The Knee

I wish this would fix it.  A band-aid and a kiss and the boo-boo is all better.

Its been 10 days now and things aren't going well.  I tried to run a few days ago and made it about a half mile before I limped home.  The next day I went to the gym and in the process of jumping up on the bar to do pullups I tweaked it so badly I saw stars.  I'm trying not to imagine what the people around me were thinking as I doubled up in pain from something as innocent as jumping.

That afternoon I saw a new provider - a PA actually - who took me much more seriously than the doc I saw my first time out.  Maybe it was the fact that I cried when he examined my knee because the manipulating and tests hurt so badly, whatever it was, its a relief to be making progress.  Slow progress but at least we are moving in the right direction.

Amusingly enough I was at the Ortho to finish up a third injection, on my left knee, of a product called uflexa.  Its a new, cool product that lubricates the joints to help them glide better.  What's amusing is that its my right knee that's hurt.

Considering the amount of hours put into training during marathon season I've had some extra time on my hands lately to think.  Sometimes that is good and sometimes that is dangerous.  I go back and forth - from being angry that I'm dealing with knee issues once again, to rationalizing that its not really that big of a deal in the grand scheme of life.  I mean, I run because I like it.  I don't depend on it for my livelihood.  I wasn't preparing to knock over any records or win any cool awards.  In fact, I remember pretty clearly having a conversation with myself during training last year to the effect that if I ran under 3:20 at Boston I would be happy with that as an all-time marathon PR.  Of course, then I ran that 3:19 and wondered if I could go faster.

Probably.  But do I need to?   What will be required in sacrifice for that faster time?  Time with my family and friends.  Am I going to be a world class athlete at the age of 35? Nope.  And just because you can do something does that mean you should?  These are the very ambivalent feelings I've been having through the past couple months leading up to training.  Its funny that all that time I spent thinking I needed to make a big decision about how I would approach my training this round and now it probably doesn't matter ... the decision isn't likely to be one I will get to make.