Aw crap....injury.

In the midst of my training for the runDisney Princess Half Marathon I got injured.  I was honestly at a loss.  I have been an athlete pretty much my entire life and here I was injured and completely unable to train for the first time in my life.  I had injured my calf.  I thought it was just a pull and would resolve itself.  I put on compression socks, KT Tape, Tiger Balmed the ever living crap out of it, and foam rolled whenever I got the chance.  It didn't get better. 

With 2 weeks left until the race I had to do something so I made an appointment with my doctor's office and went in.  Of course they couldn't diagnose it and had me make an appointment with the physical therapist.  After some bitchy assertive words with the scheduling staff I got an appointment for 2 days later (they tried to make it 2 weeks....um no). 

I went to that appointment expecting something scary, something that would take me out of the race, something that would completely destroy my Disney trip.  Fortunately the PT was a runner too so he understood.  He found the knot in my calf and told me it was a stretched/pulled muscle that had balled up to repair itself.  I did not have time for that so he gave me exercises and told me if it didn't resolve itself I could come back for dry needling .  That sounded absolutely terrifying so I did my best to get it better.  I sat in therapy appointments for the 2 tiniest princesses and spent the full hour I was there massaging it (which ended up being 4 hours per week).  I did the exercises and stretches in the shower, kitchen, and random times in between. 

I did get it resolved and I was able to mostly finish my training.  That was scary, the fear of not being able to compete.  The unknown of how to make it better or when it might get better was just awful.  So my advice, really really try hard NOT to get injured.  Great advice huh?