Hey everyone!
Happy day after SUPERBOWL 51! Congrats to the Pats for an unexpected and spell-bounding comeback. Best wishes go to the Falcons who had the Pats befuddled for 2 and 1/2 quarters of football. Another lesson for all of us that success can be fleeting if 100% commitment to the objective is not consistent! Anyhow, I feel a bit sorry for both teams because next year neither team will beat THEM COWBOYS!
The following post was written quite a few months ago around last Easter. I have decided to post it now because yesterday’s game reminded me of how many of these finely-tuned, amazingly conditioned athletes can get injured in the blink of an eye. Some will only hurt for a few days, some a few weeks, while others may have to undergo major surgery and face months of rehab work. Not only will they be challenged to regain their health and conditioning but they will also face an uncertain future in their sport. The following is a bit of advice for those of us coming back from injury and how important it is to attack your rehab as you would attack your workouts…with 100% commitment and effort. Here is the post…
“Well, I certainly learned a valuable lesson this past Easter weekend. Up here in eastern Ontario and western Quebec the weather was outstanding Saturday and Sunday. It seemed like everyone wanted to be outside soaking in all that great vitamin D from the sun.
People were biking, hiking, running, walking, skiing, everything under the sun…no pun intended. You just know that all that excess energy and good feelings from those sunny days would translate into some folks overdoing it. Well, count me in!
Yes, I did something very, very, very dumb. I don’t hesitate to use the word dumb because what I did was just that…dumb! Long story made short, I am/was an avid runner until my right hip decided it had had enough. My osteoarthritis was so bad that I no longer had any cartilage left to cushion my femur into my pelvis. The pain became too much and I had to stop running and prepare myself for the inevitable hip replacement surgery.
The good news is I had my surgery at the end of January 2016, the 28th to be exact. The even better news was I underwent a hip resurfacing procedure as opposed to a hip replacement. This type of surgery is an alternative to a total hip replacement which is used with younger and more active individuals (I am 49 years old). I couldn’t be happier with the results. Dr. Beaule and his team at the Ottawa General Hospital were absolutely amazing. Within a few weeks I was pain-free and I no longer walked with a limp. My life had literally changed overnight. Now for the bad news.
As I mentioned earlier, Saturday was an incredibly beautiful day. I could not resist the urge to get out and go for a little jaunt down the street and back. I figured a brief 5 Km run would be perfect to get the ball rolling. It got the ball rolling alright, downhill into a brick wall. When I finished the run I felt some twinges of pain, not to worry I thought. Those twinges of pain soon turned into more pain expressed locally in my hip and groin and radiating down my leg. Uh-oh, this does not seem good.
After a bath that evening I went to bed pretty sore. I woke up Sunday morning feeling even worse. I was now back on my crutches and not able to put any weight on my right leg. I couldn’t sneeze or cough without gasping in pain. I had really done a number on my hip. Now I was pissed off!
All I had to do to avoid this whole situation was to listen to my health care professionals and heed their advice. Not only did I not pay attention to my Dr’s instructions and guidelines, I also concluded that I knew everything so I had no reason to listen to my physio, who incidentally, happens to be my wife.
Deep down I probably knew (the thought had crossed my mind ever so briefly) that it probably wasn’t a great idea to do that run. In this case my heart won out over my wee little brain and it cost me. I can only hope that I have not done any structural damage to the prosthesis or bone. If the damage is entirely soft tissue in nature I will have dodged a bullet for sure.
My lack of foresight and complete disregard for having any patience what-so-ever is truly humbling. I often extol the virtues of patience to my clients in all aspects of their health, lifestyle, and fitness regimes. It is something I have always practiced myself until that fateful Saturday where it appears that the frontal lobe of my cerebrum had taken the long weekend off.
Our current technologically driven society has, in my opinion, altered our ability to persevere in trying circumstances or painful, challenging situations. We always want to get where we want to be, yesterday, or at the very least ASAP. This type of behaviour can often lead to an unwanted outcome, or a less than desirable result which falls substantially short of your expectations. Inevitably this can be tremendously demoralizing especially when you have worked so hard to achieve your milestones or goals.
I own up to the fact that I screwed up. Will I screw up again? I certainly hope not. If I have not learned a lesson from this situation then I truly am a dumb-ass. I have no one to blame but myself. In future I plan to heed the old but still relevant idiom best epitomized by the tale of the Tortoise and the Hare, “slow and steady wins the race.”
Have an awesome day folks!
(Update: After quite a few regressions in my training I finally got my head screwed on correctly and set an appropriate program with realistic progressions. I am pleased to say I can now run 6 km without being completely crippled the following two or three days. Sore, but not crippled. Yay for me!).