Half Marathon Recovery: Week 2

I spent a lot of time cross training last week. You see, it turns out I’m injured. Like, really injured. I stepped up my fitness game by incorporating a lot of yoga and strength training, plus I recently acquired a bike trainer. Here’s how last week shaped up:

Tuesday — 30 minutes yoga

Truthfully, I was getting really bored sitting around and doing nothing — specifically, not running. So I decided to dust off my mat and get in some yoga. Throughout my marathon training cycle I was all about the yoga. But for some reason my yoga practice essentially ceased to exist through the summer. It felt nice to get some stretches in, but there was a noticeable difference in my flexibility (or lack thereof) as compared to the winter/spring months earlier this year.

Wednesday — 30 minutes strength work + 1 hour yoga

Wednesday was an anxiety-filled day. I had an appointment with a sports med doc scheduled for Thursday so I was really a ball of nerves. I just needed to know what the diagnosis and prognosis would be! To get some nervous energy out, I did some strength work plus an hour of yoga. It felt really good to sweat it up for an hour and a half. Really good.

Thursday — Doc appointment

Finally! I had an appointment set for 1:00 pm and it could not come soon enough. As I mentioned in my last recovery post, I was seeing one of my very dear friends from childhood. I’m not sure how I didn’t know this, but she’s a successful sports medicine physiatrist and sees patients at the clinic very near my house. Of course upon finding out this information, I made an appointment with her as soon as I could.

Doctor.

She performed a series of tests and asked a whole bunch of questions. And what was her diagnosis? Two little words that no runner ever wants to hear.

Stress. Fracture.

I felt like my world came crashing down. How could I have a stress fracture?! I didn’t overtrain! I didn’t do anything dangerous! I ran per my coach’s plan — I took care of myself! How? How?! HOW?!

I was devastated.

Thankfully my doc assured me it was likely no big deal and would heal rather quickly. She instructed me to have an X-ray done but mentioned that since it was such a small fracture/reaction, it was likely that nothing would show up. I had my X-ray done and received a message from her a few hours later confirming that yes, there was nothing to be seen. This gave me some hope. It wasn’t big enough that it showed up on film. But it still hurt when I moved my foot and ankle certain directions. And it definitely hurt when I attempted to run. I was given the green light to do any activity that did not hurt including water running, Alter-G treadmill, cycling, weights, yoga, and possibly the elliptical. She stressed the “does not hurt” part several times.

This is the world’s saddest ankle. Definitely sadder than the sad bathroom counter.

The rest of the day was spent wishing and washing between total devastation and firm resolution to not let the stress fracture ruin my life. I ended on a high note with complete resolve to move forward with my fitness as if I weren’t injured at all, and I told my husband I really needed to get my cardio-fix. He hooked my bike up to our newly acquired bike trainer that evening.

Friday — 25 minutes cycling, 1 hour of yoga

I was getting used to being on the bike trainer, and I wasn’t really sure how to get a good workout in. A) It’s been forever and a day since I’ve ridden my basically brand-new bike and B) I’m on a hybrid mountain/road bike, so I kinda felt like an imposter on the trainer. So Friday was more of a trial-and-error kind of a morning. Oh, that and my a$$ started hurting because of my lack of a cushioned seat. But I got at least a little bit of a workout in, and then later in the afternoon I added in an hour of yoga.

Saturday — coaching

Saturday morning was bittersweet. I met with my 5K ladies for some work at the track.

The weather was so cold and it was basically sleeting and snowing intermittently. I couldn’t run and I didn’t want to walk, so I wrapped myself up in my IU blanket (thanks, mom!) and watched the girls run!

I brought my whistle and blew it a couple times but that thing was so damn loud it was hurting my ears. And it was so windy I wasn’t sure if they could hear me anyway! I abandoned the whistle and switched up their workout halfway through. At the end of their track session we did some lunges and squats, so I kinda sorta got a teensy bit of a workout in. But not much.

Sunday — 40 minutes cycling

You better believed I cycled my booty off on Sunday morning. I have no idea how far I rode, but I “warmed up” for 10 minutes, then added a little tension for 10 minutes, and then did a cool down. I broke a little bit of a sweat, too, which definitely made it worth it. I didn’t feel as if I got my heart rate up much, but I’m still figuring things out so hopefully it will happen for me soon.

So yep. That’s that. I’m injured. And not in the “take some Advil and put some ice on it” kind of a way. This is a for real, legit injury. I have to wait this one out until I’m healed. I have a follow-up scheduled in a couple of weeks and I’m just praying I don’t need a boot. I refuse!!

My overall goal for my recovery and rehab is to do something every day. Running would really take it out of me sometimes and I couldn’t wait for rest days. I looked forward to them because I could sleep and take it easy. But now I’m so afraid of losing my fitness and my workouts are nowhere near as taxing so I feel like I need to do at least one thing every day. Strength training, yoga, cycling — anything to stay busy and keep moving forward.