I ran a little over 14 miles last night. My training plan called for 20. However, I decided to flip flop last weekend and next weekend due to the foot injury. That meant I would do 16 last night. However, my foot started to get angry so I stopped at 14. Although I would have loved to have run 16, I'll take 14 at this point. I was actually surprised my foot did that well.

I will add that I am not struggling fitness-wise (yet). I've had to skip runs to rest my foot, but I had several more miles in me in terms of legs and cardio...Basically, everything felt great except for the foot. And even the foot didn't feel horrible. It's been worse, but I didn't want to push my luck.

My saving grace recently (when I've been forced to rest my foot) is the Olympics. I was always really into the Olympics as a kid, and I still love them as an adult. I usually run in the evenings at about 7 pm--depending on how far I need to run. Instead of running, I now sit down for the primetime Olympics show, so that's helped me to not feel the void of my usual evening activity. In that respect, I guess the timing of my injury isn't horrible.

I am not running today but will give it a try again tomorrow. It's day to day with the foot but I am feeling much more positive than I was a few days ago. I read somewhere that if you are returning from injury you should do 75% of your training for a week or so, and I am going to try that to see if I can balance continuing to train with recovery.

So I am still dealing with a sore foot. Long story short, there seems to be a really big knot in my arch. It is swollen, but there isn't anything broken or structurally wrong at this point. I ran this week on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. I took off Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. Tomorrow I will try my long run. It would be 20 miles, but I am going to switch the next two weekend around and try 16 tomorrow. I'm nervous about it. When I ran Wednesday I only made it about 5.3 miles, but hopefully three consecutive days off has helped the situation.

I'm not going to lie...it's hard to be hurt. When I can't do my runs, I get grumpy. You learn to depend on certain things in your life for stress-relief, coping, combating anxiety, a sense of accomplishment, etc. When those things are taken away, you have to adjust, and I haven't done that well. Of course, to put things in perspective, no one has died here. I just can't run right now. Worst case scenario is that I won't be able to run my marathon. I don't think that's going to happen, but even if it does, I will be just fine. However, if I can't get back into running very soon, I am going to need to turn to biking (if it doesn't hurt--not sure if it will) or swimming to keep my fitness up. This isn't my first running injury and won't be my last.

I generally don't have many regrets in life. It's not that I don't make mistakes because I most certainly do. However, I seem to be programmed to look forward and not back. I don't second guess decisions very often. This can be a good thing, but it also can be a bad thing because I don't learn from mistakes by analyzing my own behavior.

If I make myself look back on this injury, I can see how I could have POSSIBLY prevented it. I chose a VERY hard training plan. It has high mileage. I could have chosen a more moderate training plan. I might not be hurt if I had not chosen to run so many miles as part of my plan. I also could have done things differently the weekend I got hurt. I changed my schedule to take two days off before my long run but then NOT take a day off after. There is a reason you are supposed to take a day off after the long run...so your body can rest and recover. I should have either not run on the day after or done a very short run. Lesson learned. I tend to think more is always better, but it's not.

Tomorrow I will try 16 and see how it goes. I am hoping for the best!