Most nurses dont get selfie requests from patients.
Or go for a run both before and after a 10-hour shift.
Or, you know, finish second in one of the worlds most prestigious marathons.
Scott Eisen/Getty Images
But Sarah Sellers isnt like most nurses.
So yeah, Sarah Sellers isnt like most nurses.
Or most eliteathletes, for that matter.
In the year since Boston, Sellers has continued to break the mold.
Its definitely been a wild last year, Sellers tells SELF.
That’s putting it lightly.
Before the 2018 Boston Marathon
Sellerss passion for running dates all the way back to middle school.
I just loved being outside, she remembers.
So Sellers quit running for an entire year.
Then, she spent the next several years ping-ponging between running, getting injured again, and stopping completely.
In 2017, for the first time since college, she started running consistently again.
Her younger brother, Ryan Callister, had qualified for the 2018 Boston Marathon.
She won the women’s division by nearly 15 minutes.
Her time of 2:44:27 broke the course recordand qualified her for Boston.
Sellers typically feels jittery before races, but this was her worst-ever case of pre-race anxiety.
It was only her second ever marathon, and she had high expectations for herself.
It was probably really going to hurt.
She arrived at the start line feeling completely relaxed.
The race started out much slower than Sellers had anticipated.
The solo stretches, where Sellers battled unrelenting rain and fierce headwinds with no protection, were brutal.
She wondered if shed be able to hold a strong pace.
When fellow American Rachel Hyland ran by the pack, Sellers broke off and joined her.
Some of the spectators were yelling that Shalane was just ahead, remembers Sellers.
It was just a really crazy experience.
At mile 23, Sellers realized she had just 5K left to go.
Still feeling good, she took the lead from Hyland and kind of just hammered the last three miles.
Sellerss excitement dipped.Oh, theyre probably just cheering for him,she thought.
She didnt know that she had finished second until after shed crossed the finish line.
At first, she thought second place meant second place in a specific division.
Kind of a big deal is another understatement.
Meanwhile, the media requests kept coming.
At the same time, she was also trying to physically recover from the race.
Everyone who could interview me, or who might want to interview me, has already done so.
At first, she kept track of how many interviews she did.
Just several weeks in, that number hit 80, at which point she stopped counting.
That she would win the marathon in the 2020 Olympics, for example.
Both sides dont know me as person and truly dont actually matter, says Sellers.
What does matter are her expectations, and the expectations of her coach.
But it took her time to reach that conclusion.
About three months after Boston, I struggled with my relationship with running, says Sellers.
The constant attention started to wear on her.
I felt like running had always been so simple and natural.
The aftermath of Boston complicated that.
The actual act of going out running was becoming a negative, stressful thing.
So she took a step back.
She remembered that she loved running simply because she loved running.
Not because she got second in the Boston Marathon.
Not because she won $75,000 in prize money.
Not because it brought her overnight fame.
This philosophy has continued to guide her forward.
In the fall, she ran theNew York City Marathon, her first big raceand first marathonsince Boston.
The training had its challenges; mainly, sickness and small injuries.
Then, the race itself was difficult.
Sellers battled stomach cramps and ran completely alone from mile nine to the end, finishing in 18th place.
Her tempo runs have been a bit speedier.
Overall, she feels stronger, faster, and more prepared.
As race day approaches, Sellers acknowledges that there are high expectations, both from herself and others.
My biggest mental goal this year is to not get worked up by any of it.
She knows that will be tough.
She anticipates, like last year, waking up on race morning feeling sick to her stomach with nerves.
She envisions the media appearances being a little bit stressful.
But shes going to try her hardest to embrace those feelings and just roll with it.
In March, the Olympics announced new qualifying standards for marathoners.
Thats why she plans to continue balancing both jobs.
When Sellers had adisappointing racein college, she tended to catastrophize it.
But being a nurse, she says, has given her day-to-day perspective that keeps these setbacks in check.
Shes considered quitting her job entirely to focus 100 percent on running.
But every time she envisions that reality, for some reason, I picture my running going worse.
I feel like my world would completely narrow…I would be more prone to overtrain.
But the chance of it happening is not zero.
