A month of not running culminate today in making me feel restless and unhappy.
I feel like I've overdosed on caffeine. Antsy. Unable to settle.
Everyone is making me irritated. I pace back and forth in the library parking lot talking on the phone to my best friend in faraway Michigan.
She listens to my litany of complaints. He did this... then he did that.
I know, deep down, that the problem is I haven't been able to run since Easter -- April 22.
I set my goal to run 40 days during Lent. And I did it. I ran over 100 miles in the first three weeks of April alone, ignoring the pain that started to build in my heel.
On Easter, I went for a short run. I decided to take a week off to let my foot heal.
The following Saturday, I ran five miles and felt fine, but the day after, the pain was worse than before.
I rested again, trying to run some mornings, but not making it farther than the corner before I turned around and limped home.
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| My running shoes are up on blocks now. |
Sometimes I wake up at night with my foot in pain because I'm lying on that side and pushing against the side of my foot.
No, I haven't been to the doctor yet. I watch our medical spending account fly away for ridiculous costs that I hadn't expected, and I try not to spend any more on something that I feel sure will heal with just a little more rest.
I try new shoes.
I try old shoes.
I feel my body changing. When I rest my hands on my hips they feel loose and jiggly rather than tight muscle.
I hate it.
And now this, this nervous energy with no place to let it out.
I walk three miles this morning with my friend Sheila. That's the farthest I've walked in a while, but by mid-afternoon, my house full of adult children home for the summer, my husband home on vacation this week -- I feel an itching inside me that no fingernails could ever reach.
I have to run in the morning.
It doesn't matter how much my foot may hurt. That anxiety inside is worse.
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