From alcoholic to ultramarathon runner: one woman’s journey to trying to break a Canadian record

Milne is a mom, wife, grad student, coach and an ultramarathon runner. She has everything going for her now, but life wasn’t always this way.

“I ran a whole marathon in Copenhagen while drinking,” Milne said. “Mostly because at that point, I was so physically addicted as soon as I stopped drinking alcohol, I would have a seizure. So I had to keep some in my system. It was awful.”

Milne’s running journey started in her teens and continued throughout her addiction. Now she’s a recovering alcoholic who will be nine years sober in February.

Her strong will and goal-oriented personality are what help her succeed as a runner. Her husband says it’s also what helped her get sober.

“She basically does it on her own,” Shawn Parsons said. “The help was available but when she was ready to accept it, everyone was there for her and something happened in her mind and decided enough was enough and she was going to go another route in her life.”

This different route has taken Milne around the world running races of unimaginable distances. In a few weeks, she’ll attempt to break a Canadian record, running more than 734.25 kilometres over six days.

Milne will be competing in Across the Years, a multi-day running event in Arizona that starts Dec. 28 and ends Jan. 3.

She’ll have 144 hours to run as far as she can.

“It’s about 124 kilometres a day that I’ll need to run,” Milne said. “I know I’m physically capable of doing that.”

“I feel really incredibly grateful to be able to do this, every run, regardless of if I beat the record,” Milne said. “It’s such a gift I can move my body and I’m sober because if I continued, I would definitely be dead at this point.”

Record aside, Milne is running for a bigger purpose.

After losing many family members and friends to substance use, she wanted to raise awareness and money for Moms Stop the Harm.

“Originally, I was just going to raise $1 for every kilometre I was running, about 735,” Milne said. “Then my mom suggested why not raise $1 for every life that was lost in Alberta in 2021 to the opioid epidemic, which is around 1,600.”

She’s started a GoFundMe page to raise money for her cause.

Milne’s got the confidence and training behind her and a motivation near and dear to her heart.

by Teagan Rasche

From alcoholic to ultramarathon runner: one woman’s journey to trying to break a Canadian record

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