So…I don’t actually have any workouts to recap for this week.

Womp Womp.

Last year, after getting cleared to start running again, I was the heaviest I’ve ever been. And I think we all know that I’m not the most motivated and consistent person in the world (hello months long gaps in posting!). So when I started running again, I noticed after the first few weeks, a soreness in my heel. I thought maybe I had stepped on a rock or something similar when I was barefoot in the driveway or even just wearing my flats or flip flops. I though perhaps I had bruised my foot. So I rested a couple days and here’s the thing. It never felt any better. In fact, it only hurt worse after periods of inactivity and only felt better after moving or even running on it. After addressing the issue with my chiropractor, who kind of gave it the brush off, I did what any intelligent person with access to the internet does. I consulted Dr. Google.

Since the pain didn’t radiate to my fore foot, and I didn’t have any issues wiggling my toes and it actually felt better with activity, I pretty much ruled out a stress fracture. So that left me with plantar facititus or Achilles tendonitus. Both which are pretty crappy, and both which suck at healing. So I went to the local running shop and bought an Achilles brace and some inserts for my dress shoes and proceeded to ice and compress the area whenever possible. Both those things helped, but didn’t make it go away entirely. I started yoga up again and found that even though it was a little on the painful side, it actually really helped and between all those things, the pain finally went away.

Until I started to train for the Go! St. Louis Half.

And then it came back. So I started doing the compression, bracing, and ice again. None of which really helped the pain go away. And then at the expo, there was a different chiropractor there doing pre-race stretching and massage. I stopped by their booth and told them a bit about my issue and they did some stretching and analyzing and came up with an answer. Which totally seems plausible.

Somewhere between my hip area (which are totally weak, btw) and my foot there is a disconnect. Which is causing tightness because my other muscles are overcompensating. So, after doing some stretching and muscle release stuff, I was amazed at how I felt the next morning. I woke up and didn’t have to hobble around for several minutes because there was hardly any pain in my foot! Then I went and had a shit race that I dropped out of and quit running for a while. So, yeah.

Any who, the whole point of this dramatic, drawn-out post is to say that, shocker, the pain is back. And while I have made the switch from my current chiro to the sports chiro from the expo, though I’m pretty sure that’s coming, I do know the steps I need to take. They did tell me that foam rolling and using my stick and pressure point ball will have similar effects that the muscle release therapy did. So, I took last week off and have been working on stretching the area out. I need very much to be consistent with my run and exercise in general recovery methods, like the foam rolling, etc. I suck at it. But I am going to make a more intentional effort to change all that! Because it’s no fun to hobble around like your ninety when your only in your early 30’s!

Moral of the story-recover right!