I did my first "run" on the 10th January. Remember what it was like then? Freezing! And, over the next few weeks, we had snow, ice and freezing fog. But I kept going; besides Caitlin wouldn't let me off, the woman's a Nazi and it "brings her joy". I'm not sure if she means helping me to get running or watching me suffer. She tells that the only weather that justifies not running is wind strong enough to fell a tree.

You need to understand that I do not do cold. There is a permanent tussle over the thermostat in our house. I wear four layers to my husband's two and I like snow only when I'm looking at it from behind double glazing.

People kept saying, "I bet you wish you’d started this in the summer" but, no, honestly, this is great. When spring has finally sprung I will be cock-a-hoop with joy. Like banging your head repeatedly against a brick wall, running in the snow and ice will be wonderful when it stops. Imagine if I'd started in golden autumnal warmth. Would I have made it through winter? Not a hope! This is all I know; this is what I think running is: freezing fingers, arctic blasts in the ears and a searing pain in the throat. When you've run wearing long johns under your trackies and a hat that makes you look like Compo, your dignity can have no further to fall. The only possible way is up. There was a point when we were running with actual snow falling from the actual sky when hysteria set in and I began warbling:

"Right!" said Caitlin, "If you can sing you can't possibly be working hard enough" and she made me up the pace a bit. I didn't see that one coming. Enough jollity then.

We started off with 8 sessions of running for one minute with ninety seconds of brisk walking in between. Sounds pathetic doesn't it? But, for someone who can't manage a run for the bus, this is epic. I was lulled into a false sense of security despite having a stonking blister from my new running shoes. The night before our second run I went out for a drink with some other mums and had a couple too many. Caitlin, in customary jolly hockey sticks style, reassured me that a run in the morning would be "refreshing". "Refreshing!?" I replied, "I'm quite refreshed now, thanks!" My second session, therefore, involved a hangover and didn't go quite as smoothly. On the other hand, I arrived back home to find my family still in their PJ's and enjoyed a good hour of being smug as Hell!

After three sessions of this, she told me we were moving on to seven lots of two minutes with one minute of walking in between. So, swapping from mostly walking to mostly running. I was completely convinced that I couldn't do this. But it turns out that I could; I felt sick by the end of the first session but not by the third. Relative levels of nausea; this is how I measure progress. That and by the particular tree that I’d reached after my first session and, inexplicably, had made it past to the Rhododendron bushes and round the corner two weeks later. To infinity and beyond!

When I started out, I tweeted that I was contemplating my first run and someone responded that, in no time, "contemplating" would become "looking forward to" followed by "can't wait". I'm not at "can't wait" yet but I have grudgingly admitted that I'm enjoying it. Not the running exactly but the measurable progress. Twitter is full of folks who have taken this same path from couch potato to running and, to a woman, they say "if I can do it anyone can". I'm reading tweets saying how I've inspired others and I'm feeling like a fraud because I'm at home drinking gin and eating the kids' quavers. But it seems we all feel that way. We all think we're the worst of the worst and if we can achieve what we achieve, so can anyone.

After my first session Caitlin said, "You're not as bad as I thought you would be" or possibly, "You're not as bad as you think you are", I'm not too sure. Heads up ladies, none of us is as bad as we think we are.

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