My comeback pattern was cautious enough: 2 days on, 1 off, 3 on, 1 off…so by Wednesday I was ready for 4-5 consecutive days.  How annoying then, to step weirdly on the run and Boing! tweak my groin (adductor).  I’ve been able to run through it but it wasn’t till Friday that I remembered I had a roll of Rocktape in the cupboard.

Adductor strains can be so delicately painful and I haven’t always had great luck with kinesiology tape, if you don’t apply it properly it’s useless, but this time was a winner: the support and stability made a real difference.  Plus, the tape didn’t budge for 3 days, including 3 sweaty runs and 2 showers.  It’d still be firmly adhered but after today’s run I removed it – the tweak, she is gone.

Niggle aside, I was one happy runner this week, managing a solid amount of miles with legs that felt right at home on the pavement. Aerobically, it’s going to take some time but there’s no hurry with nothing ahead but summer.  Speaking of, the last 3 runs were mid-70s so there’s also been some heat acclimation going on.

Lastly, despite 6 weeks of candy-gorging and not running, I bravely weighed myself last Monday to discover I’d only gained 3lbs.  What a wonderful surprise!  One less hurdle to regaining speed.  All systems are Go.

A Full 7-Day Week In Review, Yeehaw!

Life is good.

A hamper of dirty running clothes.

So far, the road back has been fantastic.  I ended up taking Friday off – my legs were not ready for 3 days in a row, but Saturday was a sweet 6-miler and today…8 miles, baby!  The Broad St. Run was this morning (huge 10-mile race) which marks the last of my missed races this season so my slate is now clean and ready for new beginnings.

Two wonderful things
1) No more ankle kicking at all, even lightly, which means I’m 100% back in balance again. It’s so nice not having to scrub encrusted dirt and blood off my ankles after a run (that was a painful few weeks there).

2) I can now barrel down hills like a normal person again!  My body is doing what it’s supposed to without a second thought.  I’ve kept this to myself till now because I didn’t want to be more doom and gloom considering everything that was already going on, but the downhill “situation” had me wondering if I’d have to quit racing for good.

In the last race I did, the week before going in the hospital, I mentioned having faltered on a downhill.  The truth is, I came close to messing up someone else’s race and could have caused a serious jam…

At the top of a hill where I went “whoa” and had to put my arms out for balance, I came to a near stop without warning and then it took me most of the hill before I was able to run smoothly again. When I went “whoa” a guy behind me made an angry noise (rightly so) because he almost careened into me.  This has been weighing heavily on me because it’s one thing to lose time on downhills but to endanger others would be unforgivable so needless to say…major joy to see that symptom gone.

I’m still kicking myself (proverbial ass, not ankles) for ever having thought this stuff was in my head.

A long overdue Week In Review
Goodness, it’s fun to include one of these again. Not much to say I haven’t already, just Yay!

I hope you all have a Happy Monday tomorrow. I’m getting my tits smashed first thing in the morning. Can’t wait. Then I’m going to call my stupid Primary doctor’s office to ask why the updated referral for my eye exam (which is for eye allergy and standard exam) was given a diagnosis code for “Iron Deficiency Anemia”. That’s an insurance screw-over waiting to happen. Oh, the fun never ends…

So far, I’ve done a couple 4-milers and today will be 4 or 5.  As expected, I got a nice touch of DOMS yesterday but foam rolling and self-massage are keeping it in check.

I’m really excited because yesterday I realized it’s going to take me much less time to rebuild fitness than with the leg injury last Fall.  I was reviewing my logs and had forgotten that for the first 4 weeks of my return almost every run was at recovery pace because the leg was still tweaked.  This extended the return process considerably.

But this time my legs are perfectly fine, so I’m predicting 2 months will have me back in business. Not that I’m in a hurry, mind you, the only thing on the agenda would have been summer basework anyway, but it’s cool to think I can be ready for new PRs come September.

