Snap out of it

So, apparently, one of the unexpected side-effects of injury is insomnia. Never struggled with it before, but its been about six weeks since I've been able to ... you know ... sleep ... much. There's the issue of night pains, but even beyond that, there's the notion of using physical fatigue as a sleep aid. Back in the day, when I could throw down some four-hour mornings on the bike, make lunch, juggle a nine-hour stress fest at work, eat, blog, go to bed ... well ... I was always out before I hit the pillow. My co-workers may even argue I was out hours before. But now, I'm up in the morning ... I'm up late at night ... I'm up in the day ... and out of it.

I keep thinking that one of these early early mornings, I'm going to roll out of bed and be 100% fine. It's easy for me to carry this delusion because something similar happened to Geoff and his IT bands last year. Six weeks of searing pain ... and then, one day, he was just fine. I also like to tell the story of my cat, who one day hobbled home to my apartment in Idaho Falls with a huge cut on her right hind leg. The vet did a few tests (no kitty MRIs, but decent tests) and informed me that she had severed her Achilles tendon. The vet told me a $900 surgery would give her a 50-percent chance of partial recovery - granted she receive the requisite physical therapy (how do you get a cat to do physical therapy?). But in all likelihood, the vet said, she would never walk on that leg again. I struggled with the surgery decision for some time ... weighing the expense, researching the success rate, calling up specialty vets in Boise and Salt Lake, and watching my cat live a relatively happy life as a tripod. I decided against the surgery. I am a guilty pet owner.

Months went by like that. During that time, I was injured for several weeks and we were both awkwardly mobile together (something my landlord commented on constantly). Then, one day, I came home from a long weekend away - she had been inside on her own the whole time - and she was walking. Not tripoding. Not limping. She was walking. I never even saw the transition. And, to this day, I've never seen any hints of the injury. She can outsprint dogs in a heartbeat. And she's an active little kitty when she wants to be.

So the most likely scenario is that the vet misdiagnosed her and she recovered from what was probably just a bad cut with some tissue damage. But I like to think of it as a miracle cure. The way she just snapped out of it so quickly after so long ... I like to think that skill runs in the family.

Sometimes pictures reflect moods

I like the swirling storm clouds in this one. Especially since the reason I stopped to take it was that small window of sunlight in the center.

Moderation

Some days I feel despondent about injury, and some days I feel defiant. It is hard to wedge myself somewhere in the middle. But the only way to figure out how much is too much is to start somewhere near the bottom, which often feels worse than doing nothing.

I had an unsuccessful weekend of resting (although it was only resting in the physical sense. I haven't been through a whirlwind of activity like that in a while). My new plan is to slither back into cycling. And in order to not tempt myself into two-hour jaunts, I decided I was going to do that slithering at the gym. On their creaky, old, rubber-straps-for-toe-clips stationary bike. I hate that thing. Which is the perfect mindset to have when you're trying to avoid the temptation of overuse. I pedaled 20 minutes at low resistance. Mindless spinning, and in the meantime I read "Over the Hills" by David Lamb, a book written by a middle-age reporter for the Los Angeles Times who smokes and drinks and decides one day in the 90s to cross the country on a bicycle. I was reading the part where he was making his way across Arkansas and writing about all of the delicious pies he was eating. I wanted to find out more about those pies and the quirky small-town folks he met, so after my prescribed 20 minutes were up, I sauntered over to the elliptical trainer.

That's how it goes down. 45 minutes passed there. After that, enough time had passed that I had to go straight to work from the gym anyway, so I killed 20 more minutes lifting ... including the crackle-inducing leg extensions (because I read somewhere that once that crackling starts to subside, I'm good to go, so I wanted to see if it was still there. It was.) But the real drawback of all that is, when I'm popping Advil and hobbling in the evening, I have no idea whether I can blame the 20 minutes of pedaling or not.

Today my plan is to pedal my prescribed 25 minutes and nothing more, and leave my book at home so I get good and bored in that time. It really doesn't even seem worth the effort of putting on gym shorts and my knee brace, but with two months of failure and a nonsurgical diagnosis, all I have left is baby steps.

The goal is that I'll understand when it's no longer appropriate to hold back. Moderation in all things. Even moderation. (Good quote, by the way, Dave.)