Be thankful, even when you are injured

With the US Thanksgiving festivities yesterday, I was, yet again, reminded to be thankful for the things I have. Good family, good friends, good fitness and a job that doesn't feel like work being among them. It is easy to forget what you have, when dealing with the daily stress that comes with just living. Being late for an appointment can seem like the end of the world, missing a workout can make you frustrated, living in a freezing cold place like Toronto can make you wish you were born in southern California. It doesn't do any good to dwell on these details, and yet, I and most people do.

It has been an incredibly frustrating fall season with my training, in particular. With so much to balance, I expected my training time to decrease significantly in November. I was OK with this. I was going to cut back on cycling and swimming in favour of a bit more running. Running takes the least amount of time up for training compared to the other sports (especially when you have a treadmill in your bedroom) so this was expected to work out well. Adam laid out a training plan that looked perfect. I set out a few run specific goals that I wanted to hit in the spring. This was all great on paper, but when I actually started to execute the plan, the hamstring injury that had been nagging at me since after Mont Tremblant came back in full force. I got through my first two weeks of base running, had a decent run test and was feeling pretty good until the third week of training. In that third week I did a set of intervals and, while I felt OK during the set, it was clear afterwards that there was an issue. It hurt to straighten my leg when walking or running, right at the sit bone. While all the self-tests I did for proximal hamstring tendonitis were negative, I still worried. I started seeing my Chiropractor, Bill Wells, and he said I have an enthesopathy of the hamstring attachment. Basically, there is damage to the entheses which is where the hamstring tendons attach to the sit bone/ishial tuberosity.

Where it is

Bill treated me with a lot of ART and that seemed to fix things. However, after a run the symptoms would come back. After an unending cycle of me running, hurting, Bill fixing me, me running, hurting, Bill fixing me, etc. I decided that enough was enough. My running goals would have to be put on hold until I was over this injury. It has been almost one week since my last run, I've been doing a lot of eccentric hamstring strengthening exercises, getting treatment from Bill, focused more on swimming and cycling because that's completely pain-free and I have an ultrasound booked for Monday to determine how bad this injury is. So, I am thankful that I am able to be proactive about this, that I am swimming really well (2 sets of 4x200 in 2:45 on Wednesday!) and can ride my bike a lot!

So, be thankful for what you can do, don't dwell on what you can't do. Be thankful for what you have, don't dwell on what you don't have. And be thankful for family, friends, love and laughter.

If you are interested, below is my core and glute strengthening routine, that I complete 3 times a week, with hamstring exercises added:

1. 3x60s plank (with 5 straight leg raises during each 60s interval)

2. 3x15 bird dogs/side

3. 3x60s side plank (with 30s per side) with 5 hip abductions during the 30s

4. 3x15 single leg glute bridge per side

Single leg glute bridge

5. 3x8 hamstring lifts with focus on the lowering/eccentric component

Single leg hamstring lift

6. 3x10 push-ups

7. 3x8 single leg deadlifts per leg with 40lbs dumb bells

Single leg deadlifts

8. 3x25 theraband side walks per side

9. 3x10 nordic hamstring exercises

Nordic hamstring exercise