Life Now

When I restarted (for the millionth and 7 time) my blog last week I initially was going to play catch up with race reports, weight loss (or gain or both) and general ramblings of what's been going on, but I guess instead I'm going to start with the now.  I'll still touch briefly on the in between (Columbus and now) so the now part makes total sense.

3 years ago (March 2012) I ran my first marathon. Shortly after I took a brief hiatus and got very acquainted with physical therapy due to a hip labral tear and some impingement. Hiatus over, great racing season, PR.
Hip flared back up and the cycle repeated itself for most of 2014.

March 2015 was suppose to be my goal (SUB 2 hour) half marathon at Shamrock. Set back, the goal became to finish, which I DID within minutes of my PR (I should've pushed hard despite the pain, I shouldn't have stopped to pee since I really didn't need to). Anyway, another set back once that was over with months in PT, AlterG (anti-gravity treadmill) running, no speed work, more PT, no racing... you get the cycle.

And now.

August 17, 2015 was my last visit with my PT and the day I was advised to see my orthopedic doctor again. So, I went to see Dr. M on August 24. It was decided based on my history 3 years ago and my most recent (this year) x-rays to move forward with scheduling arthroscopic surgery on my hip since I had done PT, had a cortisone shot and nothing was working to really relieve my pain besides complete rest (NOT an option!!). We scheduled it for late in October (22nd) because we are going on a cruise to the Bahamas at the early part of the month and with the recovery time just did not feel it was best to schedule before. NO need to be hobbling around a cruise ship or the Bahamas on crutches.

So a timeline (more for me):

April 2012 - injured
May 2012-  began PT
Between July 2012 and July 2015 - lots of PT, PR races and easy running.
August 2015 - Visit w/ Dr. M to schedule surgery

What exactly IS my condition? 
Femoroacetabular impingement (FAI) -
a condition where the bones of the hip are abnormally shaped. Because they do not fit together perfectly, the hip bones rub against each other and cause damage to the joint. The hip is a ball-and-socket joint.

Labral tear -  A hip labral tear involves the ring of cartilage, called the labrum, that follows the outside rim of the socket of your hip joint. The labrum acts like a rubber seal or gasket to help hold the ball at the top of your thighbone securely within your hip socket.

Basically Dr. M will go in arthroscopically and shave the defunct bone, clean up the labrum. 


I am trying really hard in the time I have free between now and surgery to workout as much as possible and not think about the procedure itself. I know in the long run I need to do this to get back to running (and maybe a PR or two). I plan to document the process here to help cope with the whole not running/working out thing.

That is... life now. Well, life as far as running and my complete lack of blogging about it.