I know it's time to wrap this blog up and move on, but to tell you the truth, I've been dreading this final post to my dear loyal readers who have been following my exploits since December.
First, the news. I am happy to report that my physical therapist rocks. His name is Chris, and one of the first things I saw at the rehab facility was a little bulletin board with a display saying "Go Chris! Boston Marathon time = 3 hours 31 minutes. Great job!"
Ever the consummate conversationalist, my eyes went pie-pan wide as I blurted out, "Holy crap! You ran
Boston?!"
He just nodded, amused at my awestruck reaction, and asked me how I'd injured myself. When I started to explain dog agility, he actually cut me off: "Oh, yeah, I've seen it on TV. There's a lot of sudden acceleration and deceleration, a lot of sharp turns--and you use totally different muscle fibers for dog agility than you do for distance running. I'll show you what you need to do so you can go back to agility without hurting yourself again." Oh, and he owns a mutt named Keeley who loves to play frisbee. He takes her to the dog park all the time.
For a second, I actually thought I heard harp music. This guy is clearly the perfect PT for me.
We spent the next 45 minutes doing various exercises for the hip flexors and adductors, and then I got to relax with two big ice packs on my thighs while he got me copies of all the exercises with pictures to take home and do once a day on my own. My next appointment is tomorrow morning.
The only bummer was when I asked him if I could run agility this weekend. He just laughed at me. Next weekend is also out. That's three shows in a row I am missing because of this stupid injury.
This morning dawned migraine-ily. As in, I woke up with a migraine and wanted to beat my head against the wall. Running has decreased the intensity and frequency of my migraines by 80%. It has been a night-and-day change for me and a very welcome one. A few years ago I tried to count up all the days I had lost to migraines and came up with something like eight months!! That is a
very long time. Of course, I have only run three times for a grand total of seven miles since the race, so I guess the good effects are starting to wear off. Another reason I desperately need to get back on the roads. I had to cancel an important meeting today and probably won't get an opportunity to reschedule it.
My mom had a throat culture taken to try and discern a possible cause for her window-rattling cough, and it came back as "moderate growth of streptococcus pneumoniae." (Does that mean strep or pneumonia or both?) At any rate, it is susceptible to amoxicillin, and that is exactly what the doctor prescribed for her, so it looks like they're on the right track.
And that's all I've got, which means it's time to wrap things up and say good-bye. I should be back to running in 3-4 weeks, and Chris said I could probably go to an agility show the weekend of July 10th, so although my misery is intense, it promises to be fairly short-lived. There ought to be a happy ending for me, at least.
My mom will have to persevere a little longer to kick cancer to the curb yet again. I would guess she has another one or two rounds of chemo ahead of her after she gets this cough taken care of. However, I have no doubt that she will do it. I just hope she gets a nice long remission out of this. Ten years would be good.
Thank you again to all of you who donated to the cause. I raised a total of $4,060 for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society from something like 75 different check/credit card donors, along with many more who made cash donations and donated raffle prizes at my agility fundraiser. The total number of people who contributed is certainly over 100. Thanks to each and every one of you from the bottom of my heart. This has been an amazing experience in many ways, but I am still flabbergasted at just how many people reached out to help, and how many have lost a family member or friend to a blood cancer.
Thank you to everyone who has read along with the blog. It has always been a rather exclusive audience--I think the most hits I ever got in one day was 30--but I really appreciated every comment that you left, every time you saw me and said, "Oh, I really enjoy your blog!" and especially a few of you who said that I inspired you to start or revive an exercise program. Also, whoever was reading me all the way from the Philippines, thank you! I am also not sure who the UK reader was, but thank you as well! (I am getting this information from the little ClusterMaps app over on the right-hand side of the blog.) The German audience is a mix of family and friends, and I probably know the people responsible for 80% of the US hits, but there are definitely a few people I don't actually know personally, so yay for people who don't know me liking my writing enough to follow along! Thank you!
If I start another blog, I will certainly come back and post a link here so you can follow along if you like. And I will post something in a few days meant to help any new readers figure out what this blog is about, maybe with links to a few of my favorite entries. I will leave this blog up for a few years to help future Team in Training folks and other newbie runners who might be wondering what it's like to train for a half-marathon.
Until we meet again, run happy and injury-free, and remember that ultimately, the only reason to run today is so you can run again tomorrow.
Amanda over and out.
