The last few weeks have not been a lot of fun from a running perspective. The foot situation hasn’t been terrible, but it hasn’t been great either. It hasn’t really hurt much while running, but I can’t claim it’s been symptom free either. A lot of days it’s hurt the afternoon after a morning run. I’ve had too many runs on the treadmill and one very weird one on Wesleyan’s indoor track with Rashi. It’s that time of year though, so treadmill runs are to be expected. The bigger problem has been mental. The plantar fasciitis cropped up originally in July and I’ve been dealing with it more seriously since October. I’m tired of this bullshit.
Last week, I just started to feel stuck. Having started running a few times and then had setbacks, I found that I couldn’t imagine recovery anymore. I considered just running on it and dealing with the pain, but I knew that was stupid. I tried to imagine focusing my athletic drive on swimming or rowing or cycling, but my heart died a little when I thought seriously of giving up running. I went back to the idea of just keeping on with what I’ve been doing, but it has felt like limping through recovery somehow. Something isn’t right, though I’m not sure what. I’d go back to my idea of saying, I gave healing a good shot and it didn’t work so fuck it, let’s just run. But I know that’s stupid and also painful so then I’d just say fuck it, let’s give up running. I know that would break my heart, so I’d go back to let’s just limp along. Round and round and round. I was making myself bat-shit crazy and I was taking my inner support circle along for the ride.
Finally I set up a phone conversation with the Celt for last Monday. We mostly text, but this wasn’t texting material. I told him how I’d been feeling and he had a range of ideas. They all sounded about equally good and equally bad and I couldn’t decide about any of that either. This is not normal for me as I generally have opinions on stuff, really, on most stuff, most of the time. But I felt pretty lost and I was honest about that.
The Celt eventually said, ok, this is why you have a coach. Two weeks off of running and then we re-assess. In the meantime, “balls to the wall” with the cross-training. That decision finally turned my brain off and I felt immediate relief. I really needed someone else to make this call and I’m super grateful that he was willing to do it.
I’ve had a good week since then. I’m mentally at peace with taking the time off, though a little nervous about how long it might last. I’ve had more mental bandwidth for the rest of life, though I’m sure my family still finds me to be pretty running obsessed. I’ve got some leads on how to address the foot issue more fundamentally and I feel good about that. And I’m enjoying some good old-fashioned “balls to the wall” cross-training including this crazy bike ride! This isn’t where I want to be yet, but it’s much better than where I was and that counts for a lot.
Happy on the bike this morning, at least for now
Snowy and gross out in Michigan anyway