The Dog Days of Physio

Not going to lie, this is a tough go.  So happy to see some pals really pushing it this year hitting some big milestones.  One good bud of mine caught the running bug only a few years ago. He is down 50 + lbs now, looking to chop six minutes off of his half marathon PB to qualify for the NYC half marathon at 1:30.  The jealousy is truly raging.   That is a challenge I would covet.

For now, I’m eagerly awaiting my July 3^rd consult for surgery.   I said it from the start, I knew I needed surgery.  I’m even more of a believer of the need now.  While I have benefited greatly from my physiotherapy which has become pretty intensive,   I must have meniscal surgery if I’m ever to run again.   It is possible,   I may even go for the more evasive operation which is not arthroscopic and will literally take 6-8 months to come back from.  Whatever it is, I’m prepared to make the commitment, whatever it takes.   Life is too short, way too short. 

So on the physio front.   I played 2 rounds of golf last week,  back to back, which is not ideal for the meniscus.   I went in for a session last night in as bad as shape I’ve been in since the injury.  Get this,  A piece of tape, on my bottom left foot,  about 4 inches wrapped from the bottom on the medial side to the top and see you later pain.  That simple procedure takes the pressure off of the meniscus altogether, amazing.  The good news so far in the 4 weeks is that I have the VMO firing again.  What I mean by that is that I got myself into a position where I was actually losing muscle mass from running and aging of course.  When I started training back in December,  my left quad became so weak it was not firing like my right.  We figure the likely scenario,  is that this injury was born out of weakness, not freakiness. 

I’m thoroughly enjoying the spinning right now.  It’s been so good I’m actually going to take the bike to the cottage for the long weekend upcoming and pound off some big rides in the 80k distance.  I have slowly increased my rides from 15 to 45 minutes and subsequently started to shed some layoff weight.  More to follow on July 4^th.    

Keep running y’all,  you never know when the privilege will be taken from you!