Ok, so here's the deal

I’m not limping around.  There’s a little bit of tenderness around the outer part (anterior?) of the ankle, so it’s not healed, yet.  We’re coming up on a month since I rolled it the second time (12/8 was the day) and if it takes a month to 6 weeks to heal then I should be in the clear in a couple of weeks.  I’m eyeballing the weekend of 1/13 to go out and do some light hiking (with a brace on).

 

Running with physical, structural pain is a bad, bad plan.  That’s a good way to set in motion a cascade of other ailments that just wreck you.

 

Of course, that’s not the same as running with emotional pain.  I can’t tell you how many runners I know who are literally running FROM something and the only way they can quiet their demons is by pounding mile after mile out, day after day.

 

No, that’s not me.  Sorry.  I like my family.  I like my life.  I’m just trying to not be fat sick and dead and maybe make the world a better place while I’m at it.

 

So, anyway…

 

The plan as it stands is to do some light hiking on MLK weekend out at Lake Livingston.  Then, if everything is holding up and in working order, go out and try to ease my way back in to a mile.  After the mile, I’ll start stretching out for weekend long runs. 

 

I’ve been growing a beard for the last 2 or 3 months (I can’t remember when I last shaved).  I’m getting kind of tired of it because it’s long(ish) and scratchy.  What I think I’ll do is shave when I start back out on the streets and then grow a “50 mile beard”.  That might be fun.

Ok, so where things stand

Want to know something fun?

I took care of my Achilles tendonitis and properly stretched and treated that annoyance.  Things were feeling good.

Then the week before thanksgiving I go with the fam to Enchanted Rock (people not from Texas, google it) and do some camping and hiking.  It was awesome.  Enchanting, even.  I hiked the summit, then around the Rock.  It was pretty boss.

It was SO boss that I decided to do it again the next day.  That’s when, as I was walking down the steps toward the trail that goes to the summit, I sprained my ankle.

Derp.

 

Left foot rolled under, leg collapsed, I fell down 3 steps, ended up square on my ass.  It was painful.

 

No…  painful would have been an upgrade.  It was white hot throbbing bolts of lightening up the outside of my leg into my hip agony.  We had a 4 hour trip home.  And we were stopping to camp overnight halfway there because we thought that would be fun.

 

My god I was in so much pain.

 

Then about 3 weeks after that, as everything was slowly getting to the point where it wasn’t completely painful to walk on it again…

 

I reached down to pick something up and my foot rolled under me. A white hot bolt of searing agony ripped through my leg and I ended up ass over hips laying in the street.  I took a couple of pain killers, iced it, wrapped it, drank some whiskey, and laid down for a long winter’s nap.  That was about a month ago, now.  I’m MOSTLY pain free, with just a bit of tenderness around the ankular region.  The limp is gone.  I have nearly full range of motion.

 

I feel old and broken down.  I’m only 42.

 

I need to get out and be active again.  This is driving me absolutely nuts.

Uhg...

So…  The Galveston Causeway Toughest 10k…

 

Yea, I totally overslept.  The week was exhausting and instead of going to sleep early to get ready for the early wake up call I crashed and crashed hard.

My lovely wife tried to wake me up twice.  I reportedly groaned something incomprehensible and put my arm over her.

So…  That’s that.

 

There will be no half marathon in November.

 

I’m going to set my sights on a series of 5ks in the spring and get my times down toward the 30 minute mark and gear up for the bridge series in 2018.

 

Eventually I’ll get the trifecta.

Eventually.

Ugh.

So I overslept.  Bloody hell.

 

Overslept and missed the entire goddamn thing.

 

Oh well…  Time to get on with next year.

You can't always get what you want

Ok, so I’ve been taking it easy the last few days resting and icing.  My last proper run was 10/2, but later that week I spend an evening walking up and down stairs moving someone out of a house and then 2 days later literally ran back and forth around town.  So that kind of counted as a workout.

But per usual, my foot was KILLING me on Sunday a week ago when I woke up, so I went the precautionary route and iced and rested for 3 days until there was no pain at dawn. That got me in to Thursday and the next day was a business trip.  I brought my running gear so that I could get in a few miles at the hotel only to find out I FORGOT MY DAMN SHOES!!! 

 

GAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!!

 

I have a 10k in 6 days.  I am woefully underprepared for THAT, but worse I have a half in 5 weeks and may have to skip out on that one again, which pisses me off greatly.  I may show up and slog my way through, taking it easy so that I don’t hurt myself and collecting the hardware.  I don’t know…  I feel like garbage.  This sucks.

 

Anyway…  planning on logging another mile or mile and a half tonight.  Then dosing with ice to make sure I’m safe.  I don’t even know right now…

All better, I think

The tenderness in my left heel is gone.  I skipped maybe 4 miles of runs (Wednesday, Friday, and a 2-3 mile long run over the weekend), obsessively iced, compressed, rested, elevated and basically laid off my foot as much as I could.  Today (and yesterday) I woke up with no pain.

 

Hallelujah.

 

Tonight, if time permits, I’ll go out for a mile.  That’s the plan.  One mile, easy does it, nothing fancy.

 

But if I don’t have time, I won’t worry about it.  I’ll get out there Wednesday.

 

AAAAHHHHHGGGG!!!!

Ok, the good news is this tendonitis is not the same tendonitis as before.  The bad news is that this tendonitis is not the same tendonitis as before.

 

Before it was right at the base of the Achilles tendon where it meets the heel.  This time it’s off to the side, between the Achilles and the knob of the ankle, along the side of the heel.  I mean…  jesus fucking Christ.  Can I just be pain free in this goddamn foot for a change?

 

Anyway, ice every 2 hours.  Ibuprophen as much as I’m allowed.  Epsom salt bath (because, maybe witchcraft works?) every other night.  I even got a compression brace to wear.

 

I skipped the weekend long run (because I’m lazy) so that I could rest and let the tendonitis get right.  I got a 1 mile run in last night and it HURTS LIKE A MOTHERFUCKER today.  The mile was a 12:00 mile, though, and I felt really good running it.  I’m looking forward to the Wednesday mile and hopefully next week or the week after I can start extending some of these shorter runs by a little here and there.