The (literal) Agony of Defeat

It's no secret. I complain constantly about my hurt leg, the shin splints nonsense, and what I'm doing to work my way through the pain. Some massaging, some stretching, some hot baths. It helped a bit, and when I ran it only hurt for the first few hundred feet. I had made up my mind to work through the pain, cross my fingers that it would improve, and just keep on keepin' on. Until last night.

I started off on my 4 miles. It hurt more than ever in the first few hundred feet and never stopped hurting. I slowed down, and altered the way I was running to relieve some of the pain. The result was a very slow but strenuous run in which I tried my best to not move my ankle, since that caused the most pain. I couldn't even make it 3 miles before the pain got to be in the "unbareable" range. I walked home, miserable and defeated.

Stretching afterwards didn't help. The hot shower didn't help. The only thing that seemed to help was to lay on my couch with my feet up. Stairs are a complete monster for me now, and I walk with a slight limp. I'm pretty comfident I pushed myself too hard with shin splints and got right into "stress fracture" territory. Shin splints are usually when the muscle gets torn up from things like running 12 miles and starts to separate from the bone. Stress fractures follow since the bone has less support from the muscle and impact causes hairline fractures. The only thing you can do once that happens is stop running.

Its frustrating since I've got 2 months to the marathon, and I've got to take a month off. If it was 2 weeks away, I'd just buckle down and do it anyway. But I can't live with this for 2 months as it just gets worse and worse and worse and worse.

Anyway, I pretty much hate myself over it. I'm the type of guy who sets his mind to something and gets it done. I'm going to start looking for another marathon in the June timeframe and try again. I just hate admitting defeat. Friggin' marathon.