Running in Afghanistan was an act of defiance. Now in Canada, I run to show others they can

This First Person column is the experience of Atefa Rahimi, who moved from Afghanistan to Saskatoon. For more information about CBC's First Person stories, please see the FAQ .

It was still dark when my little sister and I got up at 2 a.m. to train before everyone else in Kabul woke up. I felt like I was touching the sky as we ran through the beautiful, towering hills that surrounded our city.

We were hungry and tired, but I didn't care. I felt alive. 

Running has filled me with joy and energy through the darkest parts of my life, first in Afghanistan and now in Canada.

I was only 14 when my mother died. I had no choice but to become a mother figure to my four younger siblings. I was a child, but I stepped into an adult's role. It was my job to take care of my siblings, our house in Kabul and everything else that came with it. It felt like life was collapsing on me. 

Through all that pain, sport helped me survive. I was introduced to kung fu in 2017, and a year later, joined a running team in the city. My family hadn't supported me in either activity. I'd had to fight with my relatives and a society around me that didn't believe that girls should do sports. 

There was no one I could look at — in my family, my community or beyond — and say, "She did it, so I can too." I had to become that person. 

I became the first woman in my entire family and extended relatives to become an athlete. There wasn't a single day when it was easy. But slowly, something started to change. My cousins started doing sports. Their families began to allow it, little by little, because they saw me doing it first.

In a place where I had never even seen a woman ride a bicycle, where the idea of a girl running through the streets was