I’m starting to run again with some sort of consistency now. Before it was a day here or there scattered with no running days in between. The biggest measure of improvement is the fact I’m starting to feel like myself again, and by that I mean the antsy feeling throughout the day of when I’ll be able to run again isn’t so predominate.

Even if the mileage is something I would scoff at 3 months ago, I’m happy to be getting that little bit in. The hamstrings are tight immediately after, but I stretch it out, and for the rest of the day they’re actually pretty good. It’s now a habit of mine to constantly test things whenever walking anywhere. Stepping up on curbs with an overstretched stride or leaning into my step when walking up inclines have become the two most used methods for assessing how things are. When no one’s looking, I’ll even do a little trot or jog sometimes. That pulling feeling is almost gone. At times I even expect it to hurt and I find myself backing off a bit as a reflex when testing it, and then when there’s surprisingly no pain, I wonder if it’s because I reflexively backed off, or if it’s truly significantly better.

Things still aren’t 100% right though. It’s hard to tell if it’s the injury, loss of fitness, or the fact that my muscles are so overstretched they have as much bounce as wet sponge. Or, am I just super aware of every little twinge or ache because I am so scared of exacerbating the injury? The fact remains, however, I am now slow. I don’t care about the speed. Or at least, I try not to. I was hoping I could bounce right back into training once I was past this injury, but I can see I might very well have a long road ahead of me. I’m giving thought to skipping a fall marathon this year. I’ll have to decide later in the season based upon how things go. I think my only hope may be Philly again since its so late in the season. As much as I would like to have something like that to focus on, part of me would like to just ditch the idea completely. Even now, I still struggle with not putting pressure on myself to maintain a certain pace when running and I’m not even fully recovered from being injured. I think giving up on the idea of a fall marathon, and racing for the rest of the year might be better for me in some ways.

I’ll take it easy for the summer and maybe decide then.