Coolest Get-Well Card Ever!
My friend Paul, a funny wonderful guy I know from the forums and Facebook though have yet to meet in person, was telling his young daughter about my operation the other day because, as it happens, she had a similar procedure at the end of last year to fix a hole in her heart, which right there makes her about a zillion times braver and cooler than me.

But not only is she brave and cool, she is also a woman of mystery because she seems to have many aliases (Madeline, Madge, Miss Magda Em, Magda, Magde, Maddy) so I suspect she’s a spy or at the very least, someone with a questionable past.  But also what she is, is darling beyond belief, because I don’t even know her and she made me a card! And not just any card but a beautiful 3-D, rockin’ crazy cool piece of art.  I told her I’d frame it but then you’d only be able to see one side, so I’m going to keep it open on display so everyone can admire it for its complete and utter awesomeness.  Check it out.

Thanks Maddy a.k.a Miss Magda Em a.k.a Magda a.k.a Magde a.k.a Madge a.k.a Madeline. I love this card!

And with that bright finish, I hope you all enjoy your weekend in every way you can.  Later, everyone!

This was not planned, I had all intentions of making a conservative re-entry with 5min on/offs, maybe totaling 20 minutes of run time, but when I hit the famous stoplight where my legs would typically go wonky and they didn’t and I was able to run across the street like a normal person, I just kept going.  I promise I’ll be more careful getting back, probably use Daniels’ schedule but I was just so thrilled to be back to it, passing a couple regulars in the park like old times, it was heaven.

As far as the legs, I only had a short period with kicking the opposite shoe but not at all ripping into my ankles and it eventually passed with a little concentration.  The little downhill was still slightly strange but only for my own mental buildup of “uh oh, here comes the hill, but I’m not worried! yes I am but I’m telling myself I’m not…”  I’m confident that’ll disappear with a couple more tries.  And I didn’t have any of that sinking gait I had when attempting run/walking 2 weeks ago.  It felt like me.

I can’t say I’m completely out of the Ronald McDonald House For Spastic Old Lady Runners quite yet, this is way too early to tell if it’s all upward from here, but I choose to err on the side of optimism until further notice.

How do you spell Complete Incompetence?  M.y. P.r.i.m.a.r.y  C.a.r.e  P.h.y.s.i.c.i.a.n
I cannot believe what a dolt she has proved herself to be and frankly, I wasted a beautiful bouquet of tulips on Telephone Girl because she hasn’t helped matters either.

Remember I went for a mammogram Monday before last and was turned away because of the wrong prescription code?  When I came back and looked at all the check-up prescriptions my PCP had given me (mammo, pap smear, colonoscopy), I noticed they all had this same general code.  So I called Telephone Girl who said she’d mail me updated versions with the correct codes. A week later…no mail.

So I call today saying I’ll come by to pick them up and Telephone Girl says with a defensive tone “The doctor said those codes are all correct, the mammogram is the only one that wasn’t.”  I told her I’d come by to pick that one up then, though I wish Telephone Girl had never offered to mail anything if she wasn’t ever planning to mail anything.

Anyway, because I didn’t trust this bit of news one bit, I started calling the different offices and wouldn’t you know, I would have been turned away from everything!  This is particularly disturbing for the colonoscopy because the prep for that sucks donkey balls: an entire day of drinking only clear liquids then that evening, you drink an entire gallon of a vile concoction that makes you shit your brains out over the course of a few hours.  Can you imagine doing that for nothing?!  And then having to do it again!?

And the ophthalmologist requires an actual referral, not just a prescription, so that would have been yet another bust.  I’m telling you, I am sending serious hate rays to that woman as I sit here.

So I called my primary care’s office again and Telephone Girl pawned me off to the medical assistant who was very nice and knew right off the bat those codes would not work.  When I asked if another doctor at that office was less mistake-prone, she fielded the question by saying “these new codes were put into place third quarter of last year, so this is a new thing for everyone”.  Um, third quarter of last year, so you mean…about 8-9 months ago? IDIOTS.

