Re-Evaluating.

For whatever reason, my crappy performance at the last 5K I ran really kicked my butt and ruined my motivation. I don't know what it was about it.  I did run a 10K in July, the Prowl the Sproul 10K up at home.  I was proud of myself for doing it because everyone else that had signed up decided not to run it because of the heat.  Although it took me forever, I was very proud of the fact that I went and did it anyway.  Running the Lilies for Lily 5K alone was one thing, but this puppy was in the woods in a location I wasn't familiar with, so it felt good to complete it.

However... along with the completion of the 10K came the worst running injury I've had to date.  The ball of my foot was throbbing to the point where I could barely walk afterwards.  I had had a little bit of pain in that area from time to time over the summer, but didn't think anything of it.  Finally in August, I saw my doctor about it and he sent me for an x-ray which came back inconclusive, but with the pain still an issue, he sent me for a bone scan.  The bone scan came back suspicious for a fracture in the head of my first metatarsal, or at the ball of my foot. 

What did that mean?  No Zumba. No running.  And a walking boot for 6 weeks.

Where did that get me?  Back at an orthopedic surgeon at the end of those 6 weeks... which only led to no boot, but still no activity involving pressure on the ball of the foot, as well as tendonitis in my flexor hallicus longus... a.k.a. my big toe joint.  My flexor hallicus longus is so tight that the surgeon could barely move my ankle or my big toe.  I am now doing stretching exercises 5-10 times a day to stretch the muscle out.  My legs are so tight that doing a calf stretch on the stairs makes me feel like my legs are going to snap.  The surgeon said that the cause of it was all of the jumping and twisting from Zumba, but not enough stretching of the muscle.

Blah.

So, I go back on December 5th for a follow-up and if I haven't made any progress, I have to have a cast put on to permanently stretch the muscle out.

Gross.

Anyway...

Basically, this injury has cost me weeks of running, weeks of Zumba.  I can feel the effects when I walk upstairs, when I wake up and my legs are stiff, when I get dressed in the morning.  I have gained 20 pounds since the last time I weighed-in on my blog.  When I weighed myself last week, I was at 186.6.

My new best friend.

Because of that, I decided to stop making stupid excuses for myself and went out this weekend to get a stationary bike.  I cannot use the lack of running and Zumba as an excuse.  Although I may not be dripping sweat by the time I'm done with my bike workout, at least I got my body moving for that period of time.  I am working on incuding swimming to the mix and I really need to start incorporating pilates into my routine.  I need to bring back abs and arms and stop whining about the fact that I can't run. 

Tomorrow will be my first official weigh-in of this program.  As far as food, I've decided that at work, I am going to do salads every day because we have a good salad bar at school and our teacher lunches are only $3.  I'm taking yogurt as my afternoon snack each day and will do nuts or something for on the way home from work.  I'm feeling confident that I can do this.  In the last 2 days since I got the bike, I've cycled 22 miles.  I need to just set a goal for myself and stick with it.

I need to remember the reason why I am here in the first place -- the guy with the prosthetic leg who crossed the finish line at the Mega.  If he can hike 26 miles, I can recover from an injury without ruining everything I've worked for.