’t made that commitment. At a marathon you feel the heights of emotion, with people you’ll never see again. You truly engage in eye contact — that sense of “you can do this” and they really want you to. It feels great and is a total high, but equally comparable to running a 5k that manages to shift your mood. It’s a magical alchemy within us — an amazing gift to have at our disposal. So why not use it? It’s like having a really nice whisky and never drinking it.

What impact has it had on you as a freelancer?

Exercise is such brilliant thinking time — unless it’s a team sport, when you’re more immediately focused on other people. I think I’d have written about 50% as much if I didn’t exercise. I think while I’m moving — there’s a plethora of quotes from writers about needing to walk/ swim/ run. That idea that you need a sense of motion to get mental motion.

It takes the pressure off the thinking when you’re doing something else. If you sit on a chair at you desk, the spotlight’s on, the stage is set — there’s too much pressure… Freelancers’ greatest curse is that there’s so much solitude. While it’s wonderful — there’s no tie or heels to wear to the office, and a lovely sense of freedom — we’ve all had weeks where we’ve got to Thursday afternoon without wearing a proper bra, or wearing your oldest trainers all week. And it does start to affect your mental attitude.

It’s a discipline. I’ve been freelance for 14 years now and the first year was a disaster zone. I got dressed about once every ten days. It was my first house with wifi and I literally spent all day online. You’ll be unsurprised to hear that that was before I started exercising. It gives you structure and human contact, and thinking time too…

Do you need a target when you’re exercising?

All the research shows that the thing that keeps you exercising is not to do with goals and targets — it’s the socialisation. Join a group and you end up getting along with the people in it; there’s an obligation. It’s a human connection.

There’s a tendency to think of swimming and running as solo sports and they kind of are. But there’s a contract of human interaction that’s involved in races — so many people are running for a family member, or in memory of a family member. There are huge support teams involved. You can support and cheer other people, even if you don’t know anyone. It works across the board. Even elite runners don’t look effortless — you can see it written on their faces. They still share every step on their face.

I’m very conscious not to make people think they’re not running if they’re not training for a marathon. It’s a wonderful way to start, but it’s not the only way. There’s a certain magic to training for the first time and you’re slightly better than the week before. It’s an incredible feeling what can be achieved by running around your city, day after day.

Do you get different things from running and swimming?

I thought I’d be a great swimmer; that I just needed a positive mental attitude. But I completely underestimated a level of technical ability. A cheery disposition can’t change the tides, and I had to learn flexibility. With running, I learnt about grit. Swimming gave me a flexibility that was essential; navigating being in the sea. It’s so important for freelancers — when you’ve cleared the day and your inbox is met with silence. Or you’ve taken the afternoon off to go to the park and all you can see is the emails pinging into your inbox, but you don’t have the luxury of an out of office.

Swimming was much scarier. With running, my biggest fear was shame; of having to stop. That was as bad as it could get. That I’d be sitting on the side of the road and the medics would come and take me away. But with swimming it soon became clear that if you don’t learn to do this you could just die. That raised the stakes.

One of the things I loved when I started running was that I really got to know the city. Swimming is more of a sensory deprivation. It feels like I imagine meditation to be — there’s a non-specific roaring noise. You can see, but not really see. You surrender to that. There’s a pleasure in the surrender and your brain unhooks and wanders off and thinks weird thoughts. It you’re standing by the kettle, you always end up looking at your phone.

The thing I’ve become interested in is the connection between body and mind. It’s become very distorted in the last 100 years, since we became a wealthy country. There are corners of the internet and the world that believe that to pursue the body beautiful will solve all of your body problems; and there are others that believe that your body is just a bag of bones and flesh that you carry around with you. They’re both wrong — you can only live your fullest life if you make a meaningful connection between the two. You can’t be only what you are on the inside, because we make decisions about what you are on the outside; and vice versa. We are both. Writing about that is my passion.

How do you get people to step outside their comfort zone and try something that might make them feel body conscious or self conscious?

Just by telling the truth… I’m a profoundly average person. It’s great when someone who’s an athlete says all that stuff but they’ve been given a genetic advantage — I wasn’t. I couldn’t make a career our of that. I’ve fluctuated between a 10 and a 14 over the years, and that’s been tethered to my emotional wellbeing most of the time. There’s no point in making yourself perfect in order to say these things — the connection is made if you talk about the process, not the result.

But it’s true that I’ve broken through a certain threshold of embarrassment — to try things and give them a go, which can be hugely intimidating. When I started swimming, I didn’t know whether the benefits would outweigh the humiliation of walking to the side of the pool. But it totally did.

How do people reacts to your books?

Oh God. I did an event in Edinburgh and someone cried and said that Running Like a Girl had helped her sister stay off heroin. I think she needs to take a lot of the credit herself for not taking heroin, but even the idea that she could consider me part of that support network is extraordinary. I get a lot of letters from people who’ve gone through grief — who’re raising money in the name of the person they’ve lost. It’s amazing to hear from people.

I interviewed Kate Atkinson recently and she talked about the act of writing — being able to prompt a physical response in someone. Their heart rate rises with a thriller. I love that me running ten years ago, then sitting in a chair five years later is transforming itself into people running this year. It’s like witchcraft.

Alexandra Heminsley is a journalist and author of the bestselling books Run Like a Girl and Leap In.