*The Debatewise Blog
What running has taught me – part 7
I don’t make it easy on myself. First long run after a weeklong rest was on the treacherously uneven pavements of Istanbul. It truly is a beautiful city, but I wish they’d done some work on the cobblestones in the last, oh I don’t know, 1,000 years. Still, I managed 13 miles and, more importantly, made it to the bathroom this morning with barely a grimace per step. Progress!I changed my attitude towards the injury this week, I took it seriously. Until now I’d adopted the twin strategy of hoping it would go away and pretending it didn’t exist. Which might work for the bogeyman but wont for a problem that requires attention and rest.
The old approach saw me doing some of the stretching my new Olympian buddies told me to, but I didn’t ice or heat the thing, didn’t stop when it started hurting and didn’t even bother to work out the difference between a sports masseur and physio; I just thought one beat you up for twice as long but didn’t charge twice as much.
In my mind my magic body would heal itself without me doing anything different and that I had to keep running now or I’d collapse mid way round Canary Wharf on the 26th. But last Monday, after the pain refused to go away, I went to the Runners World forums, looked up “how quickly lose fitness” and found it takes at least three weeks and even then not very much or very fast.
Phew. No need to panic then. Have another week off and I’ll still be fine. Get some proper, stress-free, rest. Add a new this-is-not-going-away-so-take-it-seriously approach with ice packs just before hot ones, stretches twice a day and even sleep in compression tights (proper male sporting ones, with stripes down the side and athletes on the box and everything).
But why did it take me two weeks to go to the forums? They’re always where I tell other people to go, hell I even had a business that told big corporations to treat the views there seriously. So why can’t I take my own advice? First because we never do, do we? Second, because when it comes to problems like this I can be a little on the
ostrich side.
I have a tendency to try and ignore a problem I don’t have a solution for, don’t think I’ll find a solution for, or for which I don’t like the solution I’ve found. Of course, life has a wonderful way of placing the solution in front of your face, and an irritating way of forcing you to take it whether you like it or not.
I increasingly find these solutions on the internet, but I’m sure all the Buddhists out there will claim a good long look at a leaf will provide similar insight. Regardless how it comes, I’m going to take this week as proof that seekers find and focus works. Can’t tell you how fantastic it was to be running (almost) pain-free again.