By Chamberlain Zulauf, Student Reporter
The topic for this week, injury/setbacks, was bound to show its face sooner or later. It’s hard not to get a little banged up spending so much time running. While being home was relaxing in a lot of ways, getting to spend time with family and running some old routes, I still ran into some trouble. One run late in the week had to be cut short as my knee was killing me. Getting my mileage for the day was out of the question and I had to walk back a few miles to get to my car. My IT band had become inflamed which meant I couldn’t bend my knee without sharp pain under my kneecap— it was not a pleasant walk back to say the least. It’s hard to say what caused the tweak. It could be my new shoes, more doubles than was good for me or simply just a wrong step.
The best thing to remember with any setback is that it will pass. I’ve had problems with my right knee before. I know that I just need to take time off to let everything cool off. At most I spent a few days on a stationary bike when I felt up to it. To me, setbacks are a psychological battle more than a physical one. Something I’ve been actively working on mentally is having the confidence in myself to get back into motion but only when I’m ready. Patience over frustration will see me running sooner rather than later.
Helping yourself is the most you can do when in recovery, it’s not all going to come back all at once. Don’t over stretch and try to fix the problem 24 hours a day. I think all that would do is invite the problem to live in one’s head rent free. Take the setback in stride and stay looking at the positives. For example…
It’s been a nice rest period for me while I’m nursing my knee. Sure, I was in a groove the week before this, and I do want to get back to that, but I was getting so exhausted every day so maybe this is a gift in disguise. For now, I’ll just take it one day at a time and keep building up from where I wake up each day.
