Having been in the sport of swimming for 20 years, I’ve been present during many electrifying moments when American or World Records have fallen.  None, however, have been as moving or inspiring as when I had the honor to cheer my team mate, Beth Kolbe, to breaking the 50 and 100 freestyle, and later 100 backstroke, American Records in Blodgett Pool.

Beth is one of the most incredible women I’ve ever met, displaying a degree of determination and courage rare and beautiful to see. Until the age of 14, she actually wasn’t a swimmer.  She played volleyball, softball, and soccer…until the day a terrifying car accident left her incompletely paralyzed from the chest down (she has the ability to move her arms, but has lost fine motor control in her hands).

She first got into the water as part of her physical therapy regime, and didn’t get serious about swimming until a Paralympic swimmer spotted her talent and encouraged her to train for a chance to compete at Paralympic Nationals.  Once an athlete, always an athlete – Beth saw an opportunity to be back on a team and challenge herself, and decided to see just how far she could go.

Beth was still a very new swimmer when she entered Blodgett Pool as a Harvard freshman.  None of us, probably not even Beth, knew where her journey would take her – she still had a lot to learn about technique and mechanics.  However, she threw herself into training.  When we were at the pool at 6am, so was Beth, swimming wherever there was space, doggedly pulling herself through thousands of yards alone.

• Side note:  For all of us able-bodied swimmers, just try to imagine the sort of mental toughness Beth had to execute when she trained.  First, have you ever tried to swim without your legs?  As in, without even adjusting your body to keep them floating?  Yeah, try this sometime:  take a rubber band and put it around your ankles.   Now keep your hands in a slight, open fist.  Without even tiny adjustments with your hips to keep your legs up, try to swim 25 yards.  Now imagine doing that for hours a day, for months on end, totally by yourself, constantly having to draw on your own strength for motivation.

Yeah.  This girl is a STUD.  Period.

When we were in the gym lifting, Beth was there, working with a strength coach right alongside us.  Nothing would stop her:  from chronic bursitis and tendonitis in her elbow, to a hard-core burn on her leg, Beth swam anyway, never complaining, always patient, always positive, always smiling.

As time went by, Beth got stronger.  Her technique got better.  Her turns became more efficient.  And one day, while our team mates and I screamed for her from the end of the lane, she broke the American Record in the 100 free for the first time.

She would proceed to break that record, and the others she set, several more times.

Four years later, Beth now holds the American Record for the 50, 100, and 200 freestyle and 50, 100, and 200 backstroke long-course, as well as the 50, 100, 200 freestyle, 50, 100, 200 backstroke, and the 50 fly for short-course.

That’s a total of 13 American Records for you math people out there.

She has represented the United States in England, Belgium, and Brazil.

And this past summer, Beth was a member of the Paralympic Swim Team that represented our country in the Beijing Olympics.

We applaud athletes who make comebacks from devastating injuries, but this is a story about courage taken to a whole new level. This is the story of a girl who, when dealt a life-altering blow, refused to give up on herself, found a new dream to believe in, and went after it with all her heart.  It’s a story so powerful it nearly brings tears to my eyes.

For these reasons, and because she’s one of the kindest individuals I know, Beth is on my list of People Who Inspire Me.

This week has not been going well.

For whatever reason, on Thursday morning the stress and dissatisfaction I’ve been feeling over certain aspects of my life surged to a raging war inside my body.  A war between my tempered rational side, fighting to contain a virtual melt-down, and my fiery emotional side, struggling to break out in physical manifestations of my discontent.   By 2pm the rational side was well on the road to annihilation, a huge ball of anxious energy was expanding in my chest, and I feared that at any moment I would either scream or burst into tears.

The last time I felt like this was during my sophomore year at Harvard.  It was 11pm and I was feeling claustrophobic from the mess of frustration, helplessness, stress, and inexplicable sadness stifling my soul. I had a physical need to get out, to release the tension from my body.  So I tied on a pair of running shoes and took off down the frozen, dark streets of Cambridge, running as hard as I could, not caring where I was going.

My feet took control, and I found myself 20 minutes later facing the entrance to Blodgett Pool.  I swiped my ID card, and was shocked to hear the lock click open. The deck lights were off, casting dark shadows across the water.  The building was so silent, it seemed even the filtration system was holding its breath.  Being 11:30pm, I had a vague sense that I wasn’t supposed to be there.

I didn’t hesitate for a second.

Suit on. Cap on. Goggles on.  Flying through the air, shattering the mirror-like stillness, streamline underwater, five fluid dolphin kicks, breaking up through the surface with my first stroke, water racing along my body.  I swam, alone, flying at my own pace, for once without regard for the clock, not thinking, not feeling, just letting my jumbled emotions flow out of me as I enjoyed the basic pleasure of moving through this liquid environment with strength and grace.

By the time I returned home that night (to an admittedly deserved safety lecture from my neighbor), I had regained a sense of equilibrium and balance.

I needed that again.  Now.

I took off, in my car this time, down the 101, my sights on the Dolphin Club.  I need to swim.  I need to swim. I repeated the mantra over and over to myself.  But not in a pool.  Not with other people.  Not with a pace clock.  I desperately needed to escape into my own aquatic world.

I charged into the 57 degree cove, for once welcoming the frigid shock as the cold enveloped my body.  I swam hard and fast, my stroke long, my tempo up, racing into the setting sun, the brilliant gold light blinding me whenever I sighted ahead.  As I did 4 years ago, I stopped thinking.  I let my thoughts dissolve into the opaque blue-green that danced around me, hearing nothing but rise, fall, and break of the water.  I let the tension slip away with each breath.

45 minutes later, I was exhausted from the cold, and from sprinting away my issues.  But finally, I felt some peace restored to my psyche, the raging fire not quenched, but at least dimmed to a flicker.

For me, swimming isn’t just a sport, a way to exercise, a competitive outlet, or a challenge.  Swimming helps me maintain my sanity.  I’m so grateful to my father for getting me into the sport of swimming.  I’m sure everyone has something they love, and their own means to escape when overwhelmed by the world.

Swimming is mine.  What’s yours?