Still no running ....

It’s been 2 ½ weeks since my half marathon and I’m still not back to running. Why? Well, because me knee is still hurting every now and then and the Physio said I should wait until I have been without pain for at least 5 days before I start running again. She said these kinds of injuries are tricky because once you have them they are really hard to get rid of permanently. And starting training too early after an injury is pretty much the safest way to ensure you will never fully recover ;-)

So right now I’m going to the gym 3 times a week in the mornings. I do strength training (taking it easy with the workouts that put stress on my knee) and I do some cardio on the bike. Apparently riding the bike is good when you have knee injuries because it trains the muscles but because you’re sitting it’s low impact – unlike running! I also try to go for walks at least 2 or 3 times a week which is actually really nice because we have been having absolutely beautiful spring weather and I walk either in One Tree Hill which is a park just a few minutes from where I live or I go somewhere to the waterfront, like Mission Bay, and walk there. So in a way I’m enjoying taking it a bit easier after all the full on marathon training. But at the same time I’m getting a little impatient and nervous.

In a way it is totally stupid. I’m still working out 3 times a week and I’m doing active stuff on weekends like walking so compared to what I used to do most of the past 26 years it’s pretty damn good. And the weight loose has continued to go well, too. I was a bit concerned that when I started reducing the amount of work outs the weight loose would slow down or I would have to change my eating habits but it all worked out really well. I’m eating a little less carbs then I did in the last weeks of marathon training but besides that my diet is still the same and I’m still losing weight at about the same rate than before. So technically it is all going well and there really is no reason to stress or be in a rush to get back to running.

But for some reason I’m very anxious about not running. It’s kind of like I’m scared to fall back into old habits. I had this really good rhythm before the half marathon, it was like a routine I didn’t have to think about. I had my running days and my gym days and a plan for how much I would do each day and all I had to do was follow that plan. Now all the sudden there is so much more flexibility and it’s so easy to trick myself into thinking it doesn’t matter if I don’t work out today, I can just do it tomorrow and what difference makes a day. You’re probably thinking I’m totally overreacting and you’re probably right ;-) I should just relax and take it easy for a while until the knee has recovered and then start running again slowly. Too bad patience is not exactly my strong suit ;-)