Thursday, January 15, 2015

Enforced lay-off week

After watching the women's race on Sunday we headed home to Sheffield via a couple of stops to keep my leg moving. I gave up on being stubborn and started asking for the keys to disabled toilets at service stations. I've never noticed that in many cubicles (including those in the Neville Hall hospital in Abergavenny) only have 1inch between the swinging door and the pot. Not good if you're on crutches.

The journey was mercifully efficient. Walking into my own house on crutches was very weird. Going up my steep stairs was very weird but I got it sorted. Dosed up on drugs the night was pretty peaceful.

The muscle was doing better and better as the day went on. I worked from home which turned into churning out traverse training profiles to get my bonus for the year.

By the evening I was putting plenty of weight on my right foot as I walked with crutches.

On Tuesday morning I took one crutch to the bathroom and felt like a bit of a fraud so I started to make do without. I could put enough weight on it to press a brake pedal in an emergency stop so I drove to work with one stick in the car just in case.

Things were mending so well I didn't really think that a physio was going to be necessary I mean it would take me 6 weeks to see a nhs one anyway so I didn't bother with the doctor. I have had enough time sitting in waiting rooms.

Then on Wednesday, a work colleague told me how long it took him to recover from his torn calf. Same as me - back to walking in no time - but it took him weeks to recover his spring without feeling the strain. I texted my usual physio. She gave me some pointers but couldn't fit me in so next point of call is Accelerate running store.

Their sports therapist is in today and can see me. Yes! Inappropriately dressed in my work kit and borrowing a pair of silly large shorts he starts by counter-diagnosing the hospital. I don't care whether he is right or wrong, the glimmer of hope that I might not have torn it is something to cling to. He proceeds to maul my sore muscles into some kind of soft mass instead of the clawed, gnarly lump of scrap metal they previously represented.  Momentarily the pain all concentrates into my knee pit and Achilles and we have to stretch it all out to move it along.

He gives me some exercises to strengthen muscles around my pelvis which are forcing my poor calf muscles do all the work then ends with music to my ears that I should get on the bike to get the muscle moving.

Thursday starts stormy and windy with enough chill to hint at ice so I opt directly for the car again although a ride would've been nice. I sit in the same boring traffic on the way to the same boring projects and watch riders pass me. I feel envy.

I get through the day somehow and go for a haircut which makes me feel nice. I arrive early... allowing too much time for that bloody traffic. There's a running shop nearby where I find the perfect windproof jacket in the sale so now my evening is twice as good. I head home looking good and with an incentive to get well. Since TSK is going out to QioGong I have the house to myself to set up the turbo.

I started off quite wobbly and had a few stops to sort out my Garmin sensor. In the end I gave up and switched to the new one. For 7 minutes I have no idea what I achieved. I got back on and warmed up properly. I only managed another 22 minutes before my legs started to get twitchy. It was disappointing given that I was thinking of riding to work but on Saturday I didn't think I was going to be walking for 6 weeks so I guess I can't moan.

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