Running Chick

Seems like ages ago, right?  I haven’t been on a complete hiatus, but I haven’t really been in the mood to blab about my continual struggles with shin splints, tendonitis, podiatrists and all that stuff because it’s pretty much as depressing as it sounds.  Suffice it to say that I think I’m going to christen myself the Queen of Injury.

In my latest effort to rid myself of my various injuries, my podiatrist recommended that I get myofascial release therapy.  I’ve read about it before and was surprised that we actually have a massage therapist who specializes in that locally.  I figured I’d give it a shot.  It’s not like I have anything to lose except money. :-/

My first session was early last week and he worked on my left leg which has been giving me trouble for over a year.  It was a little weird and unlike any other massage I’ve had before.  Instead of attacking knots & tightness using his fingers, palms & elbows, the therapist just placed his hands on whatever area he found that was tight and firmly pressed and stretched at the same time.  I could feel the muscle slightly constrict against the pressure, but then, after about 30-45 seconds, I could feel it completely release.  It was so bizarre.  After an hour, he sent me on my way.  I went home feeling so great that I immediately went out and went for a five mile run and it my left leg was completely pain-free.  A little over a week and three runs later and it’s still pain-free.  Woot!

Earlier this week, I had my second session.  My right IT band has been super tight and giving me some lateral knee pain, so that’s where he focused his time.  I went for a four miler tonight and, while the pain isn’t all gone, it’s probably 85% better.

I have two more sessions scheduled, and then we’ll evaluate where I am.  I’m hopeful.  So far, this is the only thing I’ve tried that’s returned positive results.  It would be really nice to start increasing my mileage into the double-digit range, I’m getting so sick of the short two and three milers!

It's pretty clear that when I'm not running, I'm not blogging!

The last time I did any running was back on April 9th. I did 4.5-ish miles on the Tech Trails and could barely walk the next day due to knee\inner thigh pain. So, I just decided to stop.

At first I thought I might have pes anserine bursitis, but my symptoms didn't quite fit the profile. Finally, after much scouring of the internets, I landed on a sartorious muscle strain. I found this great link which listed all the typical symptoms of a sartorius strain, but I forgot to bookmark the link (dummy) and now I can't find the darn thing. In any event, after reading the article, I was pretty convinced that's what I had.

I finally got my insoles back with an additional adjustment to my arch.  It’s 1/4”, but it looks a lot bigger.  I’ve been wearing them regularly in my old running shoes but I haven’t done any running in them yet. My plan is to take the rest of April off and then pick up my half marathon training plan again in May in the hopes of doing the Appleton HM in September.

In the meantime, I've been having fun crashing my new bike! Fortunately, since all my crashes seem to happen when I get tangled up in loose sand, my landings have been on soft ground. Unfortunately, my legs look like somebody took a baseball bat to them. Hawt!

Josh and I broke out the cruisers a few weeks ago and we've been bopping all over Calumet with them. It’s funny, we get lots of compliments on them but most people refer to them as "old timey bikes" or "antique bikes" rather than cruisers.

Wow, has it really been since 17 Feb that I've updated? I have been neglectful of my blogging duties! Well, let's get on with it then. The Injury Front Yeah, my legs are effed up again and I'm pretty ticked off about it. There were starting to bother me about two (three?) weeks ago so I went back to Podiatrist to see if I needed an adjustment. He observed that my left leg was shorter than my right leg and added a 1/4" lift in my shoes. I had three (maybe four) really good, pain-free runs (It's been so long, I'd completely forgotten what that felt like), and then things slowly started to fall apart until everything hit the bottom last Saturday when I set off for a 7 miler and had to bail at 2.5 miles in disgust because my shins & knees were killing me. In hindsight, I should have bailed after the first mile, but I didn't. I'm stupid. Anyway, I've got shin pain and now knee pain and I've never had knee pain from running before. In fact, it's about the only thing on my legs that haven't given me problems. Hamstrings: check. Hips: check. Calves: check. Shins: check. Ankles: check. Knees: awesome! So, I'm taking this week off to do some moping cross-training and I'm going back to yell at discuss things with Mr. Podiatrist on Thursday. Last summer, he advised me that my problems were caused by over-pronation and that custom orthotics would resolve this issue and I'd be running big pain-free miles in no time. $500 custom orthotics will cure my lower leg issues, my ass! If anything, they seem like they've caused a good portion of the issues and I'm about THISCLOSE to going back to my original setup of over-the-counter cushioning insoles in my stability shoes. The Simon Front Poor little Simon has had a rough month: weight loss, appetite loss, vomiting, lethargy, drugs, drugs, drugs. He finally seems like he's leveling out and is (mostly) keeping food down and his appetite is much improved. I had to bring him back in last Friday so he could get his T4 (thyroid hormone) levels checked after being on Trapazole for the last month. He's been on & off the medicine so much in the last month, that I didn't hold out much hope for good news, but I was pleasantly surprised that his levels are back in the normal range. Woohoo, good news! He's still having bouts of vomiting in the middle of the night which I usually step in as I stumble to the bathroom in the morning (gross), but it's sporadic. And his appetite is okay. He's never had a big appetite to begin with, so as long as he's eating and not losing any weight, I'm happy. So, we continue with the two pills/day and that's that. Well, that's about it. Until next time!