Suck in, squeeze, breathe.
Suck in, squeeze, breathe.
The warm wind washing my face, freedom. The light tapping of my shoes as they hit the pavement, freedom. My thoughts, not on my surroundings, but on every movement I make, every twitch of my left foot, every second without a fiery scream, freedom.
After weeks of no running, none, and hardly any walking, today my feet were finally given permission to once again feel the security of their sneakers totally enclosing their flesh.
And the freedom, ohhhh the freedom. It wasn’t Chariots of Fire or Gonna Fly Now or even Survivor filling the music in my heart. Nope, I had full on George Michael:
FREEDOM!!!!!!
For several weeks, almost as long as I’ve been absent from the blog, I have been encumbered by a foot injury. It is still unclear as to what exactly that injury is. I initially thought it was plantar fasciitis, but Miss Physio quickly poo poohed that. (Thank gawd!) My foot muscles are so tightly knotted, my ankle, calf, thigh and pelvis too, causing my foot to shift outwards and my heel inwards, almost like a clenched claw that refuses to relax. And that’s not all. I have no core strength (no surprise there), and as such I am putting undo pressure on my hips, causing undo pressure on everything else. And it’s finally caught up with me.
The heel of my foot has been on fire for weeks. I have endured rounds of intramuscular stimulation (IMS) therapy in varying regions of my calf as well as my pelvis. IMS is acupuncture-like needles being injected into the sensitive areas to release the tightness. It feels like 5,000 bouncing Charlie horses pummelling you at once!
I’ve had deep tissue massage to pretty much all the areas listed above. And I’ve been given strict instructions on how to walk.
What?
Yep, that’s right folks, I don’t know how to walk. Not sure how long I haven’t been walking right, but my guess is about 25 years… when a boy at diabetic camp told me I walked like I had a pickle stuck up my butt!!! I blame him, because apparently that’s how you’re supposed to walk. Suck in that belly, tuck in that butt, straighten that torso, no arch, no hip sway. Jerkface!
And what do you know, as soon as I started doing it, the tension around the heel started to ease. Who knew? Oh right, everyone!
I went for my first run today. It was just a quick 4 km, 25 minute jaunt. It was hard to go a slow pace, I was so excited to be out there. It wasn’t perfect. It took a few minutes for my feet to warmup, to feel somewhat comfortable again with the motion. It wasn’t perfect. My left foot wasn’t completely at ease even when warmed up. It wasn’t perfect. I kept having to remind myself to suck in the belly, squeeze the butt, breathe. It wasn’t perfect.
But it was running.
