Marathon Recovery - Ouch!

I am sure my one reader wondered where I went after I finished the City of Oaks Marathon on November 6th. Well, the majority of the aches and pains went away two days after the Marathon. In fact, all of the aches and pains that I had been feeling after the Marathon were gone by Wednesday morning. However, that was when I started to feel pain in my left foot.

I initially ignored the pain as I thought it was the result of adjusting the way I was walking due to the aches and pains I had been feeling. The pain was on the top of my foot and was more of a dull ache whenever I put my weight on that foot and a sharper pain when I flexed my toes. I ignored it until Friday morning when it hadn't got any better and I decided to go for a run to see whether it was something that would work itself out. It wasn't.

I turned to my trusted friend Google and went through the symptoms for a stress fracture. I didn't have any noticeable swelling or bruising and I couldn't find a particular spot along any of the metatarsals but I certainly had a continual dull ache and pain whenever I applied weight or flexed my toes. I tried ice, I tried heat, I tried elevation and I even tried cotton balls between my toes but the pain just moved around and never really went away.

After 3 weeks, I went to see Dr Boehm at Raleigh Foot and Ankle and got some X-Rays. Dr Boehm was very knowledgeable and quickly diagnosed me with a 'Stress Reaction' and not a Stress Fracture. He said that I could return to running on soft surfaces and as long as I kept my mileage low, I wouldn't adversely effect my recovery time which he put at 6 weeks from the Marathon. He said that it is very common for first time Marathoners to experience a Stress Reaction which is something that occurs along the way to a Stress Fracture and that if I had continued to run in the first couple of weeks after the Marathon, I would have most likely ended up with a full blown Stress Fracture and a long road to recovery.

I must say that by the time I got to week 5, I was becoming skeptical as I still hadn't seen much improvement and was beginning to get frustrated at being unable to flex my toes without pain. However, by the end of week 5 things had started to improve and I went out for my first run. I felt some discomfort, but certainly not much at all and after stretching and icing at the end of my run I woke up the next day feeling better than I did before the run. By the end of week 6, I was completely pain free... maybe these doctors do know what they are talking about after all!

I have been gradually increasing my mileage and changed the way that I lace my shoes to reduce the pressure on the top of my foot and today I am pain free and ready to start training for something again!