Recently, I've had the pleasure of hitting the pavement in another way. It's been nearly 10 years since I've been able to run any significant distance; due to a combination of tendonitis (ITB), bursitis of knees and hips, and a combination of other less-than-pleasant indications that I'm not the indestructible 17-year-old I still occasionally think I am, I've been held to about 20 minute sessions of pavement pounding per day. Sadly, 20 minutes is neither enough to garner the high that makes long distances so attractive nor is it sufficient to satiate my masochistic nature.
Now before you get too depressed on my behalf, there is an extraordinary upshot to this story. Of late (and by this, I mean over the past three months), I've finally been able to push the envelope in a significant way. I've extended my range, as of Wednesday this week, to just shy of 13 miles. Now that's progress- from 3 miles (tops) to 13 miles!
Yes, I am pleased in the extreme with the progress. I've spent upwards of two hours running, enjoying the pseudo-bliss of runner's high for the first time in a decade. Alas, it wasn't meant to last.
I am getting old. I simply can't deny it any more. My metabolism has dramatically slowed- I can't get by on a 5000 calorie diet anymore. These days, I'm bound to a 3800 calorie diet. I currently weigh 15 pounds more than I did 15 years ago- and 10 of those pounds were packed on in the last year. I'm closer to thirty than to anything else... and getting still closer by the day. And, to top it all off, I simply don't heal as well or as quickly as I used to.
My recent stint with distance running is the perfect example. I had been running between 6 and 10 miles daily for about a month before biting the bullet and going for the half-marathon on Wednesday. I had been slowly ramping up the time and distance with each run, monitoring my knees and hips very carefully so as not to do irreparable damage. It was all leading up to the day that I could pass the 13 mile mark. At that point, I knew I was a significant step closer to the half iron-man I've been working toward.
The run started badly. I had been out on Monday, taken Tuesday off (intentionally, thinking of my Wednesday plans). I had stretched thoroughly (a necessity these days) and felt pretty good. 100 yards out the door, though, I felt a "pop" in my left hip joint and the (expected) accompanying pain. I've felt it before, many times. It's the kind of pain I can ignore and run through, but have to pay for later. My thought process at the time was simply:
"No worries. It'll hurt, but it'll heal. It's worth running through."
So I continued. I posted some great speeds going up the hills on the run (there is a several hundred foot climb in the first 4 miles of my run, all of it off-road). I came in within 20 seconds of my personal best at the 4 mile mark, made the turn for the wide loop, and started down the hill.
If you've had experience running before, you know the tricky part really isn't the uphills- it's the downhills. You have two choices: take it slow and suffer the time loss, or let gravity do the work for you. The latter seems preferable on paper, but when you're tumbling down a steep hillside, the first thing you notice is the beating your joints take. Consider again how my run began. My hip was not a happy joint.
Still, I was determined to pull of the distance I had set. Down the hills I went, for another 4 miles until I finally reached the road (yes, that's right, 8 miles of trail running). I knew I had 4.5 miles remaining on the intended route as I kicked the last dust from my shoes. And I also knew that the slight burning sensation the outer part of my right knee was a bad sign.
I could have cut it short. As the crow flies, it was about a mile from my location to home; on the roads, it was about a mile and a half. Chances are good that I would have made it home without instigating a serious flare-up of tendonitis in the knee. I've heard it said that insanity is doing the same thing twice and expecting different results. By this definition, I am quite insane.
By the time I rounded the last corner to make the half-mile ascent home (we live on a hill), I had practically no range of motion left in the leg. It was quite literally a dead limb dragging behind me. It must have looked strange- some guy running one legged with the other foot turned nearly 45 degrees out and straight as a board.
Now don't forget the hip. It was my right knee that locked up. I had no way to carry any weight on the leg, let alone soften the pounding on the left hip.
I could end my narration of events here, but I'll give you a picture of the aftermath of my (almost) half marathon. Here's the definitive list:
- One completely frozen joint (right knee)
- One excruciatingly painful hip (left)
- A seriously inflamed and unhappy achilles heel (right ankle)
- One idiotic grin of self-satisfaction for not only making it through the distance, but doing it with all the damage...
If you ever wonder what it's like to be a Metge, consult the list above. It's fairly well summarized.
Last note... I ended up taking an afternoon off of work and heading off to the doctor's. Something about practically crying from pain with every step didn't sit right with me. Interestingly enough, the visit was extraordinarily informative. The doctor (Doctor Christiensen, practicing in Saratoga Springs) is a phenomenal doctor. After describing the symptoms to him, his first response was to ask the history, identify a pattern of tendonitis, and look for an underlying cause. He's a sharp guy with a great memory- he pulled up an article describing what he suspected might be going on.
His suspicion was a hereditary condition- Ankylosing Spondylitis- that would lead to easy inflammation of the joints as well as a few of the other problems I've experienced over the past 10 years. Interestingly, he asked my about back pain. I told him that this was a very regular fact of life for me- sometimes, it is as much a notice of my existence as is my pulse. Even as I sit here typing, I can detect pain in my lower back. That, combined with limited flexibility in the lower back, led him to ask for a back x-ray and a blood test. We'll see exactly how that goes. It certainly would be nice to get answers to a decade-long question.
Mark Metge