Sock tans

Well, I’ve officially hit my lowest. I talked to coach this morning, I’d been holding out the hope that he’d be lenient with me since I’m injured but nope. Basically I have to finish the progression run on August 16 or I have to train on my own until December, then can come back and basically try out again. Coach said I’d still be part of the team but... nope I really wouldn’t be. The only difference from being completely on my own is that I still would have access to the training room and athletic trainers. I’m just having a really hard time believing that I can finish the progression run, it already was going to be hard had I not gotten injured. I’ve never finished it before and it’s a tough one. Yeah I’ve never just given up like this before... and I haven’t given up I think I just need time to think and remotivate myself, to try to believe in myself again.

I don’t know if I should start running and increasing my miles, pushing through the pain while knowing I’m going to have to stop again eventually, probably mid-season but at least I’d be able to run with the team, or if I should accept it for what it is and allow myself to heal, risking not being fit enough to finish... if I ran I could get some faster workouts in and be able to feel what paces felt like. It’s different on the bike because it’s all effort based so I won’t have that confidence that I can run fast if I’m only biking and running like 3-5 miles. The progression run is 7.75 miles. I just don’t know what to do.  

I also really need to look at my life and figure it out, I don’t know what I should do... at this point I’m wondering why I’m still at SUU. If I get cut, I mean I’ll be here for another year because of my scholarship, but next year I wouldn’t have one, unless I miraculously recover from this injury and have a stellar year this next year. So... why am I here? And what do I want to do with my life? I‘m not too sure about my career anymore either. Time to figure things out.

Ended up running 5.25 miles at 7:24 average

Ran 2 miles, 7:24 average. Then biked 25 minutes, 4.8 miles

Things are looking up. My manager let me off work early yesterday because it was slow so that was amazing, I was able to spend the rest of the day trying to figure things out. After a solid 4 hours of thinking and praying and a long phone call with my mom, I asked one of my friends to come over and give me a priesthood blessing. Holy cow it was one of the most powerful blessings I’ve ever received. Right after James was like whoa and said he’d never felt that while giving a blessing before. God is real.

The situation hasn’t changed at all but I’m feeling a whole lot better about everything. I know that SUU is where I’m meant to be, at least for the time being. I was told that God is aware of my stresses about my femur and about something else very personal (and there’s no way James could’ve known about that). That was really, really amazing. It was also said that God doesn’t always change our circumstances because he has to respect others agency, since it is his gift to us and essential to his plan, but he will help us to overcome them. That applies to a couple different things in my life right now. But I don’t know what exactly that might mean for running, if that means God will help me to finish the progression run or if he has a different plan for me in mind, but I do know that whatever happens now is in God’s hands, who ultimately knows what is best for me. There was a whole lot of other revelation too but I think that’ll suffice for this blog entry.

So going forward, I will work my hardest on the bike and with the couple miles I can run and then hope for the best. I’m not going to push my recovery, I’m going to listen to my body and to my athletic trainers. Running myself into the ground isn’t going to do anything, I’ll still find myself in a tough spot with coach when the pain becomes unbearable to run on and it could end up pushing me back further than if I just let myself heal.

After all is said and done, I’ll know that I worked my hardest, did what I could, and if that’s not enough then I’ll know that God has something different in mind for me this next semester. Running isn’t everything, after all. Perhaps a new opportunity will open up in place of running, if it comes to that.

Still have to figure out my career plans, but I’ll save that for another day and just enjoy this moment of clarity for a bit.

Biked 46 minutes, 9.62 miles. 

Dikes, 7:24 average. Apparently my body really loves 7:24 pace lol

Decided to slow it down. Dikes again, 7:58 average. Felt myself wanting to speed it up but I forced myself to go slow. It felt nice, no pain in femur where yesterday I felt slight pain.

I’m going to meet with Coach again on Monday, my goodness things just totally flipped around. Coach texted and said he’d thought about what we talked about and said he’d have no problem, because of injury, making sure I train with one of the main groups on the team. SO MUCH RELIEF.

Training wise, though, I know I need to make an adjustment, I guess I’ll talk with Coach about it Monday. Either decrease mileage or slow down the pace, I’ve been injured three times in the two years I’ve been at SUU. Twice this past year. To avoid further injury, and maybe help me improve from here on out, I need to change something and right now I’m leaning towards slowing down the recovery runs but we’ll see what Coach says. 

6 miles easy, 7:45 average. No pain again in femur and I actually felt great. Got a little tired at the end but it was a different kind of tired, felt good. It’s been a while since I’ve felt that.