Leaving UNC

“There is someone here who needs to speak to you,” Coach Watson told me as I arrived at our afternoon cross-country practice. We were about to hop in the team van to head to a nearby trail for a workout. “They are in Coach Craddock’s office.”

Concerned, I walked away from our team vans through the UNC-Chapel Hill track training facility to our head coach’s office. Two FBI agents were waiting for me. I knew what it was about.

My mom had called me on a burner phone a couple of days before letting me know she and my younger sister were on their way to South Carolina. My younger sister, Annelise, ran away from our dad’s house in Minnesota on Halloween. That night, my mom’s friend picked Annelise up and drove her to our mom in Northern Michigan. Since then, my mom and Annelise had been bouncing from place to place in Northern Michigan to avoid being caught by the authorities. Some people from my mom’s childhood church lived in that area and supported keeping my mom and sister together, so they worked together to hide them. One of the families from the church now lived in South Carolina and happened to be visiting the Upper Peninsula when my mom and Annelise were there. This family agreed to take my mom and Annelise south to stay at their home for a while. From there, they planned to drive to the Canadian border so my mom and sister could gain refugee protection. If you think that sounds like a rough plan, you are right. My mom does not typically carefully think through her plans.

Carver County Court in Minnesota ordered my mom to end contact with Annelise. For Annelise and my mom, that was torture. Annelise, my mom, and I did not believe the court should have completely ended my mom’s contact with her. However, this was not a new issue. The court similarly ordered my mom to end contact with me when I was in high school. The basis for the order had been school delinquency and an unstable living environment. My mom and I had not had a home for at least a year when this order was sent out and I had missed months of school. We had moved from relative to relative and hotel to hotel. But I refused to leave my mom. Instead, I convinced my mom to go to Michigan to hide with me. We only had a few months to dodge a pick-up order before I turned 18. But this time, Annelise was only 13. That would have meant five, likely impossible, years of hiding in the US before she turned 18.

I knew all of this, but would never tell the FBI agents. I wanted my sister to be with my mom and I knew the system that was supposed to protect us had betrayed my family, so I did not trust the FBI with the truth. The FBI agents questioned me exhaustively. There was an Amber Alert out for my sister. Did I know anything about who might take her or what their plans were? Did I know where my mom was? No, I lied. I was crying hard. I thought I had done a “good” job of storing my anxiety around what was going on while I was in school, but this questioning made me break down. The agents did not get any information from me and eventually let me go.

After they released me, an assistant track coach sat next to me on the high jump cushion to comfort me. He told me his parents had gotten divorced, too. He knew how hard that could be and was there for me if I wanted to talk. It was sweet, but I couldn’t imagine he knew what this was like. I felt like an outsider.

My coach and teammates hadn’t waited for me to finish the interrogation. They were at the trail for the day’s workout by the time I was done, so I would run the workout on the track with our head track coach supporting. Dazed, I walked out to the track, warmed up, and ran 800s. I remember the blue track and Coach Craddock calling out my splits and telling me to relax my shoulders. I don’t remember if I ran the prescribed splits. I don’t know if I could relax my shoulders. I was carrying a lot of weight.

As soon as the workout ended and I walked far enough away from the training fields, I called my mom’s burner phone to let her know the FBI had questioned me. The plans to head to Canada became more urgent. And now I was certain I wanted to go. I knew if my mom and sister were caught or if they did not successfully gain refugee status, my mom would go to jail and my sister would be sent back to my dad’s or foster care. If I didn’t go along, no one would be around to get my mom out of jail. On that phone call, I asked my mom how far away they were and when they could pick me up. They were already in South Carolina, so I left UNC in the middle of the night that night, leaving most of my belongings behind in my dorm room. I left without telling anyone.

Although it is tough to say in hindsight, it is possible I would not have gone to support my mom and sister if things had been going well for me at UNC. I was constantly torn between saving my mom and Annelise and moving forward with my own life. But when two difficult situations collided, I usually prioritized my mom.

