10 weeks till Flint Hill's 50 but who is counting?

I still have the tiniest of hopes that I can do something at my upcoming race.  At the very least I will volunteer at an aid station, but maybe I can power walk the full?  Hoping for the best, preparing for the worst. Rather than a day by day since most days were spent doing PT and resting, here are the highlights.

boom watching me do PT

I did go see my chiro again on Wednesday.  She agreed an MRI if covered would be a really good thing to have.  I pointed out that yes, nerve flossing does help for a brief moment, but the toothache pain radiates from under my butt cheek, and while that could still be nerve it could also be muscle.  I also reminded her of the weird indention in the back of my leg that runs on the biceps femoris.  Yes, I do think the brace was irritating it but it was super sore.  Could this be a tear even though I wasn't lame and limping and didn't have an acute incident?  She did lots of release on several different other areas to make sure we weren't missing anything.  I think I make her and all of my over providers think because she had several books out looking at anatomy and different treatments we could do.  She was amazed at the amount of research I had done (have you ever had a scientist + runner, probably not, double obsession).  We did add two more exercises to my set and went over a couple to make sure I was doing them correctly.  The good news the pain is getting less, ever so slowly with the help of the brace and sitting on a balance disc at work.  I still need to get a ball to sit on because sometimes my back starts hurting as the balance disc is a little over inflated since i use it with the dogs.

my inserts and lift

At the end of the visit, we got my inserts out and tried them before I left.  We both knew immediately they weren't going to work.  The arches were super duper high.  I don't have high arches, I just walk on the sides of my feet which makes me look like i have high arches (and this is made worse when I am barefoot).  I would have thought the molds would have provided that information.  Sigh.  I took them home with instructions to try and wear them 2 hours a day.  I made it 10 minutes before through tears I had to take them out.  They hurt my feet SO badly.  I guess that was 300 bucks down the drain.  Plus the lift is a separate piece of material that has to go under the orthotic and basically I have no room in the shoe for my actual foot.  Not going to work :(

The end of the 5 course meal was this heavenly cheesecake

Friday was Valentines day and the first day in a LONG time that I didn't wake up in pain.  Of course Saturday was totally different with me waking up sore and painful and I have NO clue what I did differently to cause that.  We did split a bottle of wine at dinner, so maybe that is what caused the pain (wine = inflammation?). By the way, the five course meal we signed up for at our little local restaurant was amazing for V day dinner.  We started with goat cheese bruschetta, had salad and broccoli cheddar soup, a sorbet to clean our pallet, and beef tenderloin with a twice baked potato and steamed asparagus.  AMAZING and I felt like a stuffed pig.  Then to finish off the cheesecake above with raspberry sauce and fresh raspberries.  WOW!!!!  Plus, they had a barbershop quarter walking around singing while we ate.  Tony and I don't get away on many dates and this was fun and only a couple of blocks from our house so we could have a drink or two and not worry about driving.

Saturday the weather was beautiful which meant we had to get out.  Tony was working and the trails were still snow covered and or icy, but that didn't stop us.  We went out to a little park that had some trails and hiked up to the top of the hills that overlook a big lake that was covered in snow geese.  We made it quite a while till the wheels fell off and Andrew got whiny.  I was worried that my leg would be hateful post hiking, especially since we were either going straight up or straight back down.  My left leg felt fine post hiking, but my right knee did not.  What the heck knee?????

trying to watch Daytona at the local bar through rain delays

I did wake up feeling better and not sore at all on Sunday. I am feeling hopeful that this means I can get some sort of exercise started and soon, even if it isn't running.  I need to do something whether it be walking or hiking or what.  I have two appointments scheduled for this upcoming week that should give me more insight into things and if they don't, I will be scheduling a MRI for sure. 

Hoping you have a wonderful week and run some miles for Stella and I!