Just Rolling Through a Minor Injury

Last week I screwed up my right foot. When I was out for a run with my wife, after a particularly intense cycling workout, I felt my right foot landing pretty hard on the front left part of the foot. I remember myself thinking that it didn’t feel right and that it would probably hurt later. Oh yeah, I was right on that one ;)

Wednesday I felt nothing, went for a bike ride outside in the morning and to yoga at night, where I think I pushed it a bit too much. I was woken-up on Wednesday night feeling by some serious pain in my foot.

Through Wednesday night and Thursday the pain lessened, so I did my cycling workout then a light swim at night. After meeting a friend for dinner on Thursday night, the pain was back with a vengeance, since I kept trying to push through and ignore it. The pain was pretty intense on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, keeping me on the couch for most of the weekend.

Now that I look back, it seems pretty obvious that I may have been pushing too hard and especially not stretching enough after my workouts. Just looking at my legs, especially the right one, I can see how they’re developing through the cycling training and can have a tendency to really tighten-up if I don’t use my foam roller after every workout. Whether I like it or not, I think my age plays a factor in this. Nevertheless, having to make sure I do the right thing after the workout seems like a small price to to pay, considering what I’m trying to accomplish.

At first I experienced complete frustration with the situation, mostly because the pain was intense enough to make me deviate from my carefully planned plans, which are also a routine in some shape or form. I had visions of suffering a serious setback in my cycling training and being in pain at an event my wife and I were looking forward to attending, where my Mom was being recognized for a lifetime of volunteer work (congratulations, Mom!). What made this even more disappointing is that I had to cancel on the event at the last minute, since the pain was so intense.

After these initial feelings passed, I tried to take a step back and approach the injury in a different way, applying some new approaches I’ve been reading about lately, mostly related to mindfulness. First I tried to be aware of what I was experiencing and then acknowledge these initial feelings, rather than igore them, then let them pass.

After that, I tried to be aware of how I would usually progress in these situations. For example, my wife suggested I schedule a doctor’s appointment to have the foot looked at. My first reaction was a big “NO”, thinking that I’ll fight through it and let the injury take it’s own course. I was also planning on trying to do my usual Saturday bike ride, thinking that the ride might put the muscles in my foot back in alignment. Again, my wife just gently suggested that a little rest now might get me back on the bike faster in the long run. Again, my first reaction was “THANKS FOR THE SUGGESTION BUT FORGET IT, I’M GOING!”.

Then, I took a step back and thought to myself that this time things could be done differently, not necessarily having to play out like they have in the past. I called and made a doctor’s appointment for today and am glad I did. Knowing I had the appointment today made yesterday easier to get through, especially while I was experiencing intense frustration from being stuck on the couch on a beautiful Sunday that was also Mother’s Day. At least having the appointment gave me some hope and optimism that things would be getting better soon.

Looking back too, it is now obvious to me that not going for the bike ride was the right choice too. I realize now that, at the time I was considering still going for the ride, my thought process was pretty clouded by what I “thought” I should do, mostly informed by embedded patterns of thought and action, rather than do what I “felt” was the right thing to do. I’m really glad I kept myself open-enough to my wife’s suggestion.

There are other things that I think I learned and am learning from this experience that I may try and capture in future posts. If I don’t, one reason will be that as soon as I start feeling better, it will be easy for me to slip back into the old, comfortable, and usual way of doing things. I hope that, if nothing else, this post will be a reminder to me of how it’s possible to do things differently and that next time it won’t take a setback like the one I’m experiencing to remind me of this!