Esther McCarthy: My teen is my trainer for the Echo Women's Mini-Marathon

Esther McCarthy. Picture: Emily Quinn

About 10 years ago, I got a birthday present of Ruth Field’s Run Fat Bitch Run, from my husband.

By the time he came out of the coma and recovered from the surgery, I’d actually read it and, to be fair, there were some brilliant nuggets in there.

It inspired me to join a couch-to-5k group and we used to meet at the Lee fields twice a week, walking and jogging intermittently until we progressed to running 5km with relative ease.

Self high-five. Done and dusted. In my head, I can now run a 5k.

So, when a little family group decide to take part in the 43rd Echo Women's Mini Marathon, I am deluded enough to imagine I will be able to do it with ease.

But those intervening years have not been kind, my friends, and incredibly my not running more than a tap since then has led to me being massively unfit.

So now I’m having a mini panic attack about the mini marathon. At least it gets my heart rate up.

I’m so jealous of those cool people who casually say, ‘I’m just going for a run’, pop a homemade protein ball, and then gallop off, all earbuds and effortlessness and coordinated hand motions and normal cholesterol levels. The smug bastards.

But it’s important that I do it. My cousin is 15 and he’s travelling from Cork to Dublin to get dialysis three times a week.

When he’s 16, he can go on the kidney donor list. The Irish Kidney Association have been a huge support for the family, so we are taking part to raise funds for them.

The mini marathon website has a countdown clock with the days, hours, minutes, and seconds left to the day of the race, September 22. Less than a month! Gah!! This shit just got real. I thought I had loads of time to train.

I do tend to put things on the long finger. I could pick a fella’s nose in Donegal with that finger, is what I’m saying.

So I do the only reasonable thing with a short timeline and wobbly self accountability — I bribe my teenager to train me.

This will work. It simply is not an option to not follow through, or he will be able to lord it over me forever.

So, the first morning, he texts me to get my arse out of bed. It is with resigned dread I pull on the only pair of trainers I own that don’t have a platform or a sparkle. I might actually be able to run in them without turning an ankle.

I have run out of excuses not to go, so now, dear reader, it is time to run out of breath.

We start off with a little warmup session, stretching the quads and waggling our ankles. In my head I imagine a little Rocky montage.

I see myself running up steps somewhere (the courthouse in Cork City is the best I can come up with) in slow motion and punching the air in triumph, two stone lighter. Look at me, manifesting the shite out of it. Yeah!

We start with a soft jog, me humming ‘Eye of the Tiger’ under my breath. My smartwatch gets an awful fright. It leaps into action and asks me if I want to start logging a workout. 

I didn’t even know it had that function. It’s delighted with itself, finally something to do, besides ringing my phone when I can’t find it. It starts tracking my heartrate and mapping the course using GPS and timing me.

It needn’t have bothered.

Although thanks to it, I know that it is precisely two and a half minutes later that I am bent over, wheezing like Muttley, and panicking that I haven’t made a will.

‘Pause workout?’ the watch asks. Sarcastically, I feel.

My son is waiting patiently, jogging on the spot as I hold a finger up to him and try not to puke on his Nike Dunks. He looks at me with a mixture of pity and puzzlement. 

I’m a bit baffled myself. I actually thought I was reasonably fit — I mean, you should see me in my yoga weights class.

But we haven’t even left our estate yet, and I’m gasping like a carp. Morto.

I persevere. We do 2.6km in 23 minutes. Pathetic. He makes me sprint at the end and it feels like I am moving backwards through porridge. 

That night, the bit in between my shoulder blades hurts like hell, and I do the ‘hurghghhhnah’ noise every time I sit down or get up.

Day two. He texts me again, I’m ready baby. I have two bras on, and am immediately more aerodynamic. I think my boobs actually swung over a shoulder the day before — sure no wonder my back was sore!

My pace is quicker, I can actually talk to him and when he tells me to sprint, I’m going forwards instead of defying the laws of physics and time.

I am full of hope in my heart and lactic acid in my muscles.

Now I can actually hold a conversation with him while we move along our route, adding a little bit each day. I’ve found my pace (slightly faster than a snail’s) and I’m finding myself looking forward to it.

It’s nice to have this time together, and I like that he’s in charge, I just do what I’m told.

Now, if anyone has a good protein ball recipe, let me know, will ye?

• Register here for your place in the Echo Women's Mini Marathon.