I felt betrayed and abandoned by my cross-country coach and frustrated with my performance at UNC. The coach lost interest in me and my potential since I was not performing well. I was overtrained and exhausted from running 80+ miles per week when my body was used to 40. Why did this coach recruit and add me to the team to ignore me? Because to him, I was just a number. If my body did not respond to the high training volume, then I did not matter. It was my body’s fault, not his training. There was another athlete who could step in, who desperately wanted the chance to be there. I was unaware the collegiate athletics system had churned me out. I now know it happens to athletes everywhere, at all levels, in every sport, but it was the first time it had happened to me. And I was devastated. Even as stressed as I was by outside events, I knew what was happening with my coaching at UNC was wrong.

My mom gently questioned me, “Are you sure you want to come with us, honey?” I knew she wanted me to come along because that was why they had driven to South Carolina before heading to Canada, but she did harbor some guilt for how much she leaned on me and would express it occasionally.

“Yes, mom, no one really cares about me here. [or something dramatic along those lines]. And you and Annelise will always be more important than running.”

That wasn’t entirely true. I always felt family was more important than running, but my teammates loved and cared about me. I struggled with feeling lonely and empty and I had no idea it was likely not the average loneliness kids might feel being far from home, but also the weight of the environment I had grown up in. It was not just bad coaching, there was an emptiness I had that perfect coaching would never be able to fill.

I got along best with my multi-All-American international teammate whose parents couldn’t be around much either. She liked me because I would express my taste even if it contradicted hers, which most of my teammates were a bit scared to do. She had a junky car, but few of us had a car, so it was exciting to explore and do random things with her. One day, I talked her into driving to a yogi potluck in the North Carolina woods. We did not fit in with the hippies in our UNC workout gear, but they were ecstatic we were there.

I miss her. And I miss the mundane moments I’d have with all the friends I’d leave behind anytime I’d let myself get swept up in my family’s issues. By the time we were done running from the law and I could be back on social media and use my phone again, many of my friends had been too hurt by me cutting them out completely, without explanation. Even if they were open to starting the relationship again, we lived so far from each other after I’d run away that it was difficult. I was perpetually losing any community I had around me to take care of my mom. And soon leaving people behind felt more comfortable to me than keeping them close, even when I wasn’t trying to save my mom.

I did not know how to value and prioritize my friends. I knew that I desperately missed them anytime I would run with my mom, but my mom always taught me family (and mostly that meant mom) was more important.

I was obedient, particularly obedient to my mom. She trained me to listen to her over myself. By extension, I often listened to my coach, society, and anybody but myself. And my body paid the price.

Running was my escape and my relief but at times, it also became an addiction, another physical form of trauma. That is why it is still hard to think about racing now, to measure my running instead of just enjoying it. I hurt my body by overtraining and undereating to get fast. And for what? Love and attention? Freedom from one abusive situation only to enter a new and unfamiliar abusive situation? Running allowed me to leave my chaotic childhood circumstance (through scholarships) but also hurt me (overtraining and injury and the collegiate sports system). It is a duality I admit to but do not yet fully understand. Had I not been a runner, what might I have turned to? Since I was an obedient girl, it is difficult for me to imagine myself turning to drugs. Would I have started writing sooner? I hope this would be true, but we cannot know. Several of my siblings (understandably) used drugs as an escape.

I could go for a run when I needed freedom and space from my mom, even when we were in hiding. All I needed were running shoes. It was a place she could not come with me. I could be alone.

On our way to Canada, we stayed at the home of a relative of the people who were driving us to the border. My mom had not allowed us to spend any time outside during the day and said I could not run because someone might notice and report us. I missed running. So that night, in a rare moment, I defied my mom and woke up at 3:30 am to run while everyone slept. I’ve seldom experienced the serenity I felt on that run. The stars were bright enough to light the quiet neighborhood and I didn’t see a single person out or a house light on. It was just me, no watch and no coach. I ran until I felt I had enough and returned to the house, quietly entered, showered off, and climbed back into bed next to my sister before anyone else woke up.