The waiting game.

 This sucks. This really really really sucks.


Oh, about last week: Last weekend, I did 8 miles (we are coming down to the home stretch so the miles decrease) at a hotel gym. It smelled like chlorine, has about a 90% humidity, and had a glorious view of: the indoor pool. But, I did it. I even clocked in my fastest 8 miles yet, and had plenty of energy for planks/ab roller/push-ups/free weights. But, that's not the real story here. The real story starts post-wedding with an infection.

 You know, infections just creep up on you, and sometimes you just don't realize how bad they are until a little too late. Of course, with being an attendant in a wedding, such things take a back seat to hair, makeup, and doing "the beavis and butthead dance" with your fiancee. So, when you start to face the music again on Monday, sometimes you get "chopsticks" instead of Beethoven's 9th. This is how it went:

 Monday evening, I wasn't feeling quite right and I told Alec about it. I chalked it up to some other health problems that have been my companion for a while now and decided to go to bed. When I woke up at 2am, 3am, 4am and 5am, I realized that something was terribly wrong, so we rushed out to the store at 6am on Tuesday to get medicine. I called my doctor's office as soon as they opened and said that I had to work, so I was wondering if they could have the doc call in a prescription for me. She called me back 2 hours later and said that she wouldn't do that because she had to see me in person. I feel pretty blah about this because I ended up telling her exactly the same things in person as I did on the phone.

 I told her what was going on, and that I was currently training for a half marathon in a few weeks. I also let her know that I have no insurance right now (not recommended) because I'm waiting to go on Alec's. She said she would just write me a prescription for 3 days and everything should be fine. I thought, great! No lab work= no extra money!

 I went to Target to get my prescription and the pharmacist looked at what it was and said "are you sure you don't have any questions about this?" and I said, nah. Just assuming it was your run of the mill Bactrim/Cillin. I took a pill immediately because I am terrified of infections and I wanted to get it working as soon as possible. Then I drove home and as I was getting out of the car, I started to read the warning label. It was 5 pages of paper worth (really? for an antibiotic, you need 5 pages of warnings? doesn't that sound not-quite-right to you?).

  The medicine that I took was called Ciprofloxacin. NEVER EVER TAKE THIS MEDICINE! If you have heard of Levaquin, or Levofloxacin, this is a similar type of medication to that and can have the same severe side effects. They are called fluoroquinolones and can do irretrievable damage to your body...especially if you have the genetic predisposition that considers them toxic.

 So, to continue my story, I started reading this warning label and had a few doubts about whether the doctor knew what she was doing or not...but, I wanted to believe that she knew enough about them to prescribe them to me without fearing any ill harm. This is a tricky situation to deal with, because I really want to trust my doctor, but I also don't want to face anything that might disable me from running. The label basically read all of the standard warnings about sleeplessness, anxiety, sun exposure, hearing voices, and depression, but then I got to the last page. It said that this medication causes tendinitis in people that are taking certain medications, and that suffer from several medical conditions. It also said at the very end that exercise can sometimes cause this. I scratched my head a little, and figured that the doctor knew what she was doing. I made a plan to rest while I was on the meds from Tues-Fri, and then to exercise again at the 12 mile run on Saturday.

 This plan did come to fruition, but not with the results that I intended. On Tuesday night, I felt dizzy and very tired after taking the pill, so I went to bed relatively early. Wednesday morning, I woke up feeling sleepy again, but I figured it was all because of the lack of sleeping that happened Monday night. I'm pretty sure that I was wrong about that. On Thursday morning, I sat down and had a moment of panic. I went online and started reading runner's forums about the effects of Cipro. I happened upon them when I was looking at making a plan for my next run after a few days off, and I noticed one about tendinitis due to this drug. My heart sank. I immediately stopped taking the pills in the hopes that only 2 days of it wouldn't have done any damage.

 I made a plan to call the doctor first thing in the morning to get another antibiotic. "Phew!", I thought. I was not taking it for very long and I wasn't having any pain so I must be perfectly OK. So, Friday morning, I went to the gym to do my usual interval training and weight lifting that I do the day before long runs. I was paying close attention to my Achilles tendon as I ran, and I told myself that if I felt ANY pain or weird sensations that I would stop running. I felt no pain. Everything was normal.

  I laid out my running clothes and planned to take it easy on Saturday morning, just to be cautious. I thought I would run easy and walk part of the course to give my tendons a break. At training, I skipped the warm up and headed out to walk as a warm up. I stopped for a minute after .75 miles and did some easy stretching. Then, I started to run at a slow pace and continued running until mile 3. I walked from 3-4, and then two of the mentors caught up with me and I started walking with them. We soon ran, from miles 4-6. It's funny because I was only planning on running/walking 10 miles, but I looked down and there we were at 6-the halfway point.

