Unlike my most recent injuries, this one was attributable to bad luck - I would have been hurt even if I were perfectly healthy. Perhaps this minor distinction mattered in some way and compelled me to take a different approach to my recovery. After I ditched the crutches, I put serious research into a rehabilitation program and invented a routine that included regular strength training in the gym and creative weight-bearing workouts in the swimming pool.
When June rolled around, I was feeling pretty good on my two feet and resumed running.
The Third Running Dynasty: June 2014 – March 2015When June rolled around, I was feeling pretty good on my two feet and resumed running.
Start reason: Recovery from ankle injury
End reason: Right leg injury / fatigue
The nine months after my recovery proved an unexpected return to my 2012 form. I lost interest in other activities as I focused on continuing to build my strength for running. My appetite for mileage was ravenous, almost like I wanted to make up for two years of lost time, and I eventually started building up some very impressive running figures. Sometime in the fall, I started running a cumulative half-marathon every weekend. By the time I went out of town in March for a bachelor party, I’d steadily progressed to where I was running a half marathon on one weekend day and doing a six or seven mile run on the other.
When I got back from my trip, I unpacked my bags, put on my sneakers, and went for a sixteen mile run. This was the longest run I know for sure I’ve ever completed. At the time, I legitimately thought I wasn’t just going to be able to run a marathon – I thought I would run one by accident sometime in the spring and follow it up with a ten mile jog the next day! This ambition shockingly proved to be a bit premature. Sometime the following week, I started feeling a crippling tightness in the front of my leg, just below the knee, whenever I got about five minutes or so into a run.
Whoops…
Based on my internet research, I concluded I had a truly horrible condition known as ‘compartment syndrome’. But I also knew about this other research field called ‘common sense’ and so I temporarily diagnosed myself with Running Too Much and chilled out for a few weeks. To my great surprise, the rest did help me recover and by late May I was building myself out of the rubble with easy three to five mile jogs in the early morning. It was a very welcome return to running for me. I found that running in the mornings seemed to elevate my mood and helped me better deal with the challenges of that summer. It was the first time I openly acknowledged that running was more than just an activity for me - it was the only reliable medicine I knew of to help me regulate my mood.
And what, dear reader, could have been going on that required I regulate my mood? The timing of my injury perfectly coincided with my mom's cancer showing the first signs that it was officially transitioning from ‘causing illness’ to ‘causing death’. Over the next four months, I spent a lot of time going to and fro from home, hospitals, and hospices. And let me tell you, reader - the first couple months of this were a disaster for me. There are lots of reasons why that could have been the case, of course, but I do have the useful data point of starting to feel better once I resumed running at the end of May.
There’s a line in Maniac Magee I’ve always really liked. It goes something like this – running in the mornings and reading in the afternoons gave Maniac just enough stability to handle his zany nights. I think of this running dynasty as the time when I finally understood those words . The consistency of going out and coming back proved an invaluable foundation when so many other things in my life were changing – stability really is the right word for the feeling. Though I wish I learned the lesson under different circumstances, I do consider the knowledge I have of how valuable running is for my mood to be among the most important things I know about myself.
