Wednesday, July 15, 2009

A lot to say

I will try to bring you up to speed as to what happened to me. My heel continued to get worse and I became so discouraged that I could not bear to write about it. When I am injured, I try my best to avoid anything to do with running. I won't even read my Runner's World magazine when it comes in the mail. I was the most motivated I have ever been and was running great. Then all the sudden out of nowhere I was sidelined again. My running does a lot for me mentally, emotionally, and physically so it has been very tough.

Determined to stay in shape, I purchased a road bike. The first week I got it I rode 140 miles and loved every minute of it. It was my first experience on a road bike and it was really good. But then the unthinkable happened. I got an injury from the bike. The upper part of my shin/lower part of my knee had become very sensitive and was hurting when I placed pressure on it. I continued to push through the pain but it was getting worse. After 3 weeks I made an appointment with an ortho. I have had bad experiences in the past but I just had to give it a shot.

Last Friday I went to see Dr. Hill. He was great. My favorite thing about him was that he wanted to come up with a solution that kept me active, and he was curious about what active for me was. His prognosis was irritation and inflammation. He prescribed an anti inflammatory and told me not to slow down. Well, I took him seriously. The next two days I road 50 miles and ran a mile. That's right, I ran a mile and my heel did not hurt, neither did my shin/knee.

On Tuesday morning, I got up very excited knowing I was just going to be running. I had no pace goal or distance goal, just wanted to run. Well, I ended up running 5 miles at a 7:30 pace and it felt very comfortable which helped me feel like I was not completely out of shape. It also made me feel like I still have a fall marathon in me. I am really going to scale back my goal and just enjoy running for a minute.

Today I rode 11 miles really hard with an extremely difficult hill, then I jumped off the bike and ran for 2 miles. It was awesome. I really love brick workouts.

If you are reading this thanks for coming back after all this time. I am back and have never felt better.

7 comments:

Ms. V. said...

SO glad you're back! Now get on the road!!

Lindsay said...

i had been wondering lately where you had been! glad all is ok and you are back in the game. hopefully your foot continues to feel good and you can (slowly!) ease back into the mileage. you will return to the same place you were before, just don't be in too much of a rush - enjoy it everyday! :)

Glenn Jones said...

Welcome back! Glad you are better.

And what lindsay says - ease back into it.

Marlene said...

Welcome back!

So glad you're back on the road - on feet AND wheels!

Unknown said...

Yeah man...injuries suck. The most important thing you can do is just keep your wits about ya, know it's not forever and cross-train, cross-train, cross-train!

Glad to hear you're back up and running (literally).

macnic said...

Wonderful update! Glad to hear you're on the mend!

Runner Leana said...

Sorry to hear about the injury. It sounds like you found a great doctor though! Congratulations on your brand new road bike!!