It has now been over three months since succumbing to injury at the end of July.

Like any addicted runner, I hate being injured.

But, almost surprisingly, this has been far and away the easiest mental battle of all of my long-term injuries across the last fifteen years of running.

Even at that description, I still think about the sport every single day.

I know how difficult it can be to cope with both the physical and mental pain of an injury, and how difficult it can be to avoid the mistakes that make everything worse. Here are the lessons I’ve learned through this injury block, and how you can avoid falling into the same traps.

#1 – ADAPT TRAINING WHEN UNDER STRESS

So the story goes – this injury chain only came about as a result of suffering from severe stress at work. The training load I asked my body to complete during that time may not have been structured optimally in a normal state of mind. But with enough time to recover, I might not have fallen through the trap doors.

The initial issue emanated from the comingling of work stress, and the high demand of physical activity (another type of stress). Your body doesn’t decipher between running stress and the other stressors of life. To the body, it’s just stress.

This is something I learned when I battled plantar fasciitis for a few months at the tail-end of 2022. Evidently, it’s something I had to re-learn again in 2024.

This summer, there were many moments where I was not in the right state of mind to work. To simultaneously ask my body to train for a National Championship was simply too much. Especially without the proper adjustments.

Rather than continuously putting my body under stress, hoping that running would act as a stress reliever, I should have paid more attention to my body. The two runs at the top of this section are both examples where I pushed well over the edge in the hopes of achieving some magical, marginal performance gain, even when claiming fatigue.

The greatest ultrarunner in the world (watch out for Camille Heron editing this entry), literally guides her training based on how she’s feeling every day – including not just physically, but mentally. Her name is Courtney, and she wins everything.

If I had done more of the Courtney approach in my self-coached phase, I could have adapted that final workout before injury, taken a day off, or run on flat ground. Had I done any of these three options at the end of July, I might have even been running the past four months.

#2 – STOP TESTING IT

“Stop testing it.” – My previous coach said this to me in a three-day hamstring battle that I thought was going to end my summer back in 2023. I followed his advice, focused on healing the injury rather than testing it, and voilà! I was back two days later.

Being honest, I think it’s nearly impossible for the injured runner to stop themselves from doing this when it’s the kind of injury that I have. The kind of injury where everything about normal everyday life feels normal. Walking feels normal. Standing feels normal. Many mobility exercises feel normal. Nnormal feels normal. But you just can’t run. It’s quite the mind-trick.

I find myself testing my injury every single day. I can’t help myself. Some days downward dog makes my knee tingle, the next day hiking downhill feels completely comfortable. In some ways, it’s been good to get a sense of how the injury is feeling every single day for the past three months. But it’s often lulled me into the false sense of security that I’m ready, when I’m not.

In previous injuries, I feel like I’ve often been able to gauge when I’m able to return. I even wrote about it! This time, I’ve found it impossible.

Every time it’s felt like it might be ready to go, I’ve run on the injury again, and only made it way worse.

I’ve basically had to tell myself – if I can’t lunge, I can’t run. Even last week I thought the lunging was almost there (but it wasn’t), and so I decided to run. Unsurprisingly, it wasn’t ready and set me back from my previous progress.

This has been utterly frustrating, but also a valuable lesson in letting the body heal on its own. This has probably been the greatest lesson I’ve had to learn the past couple months – so much so that I wrote a whole article called ‘Letting the body heal‘.

The premise of that article – cross-training isn’t always useful. With previous injury woes, I’ve always been able to cross-train in some small way, sometimes even pushing myself to elevate my heart-rate and maintain fitness. With this one, I noticed the greatest progress after four days of complete rest. When injured, I’m often putting my body under more stress in the quest to maintain fitness just so that I don’t hate myself for losing all the fitness I previously worked for.

This time around, I’ve tried not to care about all the time lost. I’ve tried not to care about cancelling my racing plans to end 2024 and what this all might mean for 2025. I’ve just tried to focus on getting healthy. And now that my knee feels like it’s starting to respond best to outdoor hikes, that now feels like what I’ll be trying to prioritize. But hiking will be less about trying to maintain fitness, and more about spending time in nature, enjoying being outside, and staying physically active when I know how much physical activity makes a difference for my body.

#3: RUNNING HELPS MAKE ME THE BEST ME

I’ve often questioned whether or not my addiction to the sport is a good one. Especially when in the peak of training and knowing how I’m probably pushing over the limits of what’s considered a healthy level of exercise.

But I’ve been reminded that running unequivocally remains part of the package that combines together to make the best Christmas present me.

It’s possibly even the bow on top of the present that keeps it tightly wrapped.

Since slowing down on the training in mid-September, I’ve noticed…

• More problems with my blood flow.
• More headaches, anxiety, and lightheadedness
• Greater feelings of doubt and inadequacy
• Lower energy levels

That last one may surprise some readers, but I know this intuitively from conducting my own ‘Energy Audit’ before my first race of the 2024 season back in April. That legitimate very real runner’s high is something that gives me so much energy and enthusiasm. Both with the excitement to get out the door after waking up, and with the excitement for the rest of the day after the run is over.

Running gives me energy. Without it, I often feel less motivated to accomplish my daily tasks and I think it’s contributed to greater feelings of doubt and uncertainty over my direction in life.

The other things could just be symptoms of other health issues, but as someone who is already unable to relax on a normal day – I know how beneficial running can be to relaxing my entire body for the rest of the day and staying centered.

Part of why I want to return is not only to catch up on lost time before Black Canyon in 2025, but because I know how big of a role running can play in the entire spectrum of my life. I’m not reliant on it to make me the person that I am. But I know it has the power to contribute to the best version of me.

I’ve found other ways to stay involved in the sport through coaching and the continued connections I have with XACT Nutrition. But there is nothing like the mental and physical release of the post-run. That is why I am most eager to return, why I keep testing it, and why I think about running every day!

Hopefully soon enough this will all be over. But in the meantime, I’m glad that I’ve had these three reminders ahead of what will hopefully be a safer and better 2025. Thanks for reading and see you soon!