Posts tagged injuries

I mean, WOAH. Did I fall off the earth, or what?

So, here’s the story, and I’ll try to be brief.

I got hurt, and now I’m less hurt.

…What? It’s brief.

Ok, if the brief version isn’t enough, then here’s the long version:

At some point around the time of my last post, I applied to grad school to study psychology (specifically, health psychology). Rather a drastic career change from some people’s point of view, although less so from mine. I was accepted, and started school in January. In the mean time, I think I was a little burned out from posting on two blogs at once, and I decided to take a break. Apparently that got out of hand (sorry).

The other, more salient thing that happened that probably had more of an impact on my not coming back to writing, was a chronic foot injury that’s had me sidelined for over a year. It’s a chronic overuse type of injury, and I can’t really say how it happened with any certainty. What I do know is that in September I started noticing some pain in my left foot that would flare up after workouts, but go away over the weekend or any time I took a couple days off. I figured it was no big deal, it didn’t hurt that much, and I basically ignored it (kids, don’t ever do that).

Obviously it didn’t just go away, it got worse. In December I went to a doctor who told me that “I don’t really understand what you do, so I don’t know what to tell you.” He confirmed that it wasn’t broken, told me to wear shoes and sent me on my way. Thanks, Doc. As you can probably guess, that didn’t help either.

So I kept working out on it, but with shoes, and it kept hurting…a lot. I tried taping, which got me through my workouts, but eventually even that wasn’t enough. In February I finally hit my breaking point. I went to a different doctor, who sent me to physical therapy, and I stopped working out, hoping that a few weeks of rest would help it heal (hint: it didn’t).

That brings me to the other downside of this stupid injury: food. We’ve discussed how I like food, yes? Well I went from working out 9-10 times a week (seriously, I was doing P90x and kickboxing at the same time – I was a bit of a beast) to doing NOTHING overnight. My eating habits did not adjust as quickly, and my body is still paying the price. After a few weeks I was at least able to stop the crazy gains, but even then I kept slipping – a pound a week, on average, no more, but no less. Let’s just say I have got a lot of ground to make up.

The worst part was I didn’t know what to do about it. Diet changes, yes, but I suck at that. I tried and failed. And failed. And failed. And this whole time, I was barely able to walk. Somehow after I stopped working out, my foot locked up, and it got worse instead of better. There were times I could barely walk across the room, and I could never walk without pain. Frankly, I couldn’t sit without pain. Pain was background noise to my life. Add to that the fact that I’d lost my number one stress relief in workout out, and I was not a happy person.

I had never thought much about chronic pain before I had it…believe me, it’s no joke. Not that I thought it was before, but I never appreciated how much it messes with your head. I was cranky. I was beyond cranky, I was unpleasant. I was unhappy, I was in a Funk with a capitol F. That didn’t help the eating situation any, let me tell you (especially with grad school plus freelancing taking my stress levels to 11). I couldn’t find anything that didn’t hurt, except for swimming, and quite frankly it hurt so bad just to get to the gym and into the pool that I quit doing that, too. It was always ‘just a few more weeks’ until I would be back, or so I told myself. I had to, or I would have lost it.

Ok so enough of that. Where am I now? After 5 doctors, 2 physical therapists, 2 orthopedic specialists, and 2 chiropractors, I seem to be getting out of the woods…for real this time. The real difference makers? The second ortho guy (foot and ankle specialist, referred to by the first ortho guy), who finally gave me a diagnosis and put me in a night splint. And after that, my sent-from-heaven chiropractor. The night splint helped the plantar fasciitis aspect of my foot (one of three ‘itisis’ that I have), but that, the orthotic, and the stretches he gave me still weren’t touching the rest. The chiropractor does this crazy thing called “Active Release Technique,” and it’s a-ma-zing. Hurts like a son of a …gun… but it works. I’ve literally made more progress in the last month than I’ve made in the last year combined.

So how’s that for a novel? I have taken all of the inserts, pads, and orthotics out of my shoes. I am finally back to some activity, and I can walk around without pain or a wonky gait. Doesn’t sound like much, but for me it’s like a miracle…like having my life back. I usually still tape my foot (I have become good friends with Kineseotape), but I don’t even do that every day. I have to use a lot of ice, and do a lot of stretching, but things are looking up.

Coming up: Part II of my return (Oh yes, there’s more. There’s BOMBSHELLS, people. It’s been a year and a half, it’s a lot to catch up on!)