Still Waiting!!!

   Well Folks, I'm really not sure about what to write on here anymore. So my last post was on May 2nd right? Since then I've had both surgeries performed on my feet and this whole process has taken MUCH longer than I thought it would've. I honestly never thought that I would ever see the day. Where I had an injury severe enough to keep me out of racing and running for that matter, an entire year. As it looks though, I will not be racing anywhere. Anytime soon.

   I've really kind of just been out of the game completely. After the surgeries I had all these plans to stay involved with the running community in any capacity that I could. For the first few weeks after. I made a few appearances. But my time was limited due to the fact that I couldn't be on my feet for an extended period of time. Over the past few months I've really just lost a lack of interest. As my fitness slowly decayed. So too did my desire to even do any kind of training. I've gained 25lbs. and I doubt I can even jog a 10 minute mile these days.

   Over the last month or so. I've started to get the fire back. I have been riding the bike a lot since returning to some kind of a normal routine. I even hatched the idea to ride across the state of Kansas in under 10 hours. North to South that is. As I have been on the bike and have taken stock of where my current fitness level is that will most likely not happen.

   The feet have made some progress. On my last appt. with the doctor he had told me that physically both feet had healed perfectly and that he had seen NO reason why I couldn't make a full recovery. That's great I guess but I had explained to him that when I would try running. Around the 4 mile mark of my runs I would get a sharp pain in my left foot on the lateral side. He told me that was common in about 50% of the patients he sees. Who decide to have this procedure done. It's called lateral banding and that fortunately it is one of the easier foot problems to correct. Understandably my medial plantar facia tendon in which I had the surgery on was still not quite strong enough to bare the full load of my weight and  they were considerably weaker than the lateral side. The lateral side is just not strong enough either. So it's basically being overstressed.

   He has made me a couple of pairs of inserts to place underneath my insoles in my shoes. This will force me to use my medial side more which is supposed to make them stronger. I've been wearing them in my boots at work and in the last week I have noticed a significant decrease in the pain in my feet. Also to note that in the morning I seem to be waking with less and less foot pain upon initially standing. So I think that the inserts are doing their trick. I won't say that I'm out of the woods by a long shot but I will say that for the first time since April of 2011. I am finally heading in the right direction with the whole foot dilemma.

   The doc told me that I should keep trying to run. To keep everything loosened up and to be patient a little while longer. I hate this because I'm not a very patient person by nature. The whole thought of being able to run when my body decides that it is ready is about to drive me out of my mind. I have been running little bits here and there and  coupled with the 150 plus miles of bike riding per week I've been doing. The fitness is starting to come back.

   Lately I have found myself searching through possible races dates on most of the calendars that are out there. Daydreaming, plotting and scheduling some kind of comeback. Mostly though I've just been praying that the morning will come. When I'll wake up and all the pain will have miraculously disappeared and I'll be able to run at least 10 miles a day without any pain whatsoever. Then maybe I could start to build back up my base and really be able to get serious again.

   I know in my heart that I have one more go'round in me. I also know that I will be back 100%. So I'm not going to quit trying until that happens. If my feet improve as much as they have in the last three months over the course of the next three months. I should hopefully be back to running on a regular basis sometime at the beginning of December. Watch, now that I say that it's probably going to take another year. I hope not! I don't know if I have anymore waiting left in me???