A Folder Full of Drafts and Zero Running
or "life right now"
Currently, my substack folder is full of drafts of posts that never were, and it’s too late for now.
You have missed out on, for instance, finding out about how I didn’t run a Half Marathon, stayed in a camper van in a pub car park in February and fell over a picnic table. They were great stories. Sorry, you missed out.
Anyway, it seems out of date now because my main worry is the actual Marathon that is creeping up on me. I haven’t done enough fundraising or training for it, and I’m terrified I might not be able to do it at all because I walked to the train station in DM Boots three weeks ago.
You guys can definitely help me out with one of those. My substack is free, so maybe bung a couple of quid to my fundraising page to show me how you wish I would write more posts about things I haven’t done. The money is going to Activity Alliance, who champion disability inclusion in sport, which will be even more important when everyone loses all their disability benefits. yAy!
Once you’ve done that, you can come back, and I’ll tell you about walking to the train station. I bet you can’t wait.
Are you done?
Sure?
Ok, well, I’m worried I won’t be able to do the bloody thing at all because I have injured my achilles tendon.
It was all going so well.
I’d got up to about 10 miles in training, and they felt great, I felt great, I was giving cancer a big f**k you, I was thinking that maybe I’d even manage it in around 6 hours, which is more than I ever hoped for.
Then I went to the beach for the day. A friend was visiting, and we planned to get the 10:45 train out to Cromer. I popped on my trusty DM boots (though maybe not so trusty, as I just noticed the sole is splitting after less than a year. Hmph), and we headed off to walk to the station.
I SAID we should allow at least 45 minutes for the walk, but we obviously left late and then raced down there at the highest possible speed for me, 2 guys with longer legs and 2 elderly lazy pugs.
We missed the train, naturally, and I noticed that my right heel felt a bit bruised. As we now had a whole hour before the next train, we went to get a coffee, and it started to feel really uncomfortable. By the time we got to Cromer, it REALLY hurt, and I did a lot of sitting on benches looking at seagulls, which I’m fine with tbh. By the time we returned to Norwich in the evening, I was full-on limping, and walking was hard.
My eternal optimism thought I’d probably be fine in the morning.
I wasn’t.
For the next 2 days I had to use my walking stick. It really bloody hurt, I couldn’t walk the dogs, and it was seriously triggering my unresolved cancer diagnosis trauma.
Obviously, I did not do my 2 1/2-hour run, but my Coopah run coach recommended I move it to the following week.
The fact that I’m whinging about it on the internet will probably give you a clue that I did not move it to the following week; in fact, as of this morning, my last run was 14 days ago, which is scary as hell when you’re planning to run your first marathon.
I booked myself an appointment with a physio, and this week she said I can walk. So yesterday I walked 6k and it was fine. So today, I tried a short run. In fact, I tried that short run at the end of the above paragraph, obviously writing it about it gave me the urge to see if I could make this whole situation worse.
It did hurt, but not at walking stick levels, and I will tentatively say that it got better towards the end, maybe? If it’s still fine tomorrow, I may try Parkrun.
Great, you might think, you’re back to some cautious running! Yes, it WOULD be great, if the London Marathon was in May, but I should be doing 4 hour long runs by now, not crossing my fingers I can make it through an hour, and I am FREAKING OUT.
I bet you’re hoping this has some kind of resolution. Sadly this is real life and it doesn’t. But what I will do is promise to update you next week, and leave you with a list of the methods I am using to heal my stupid tendon. Both woowoo, science and internet folk remedies.
Actual Science
Contrast hot and cold therapy.
Foam rolling my calves, shins and feet.
Resistance band exercises - single leg squats and arch activation on my feet.
Internet Folk Remedies
Are they science? Are they woo woo? I don’t know, but I’m trying them anyway.
The Saran Wrap Hack (I don’t know what Hirudoid cream is, I used Arnica)
Woo Woo
Craniosacral therapy - The guy I see for Craniosacral therapy is Gary Collins at Treat in Norwich. I’m sure that what he does does not sound like how Craniosacral therapy is described online. I think he is an actual wizard and the craniosacral therapy thing is just a cover. Anyway, I love it.
Crystals - I put amethyst in the water I use for the hot and cold therapy. Can’t hurt, right?
Visualisation - just imagining my tendon fixing itself, like a nice warm light around it.