That's the Tea Sis #3 : Injuries can suck my TOE

Is. There. No. Worse. Feeling. Than starting a workout. Or a run. Or a swim. And feeling an old-nemesis-of-an-injury suddenly flare up, making you catch your breath. You can nearly hear police sirens going off in your head *WEEEE-oooooooWEEEEE-oooooo*. Do you keep going? Do you pause? Do you call your PT? Injuries take no prisoners and don’t care if your last state track meet is right around the corner or if your summer training is about to kick off. They are frustrating, frustrating, frustrating. They make you want to punch a pillow. Or go do your workout anyways and just push through the pain, inevitably making it worse. Or sit down with a spoon and some Tonight Dough and munch through your sorrow as you wail to your mum that your athletic career is over. You best-buh-freakin-buhleeve that I have experienced these feelings. If you have too, I hope this post may provide you with some perspective.

With the exception of a funky knee during my senior year of indoor track, I never had an injury that took me out for more than a month during a season. Last summer this all changed. After taking a couple weeks off after outdoor wrapped up, I received my college summer training plan. There were fancy charts and paces and workouts that I had never seen the likes of before, and I was very excited to commit myself and come into the season feeling strong and prepared. Unfortunately, fate had another plan in mind.

I distinctly remember running in a cemetery in my hometown when I started to experience a shooting pain up the inside of my right calf during a run. My injuries were always related to my joints and bones; shin splints, hip imbalances, and janky knees due to my over-pronating-hobbit feet, but I had never felt such a sharp pain in a muscle before. I brushed it off and took to the elliptical for a couple of days, then ran again only to stop early, huffing-and-puffing out of worry and anger when I felt the same pain. This cycle continued all summer, I’d cross-train until I didn’t notice the pain any more than rip eight miles on hot summer pavement. My body was clearly trying to tell me something and I was clearly trying not to accept it. I had an injury.

Once I got to Bates I almost immediately began working with the Athletic Trainers who are absolutely FANheckingTASTIC. They revealed to me that I had post-tib-tendinitis, an overuse injury that is common in flat-footed folk such as myself. I worked through this injury from September through December, going to the AT room for about an hour Monday through Friday to go through a series of exercises, followed by some cross-training. To my dismay, after building back up to running about thirty miles a week in mid-winter, I was torn away from running again in the spring when my hips got inflamed. I raced once during my first year at college. I ran a fraction of what I could’ve been running had I not been injured. Most of all I simply missed running. My ponytail on my shoulders, gossiping on long runs, and draining lactic acid after workouts. And it was really starting to crack down on me.

I cannot tell you how heartbreaking it was to wave to my teammates from the cardio room each day as they headed out on their runs and I did my time on the elliptical or in the pool. I cannot tell you how discouraging it was to be told “Let’s shoot for next week, thenwe’ll have you try a mile or so on the treadmill” over and over again. And I cannot tell you how disheartening it was to go to meets and always be braiding or pep-talking or taking splits, never the one wearing the race-braid or getting the pep-talk or going over my splits with my coach. I missed my pre-race rituals, my race bra, my ribbons, tying my spikes extra tight, jiggling out my legs before toeing the line, and the butterfly-heartbeat that pirouettes in your chest just before the gun. I. Missed. Running. It felt as though mini-mental-cinderblocks were getting stacked up inside me, making me start to question if I would ever run again, if I could even be a college athlete, if I even had an untapped potential, if I was worth it.

You best-buh-freakin-buhleeve that I know how much injuries can suck. I’m currently working through a little flare up in my tendonitis now, so I also understand how injuries are often unrelenting and nagging. Whether your injury lasts two weeks, two months, or two years, here are a few tips and lessons I have learned this past year with my injuries that may help you!! :

1) Injuries are temporary. Remember that recovery is simply a little pause in your progress, NOT an end to your career.

2) Listen to your PT/Athletic Trainer, THEY WENT TO SCHOOL TO STUDY THIS STUFF!! Do the exercises and stretches that they give you and stay true to the return-to-play plan that they create for you. They KNOW what is best, and they want you to be up-and-running-again just as much as you do!

3) No matter how sunny and warm it is out or how tempting x, y, z looks, DON’T be tempted to bust out a rogue run or workout. You have a lifetime ahead of you and there will be more opportunities in your future, the more time you take to heal NOW the sooner you’ll be able to RETURN to your sport.

4) Don’t compare yourself to your own past times or performances. The only thing that you can control is what lies ahead, it will do you no good to lament about how “talented” or “fast” you USED to be. Hate to break it to you honey but those days are behind you, instead, take CHARGE of you CAN control, git in the saddle and work hard on the goals that you have yet to achieve!! Be PROUD of your past accomplishments, but never let them become a source of toxicity directed towards yourself. Work towards your future, not against your past.

5) Don’t be jealous of your teammates who are healthy and injury-free. Jealousy is a nasty rotten fruit that can spoil the whole bunch, don’t let that nasty thing grow in your mind!

6) Take a mental break from your sport and explore other forms of fitness/cross-training that will help supplement your comeback. Order some Gymshark. Feeling like an Instagram-fitness-baddie. And GET YOUR GRIND ON!!

7) Take it as a lesson of gratitude. You know when you’re sick and you have a nasty drippy-but-also-stuffed-up-nose and you think “Gosh, I never appreciate how good it feels to be able to breathe deeply through my two lovely clear nostrils when I’m not sick”? Translate that over to your injury, and when you are able to run/workout/etc. injury-free be GRATEFUL. Know how bad it felt to not be able to participate and bask in the feeling of how MARVELOUS it feels to be back in the game.

8) Suck it up buttercup. Though I’m reiterating a previous point, it’s worth reiterating. Accept your situation and move forward as bravely and optimistically as possible. Sure, have yourself a moment, but then lift yourself up. The sooner you accept your situation and the more time you give to your stretches, cross-training, exercises, and all that other important mumbo-jumbo, the faster you will heal.

9) Give your recovery the same effort that you would regularly give your training if you were injury-free.

10)If you are really mad-stressing about your injury, think of it likes this. Imagine that your injury is a line moving across a page. It looks like this :

At the end of the day, remind yourself why you participate in your sport. Remind yourself how good it will feel to be back racing or playing when you are healed. Remind yourself that your potential and goals are WORTH this struggle and so are YOU. And remind yourself that everyday that you do your PT exercises, roll out, work on your form, or do the little things, that you are helping yourself to a better tomorrow. And it will be SO worth it.