  The whole time that I was running, I was giving all of my attention to my muscles and tendons. I didn't feel a single twinge that was beyond my normal hip and knee pain. So, I continued to walk/run from 7-9, and then I ran all the way back to 12. It was a slow and even pace. When I got done, I felt great! I wanted to run more at the end because I felt like I didn't do my best time...but I knew that at least I had finished. I went for the perfect post-run treat with a few other girls at the snoasis snowball stand in Cockeysville, and was not even tired.

 When I got home, I had a snack and decided to cut the grass while the weather was nice. After that I basically just rested the entire day. I noticed that my arms felt really tired (like tennis elbow) but I sometimes get that, and attributed it to mowing the grass.

 Now comes the bad part...

This morning I woke up and got ready for church feeling a little more stiff than your average day. I was tired and groggy so I just kept going and didn't take any pain meds. By the time that I got to church, I felt an awful tightness going up the sides of my legs. My initial reaction was that it was from my calves being tired due to the flat course that we ran. So, when I got into church, I used my phone to look up where the tendons are in your legs. This was when I almost started crying at rehearsal. Your peroneal tendons start behind your ankles and go all the way up the sides of your legs. There are brevis (short) and longus (long) sections. My peronea longus is where I am feeling the most tightness. It was literally the only thing that I didn't want to be sore. I could have dealt with any other type of pain from running than tendon pain, because tendon pain means I was right. I was having a bad reaction to the medication.

 The questions that I have about all of this are swirling around in my head right now endlessly. Why me? Why so close to the race? What did I do to deserve this? What should I do now? Will I be able to run the race? Will I be able to recover from this? Will I gain weight from not being able to exercise?

 A few lessons have already been learned from this experience, so I know it's not 100% bad. The first is that I have always had a deep respect for Alec because of all that he went through when he tore his ACL. I never understood what it felt like, and I always avoided talking to him about it, because I didn't want to stir up old memories. But this week, when I broke down about my feelings of failure and my questions to the universe, he told me about how he felt when it happened to him. I don't know if it is good that we had to go through these experiences in our lives, but I do know that there is a reason for everything. And I honestly feel that he was meant to guide me through this and be my comfort, and that having someone who has been injured at the peak of their game who also loves me and is my best friend is exactly what I needed. It's amazing how God works.

 Another lesson: no matter how hardcore you are, and how tough you are, there is a point when you have to say enough is enough. Your body might tell you or your mind might tell you, but whichever it is, you have to listen. And then, you have to wait. Because if you push yourself too soon (like I did, doing 12 miles and then mowing the grass), you will pay for it tenfold and be even more unhappy with yourself.

 I am so terrified that I am going to gain weight in these next few weeks. I even told Alec to take all of the junk food out of the house (he was like, "what? the granola bars?") because I don't want to start snacking while I'm stuck resting. There is this inner demon that is saying "you were fat before, you could be fat again, everyone will think you're lazy if you don't run it because you were fat before, you need to just push through it and say screw it all I am tough, you are going to let everyone down if you don't do all 13.1 miles, people don't respect you as much now that you didn't complete your goal, even if you do another half marathon you didn't finish this one and it's this one that matters the most, what if you never get to run again you might as well give it everything now, and etc..." Poisonous and stinkin' thinkin', I know. The question that I have is, how do I make it stop?

 Sisters are good for that. And friends. And fiancees. And family. And that is my plan. Focus on how I've inspired people (not how I'm letting those people down), how I've completely turned my life around (not how two weeks of rest is going to send me back down the slippery slope of unhealthiness), how there is always a possibility that I might be fine to run (not how I could suffer from chronic tendinitis for the rest of my life) and how I am surrounded by people that I love and that love me.

 And I will rest, ice, elevate, tape/compress, and take an anti-inflammatory. And I will take glucosamine/chondroitin, omega 3, and coQ10. And I will let my body tell me when I am ready to run again, and not vice versa.  I will wait.

 I forgot to say one thing. My aunt has an injury herself. While I know that she will have a full recovery with rest and PT, she is not going to be able to run the race but will walk it instead. When I heard the news from her about her injury, I was lost for words. I wanted to tell her this: even though you feel like you've worked so hard to get here and now you cannot achieve your goal, you've come so far and inspired so many people along the way. No one has any doubts about you being able to run 13.1 miles. You are stronger and tougher than most people out there, and the more wonderful because of it. Don't let this part of your journey get you down, because there is always the possibility of another race. Just tell me where to sign up, and I will be at your side.

 My goal now: start believing that about myself.




XO