For Josh and Fernando

COEUR d'ALENE - It is a cloudy, cold weekday morning as Monica Preciado jogs along Dalton Avenue.

Soon, she'll turn onto Government Way. Next, a left on Appleway. With another left turn on 15th, she will shortly arrive back at her parents' house. Six miles. Under an hour.

But before the woman in the gray sweat jacket and black pants finishes, as she keeps her feet stepping steadily in her Mizuno shoes, as the traffic rumbles past, she'll think about her life. She'll think about her husband, Fernando Preciado. She'll think about her brother, Josh Wright. And her children.

Sometimes, she still hears Josh's voice, urging her to run faster. It is those times she laughs, even smiles.

"My brother is with me. Fernando is with me. They're watching me. They know this is good for me. I run a little bit better," Monica, 33, says as she relaxes in her parents' living room, drinking water and eating a PowerBar.

"I run a lot and I think about my brother. I think about Fernando," she continues. "I think about all the runs I've done."

And there are more to come. More marathons. More halfs. More 10Ks and 5Ks. But one, the race Monica is training for these days, is her single focus. It drives her on as she crosses streets, hops over puddles and feels the rain and wind in her face.

It's the Marine Corps Marathon on Oct. 30 in Washington, D.C.

There, she will be running in memory of her twin brother, Josh Wright, who died Sept. 13, 2009, after a lifelong battle with aplastic anemia, and her husband, Staff Sgt. Fernando Preciado, who died in a motorcycle accident a month later at the age of 32.

Monica will also be running to raise money and awareness for the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors, which provides comfort, care and counseling for anyone who has suffered the loss of a military loved one.

Monica lost two.

Her brother was known for his support of the military. He mailed care packages, letters - whatever might raise the spirits of the men and women of the armed services.

Her husband was in the Marine Corps 10 years before transferring to the Army. He was involved in military intelligence, had recently returned from Korea, and had accepted an instructor position in California so he could be home more often.

"He was getting tire of the deployments. He'd done two tours in Iraq and two in Afghanistan," Monica said.

The deaths of her brother and her husband hit hard. A longtime runner, Monica gave it up. Quit. Done. No more time alone to ponder life. Her children had to come first.

"Running has always been everything for me," she said. "I love doing it. It's always been something I've done."

And Josh was her trainer, the one who encouraged her.

When Monica ran the Marine Corps Marathon in 2007 to raise money for Operation Second Chance, another program to help military families, he constantly texted her throughout the 26.2-mile course.

"Run faster," came a message.

"Are you done yet?"

"Why aren't you done yet?"

Running, for Monica was fun. A blast. A pick-me-up.

"Running is therapy for me. It makes me feel good," she said.

But when both men she loved died within a month of each other, she stopped.

"I couldn't do it. I couldn't bring myself to do it. All my priority went to my kids," she said. "It was about them, so I stopped running."

Family rock

A military wife, she says, always knows there's a possibility she could become a single mom without warning.

"But you never think it's going to happen," she said. "You always think, 'it's not going to be my family.' Then it became my family. Now their kids didn't have their dad."

Monica pushed on with life because that was her only choice. Military moms are trained to be strong, to be the family rock when dad's not around.

After Fernando's death, Monica spent as much time as she could with her children, Mae, Nathan, Adrianna and Isaac. She threw her energy, too, into work at Kootenai Medical Center, where she's a surgical technologist, a job that comes with high stress and long hours.

Her colleagues, though, and her family, too, noticed she wasn't OK. She couldn't hide it. Inside, she was hurting. Despite Monica's assurances she was just fine, they insisted she take time off. Regroup. Recover. Relax.

So she did.

It was then, she turned to TAPS.

The program provided assistance, including a counselor who had several sessions via the phone with Monica.

"What is it that you like to do? What makes you feel good?" the counselor asked.

Running, came the answer.

"When was the last time you ran?"

Don't know.

"Maybe you need to go for a run," the counselor suggested.

"I went, 'You're probably right."

The next day, that's what she did.

It didn't exactly go like you might get in a movie, legs churning faster and stronger than ever, arms pumping, sweat pouring, head held high.

"I practically had a meltdown," she recalled, laughing. "A mile into it, I'm crying, thinking this is the stupidest thing. Why am I running? Then I'm thinking, this is dumb, why am I crying?"

She would not, could not, stop.

"The farther I ran, the better I felt," she said.

Two miles into her run, she stopped crying. At mile 3, she was laughing. And at mile 4, she could hear her brother's voice.

"Keep running," he said. "You're not running fast enough. Why are you not running fast enough?"

By 6 miles, Monica Preciado was done.

Running felt good again.

Marathon time

The next morning, she registered online for the Marine Corps Marathon, which filled within an hour. She wanted to run for her brother, her husband, her children, and TAPS.

The program was there when she needed it, she said, and will be there for others, too, with case workers, crisis intervention and trauma resources. She hopes to raise $5,000.

Monica comes from a military background. Her father, Neal Wright, was in the Marine Corps. An uncle was retired Navy. Another was also in the Marine Corps.

"Even though there's not a base here, there's still support, and that's important," she said.

"I figured if I could help raise money to keep all that going for helping me out, and helping my kids, why not? So I took up the cause and started training," she said.

She's been running about 40 miles a week, mornings, afternoons or nights, either on the streets of Coeur d'Alene or around Hayden Lake, where she lives.

She always runs with an iPhone strapped to her shoulder should work call, and usually wears a hat, her brown hair tucked underneath. She listens to the Dixie Chicks, "anything country." Her brother Josh made music CDs for her, too, which bring back wonderful memories.

"Just so long as I have a good beat, keep the rhythm up," she said, smiling.

Running, she explains with a smile, is no longer an option.

"If I don't run, I'm kind of cranky," she said, chuckling. "My kids will say, there's the treadmill. Go run mom."

Her father and her children will be waiting at the Marine Corps Marathon finish line. She expects to take around 5 hours.

"I'm not really in it for the time. I'm into finish it. I want to be proud of myself when I finish," she said.

Her father, Neal Wright, said his daughter has faced her share of trials and tribulations. She has never stepped away from a challenge.

"She keeps going. She's as stubborn as her mom, maybe more so, I'm not sure," Wright said, chuckling.

"Life hasn't been the bowl of cherries she thought it was going to be," he added. "She has fallen down. She's still going, still kicking, still running."