It's just that I haven't enjoyed running these past two months and I don't really want to talk about it (er, write about it). In fact, I've actually hated running at times. I've always taken a hedonist's approach to running: I run because I enjoy it. I love challenging myself, and running has always been a great way for me to do that. I will never forget the first time I ran from my house to the point of UMass Boston and back-- a whopping four miles. It didn't matter that I walked almost as much as I ran, I felt like a million bucks. So I kept running. I just kept adding miles and going farther because I wanted to; because it was some sort of fucked up version of fun for me. I loved my first half marathon because I felt stronger than I ever had before. Crossing that finish line (with my student, Naim, nonetheless) was one of the most incredible experiences of my life. Not only did I accomplish something I didn't think I was capable of doing, but I helped a pretty incredible tween do it, too. Like whoa.
I was able to continue being a hedonist in running shoes for the first few months of training for the Boston Marathon. It was great: I'd pick a distance I wanted to run, lace up my flashy pink sneakers and then go out and do it. Simple. Sometimes, I'd create these little tests for myself. Think I can run from my house to Harvard and back? So I would. It was a blast. I had awesome music, I was outside and I could see the skyline of my beautiful city. Polar Vortex be damned, those runs were awesome.
I don't really know what happened, but sometime around early February, my right heel started to ache a little bit. Like every other slight pain I've had, I ignored it. I kept doing my weekend long runs and I kept kicking ass. Then, around my second or third eighteen-mile run, my heel morphed from an annoyance into a thing. Not only did it hurt every step of every run, but it left me virtually unable to walk when I woke up in the morning. Fabulous. Despite hours of stretching, bottles (yes, plural) of ibuprofen and even sleeping in a boot at night, my heel still hurt like a angry, angry bitch.
My brother once explained to me there are three types of fun. Type 1 fun is an activity you do because you thoroughly enjoy it. You look forward to the task, love it in the moment and are stoked on it afterwards. Type 2 fun is something you don't particularly love when you are knee deep in it, but is one you can learn from and be thankful for when all is said and done. Type 3 fun, on the other hand, isn't really fun at all. Something that is Type 3 fun is an activity you feel like you should enjoy, but you really kind of loathe. Nothing good comes from Type 3 fun except for maybe the ability to check something off a bucket list. For me, running quickly became Type 3 fun once things started to hurt. Suddenly, I wasn't running because I wanted to-- I was doing it out of obligation. And really? All I was learning from those runs was that my foot really fucking hurt and, because I was favoring it, the knee in my other leg was starting to really fucking hurt, too. Terrific. But I kept running. I had to do more than eighteen miles because I was training for the Boston Marathon. It sucked.
I didn't really know how to handle hating running. I know this sounds insane, but in a way, I felt like the one activity that made me feel strong and invincible was betraying me. For the first time, running had let me down; it had hurt me. (Also? Running was breaking my heart two months away from the Boston Marathon. That's kind of like leaving me at the altar a few short weeks before our wedding. Running can be such a dick.) I felt helpless and weak and was probably more than a little bit whiney. Sorry. There was about a week where I secretly hoped I would tear my ACL or develop some other hard core injury so I wouldn't have to run Boston and could maybe stop hobbling around all the time. God, that sounds pathetic. I guess most of the reason I stopped blogging about my training was because I just wanted to stop running all together. Writing about running meant spending extra time thinking about something I had grown to hate. I just couldn't do it.
It wasn't until I read this blog post in early April that I began to regain some of that optimism I had back in my early months of training. I had a pretty substantial swollen spot on the top of my right foot (the same foot with the heel pain). Thanks to this miraculous blog post, I learned the swelling in my foot was an inflamed tendon... and it was the result of tying my shoes incorrectly. (I know. I thought I had mastered that in kindergarten, too.) Apparently, some people aggravate this tendon when they run long distances. The solution? Loop your shoelace through the far hole at the top of your shoe and tie your laces on the outside edge of your sneaker instead of in the middle. (My friend, Annette, calls this "the fat people way to tie shoes".) Yes, it's actually that simple. My foot felt better almost instantly once I made these minor changes. No lie: instant gratification. Suddenly walking hurt less which meant running hurt less, too. It also meant one of the nagging pains I had recently acquired was no longer an issue. Maybe I would be able to run this marathon after all.
Currently, my right heel aches and my left knee is super sore. But you know what? My heel feels better than it has in a while and I have a series of stretches I do that seem to help ease the pain a tiny bit. My knee is still pretty uncomfortable and I have a noticeable gimp when I start running, but I think it's something that can be improved with a few days of serious foam rolling. (Also, the knee feels a lot better with an unhealthy dose of ibuprofen. So I'll totally be doing that on Marathon Monday.) Am I in the condition I want to be to run the Boston Marathon? Not even close. However, I'm fairly confident my body will be able to carry me all the way from Hopkinton to Boston on Monday. It may not happen as fast as I'd like it to, but at this point? I'll take it.
(Side note: I stopped keeping track of my mileage and times once I started hating running. So no more data.)
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