You have no idea how much I want to switch doctors right this very minute except I can’t switch until the leg crap is totally resolved in case (god forbid) I need a referral to a different type of specialist, then I’d have to wait for another “new patient” appointment with the new general practitioner which could take another month.  It’s almost enough to start a girl smoking pot again but instead, I’ll go eat a carrot.

I cannot wait till this is a running blog again.  Which hopefully, will be soon.

My innards. An angiogram image from a few weeks ago.

There is a common reaction the doctor warned me about called Post Embolization Syndrome that includes pain, nausea and fever.  I thought I’d avoided it since I don’t have nausea or feel feverish, but that article says it arises 72 hours after (bingo!) so maybe I’ve got PES Lite.  Apparently, it lasts about 3 days so after tomorrow I should be golden.

It’s not an entirely bad thing anyway, since it signifies the death of the tumor. Good riddance, sucka! And the pain is manageable – I still haven’t felt inspired to fill the Percocet prescription, regular ole ibuprofen is keeping the sharp stuff at bay.  That, and laying on my ass which I do so well.

I’d say I’ve gotten off easy: this bit of ouchie and only a short, yet amusing bout of what I refer to as  “Junkie Itch”.  Apparently, coming off morphine can give you itchy skin.  When released from the hospital, I ended up taking a bus home (after waiting almost an hour for a cab to arrive) so I was walking and scratching my way home from the stop.  “I need to score, man…c’mon help a sister out.”

As you can see, another side effect is interjecting gritty street talk into blog posts – or shtreet talk as they say in Philly.  Aside from that, I didn’t get any bruising at the point of entry so all I have to show for this adventure is a tiny red dot on my thigh.

But while the embolization left no lasting trace, my mind is a jumble of loose ends.  Did this thing make a difference?  If my condition is improved is that due to the procedure or the weeks of rest leading up to it?  And if it’s not better or continues to waffle on and off, what makes me think getting the second hemangioma embolized will make a difference? It’s enough to give a girl heartburn.  But seriously folks, the conflicting doctor’s opinions have screwed with my head royally.

On a positive note, something I noticed while laying on the stretcher prior to the operation, is that my foot drop has improved.  I’m not sure what that indicates since last week I still had both good and bad days (on bad days my foot scuffles the ground) but it’s something.

As far as getting back to running, I was going to start run/walking on Tuesday, but since tomorrow will still be hurty, I’ll push it back a day or two.  I wish I could say I’m completely super excited to try running again but this open-endedness inserts a good amount of fear and dread into it as well.  Regardless, I’ve decided to work with whatever the legs give me: as long as I’m able to move forward, even I feel weird and “off”, I’ll continue to run.

This is important because part of my fear is that, if it wasn’t the hemangioma’s fault, building back the activity level might aggravate the symptoms.  But if that’s going to happen, now is better than later since I have a month before my follow up CAT scan and doctor appointments.  Better to blast it back into the open while everyone’s attention is still on it – if it’s a coaxable thing, that is.

As you can see, as positive a gal as I am, I’m not in any way confident that the hemangioma was the answer.  Let’s see how it goes from here.

Lara dropped me off yesterday morning and I basically waited around for a couple hours.  At 1pm I was brought into Interventional Radiology, given a gown and a stretcher.  My doc’s assistant came by to chat before doing paperwork – she’s doing a Half this weekend, her first race since having a baby, so we talked about running for a while.  Good times.

Then Dr. Cohen came over to talk before they started giving me drugs.  It left me pretty depressed.  He told me how he really doesn’t see how the hemangioma could be connected to my leg problem and that he’d been talking to colleagues of his and everyone agreed the same thing.  I guess he was giving me a last chance to back out.

My feeling about it is: I have this thing in me that everyone agrees is very large (Cavernous hemangiomas are called “giant” when they’re over 4-5cm, this one is 9cm).  If I was to get a hard knock to my side it could rupture which would be very, very bad.  Not to mention I feel it: it gives ache and cramps and bloats me when I walk fast.  So regardless of the leg connection, I have symptoms directly related to its presence.  I was there to get it done, period.

The doctor’s a good egg though and before walking away he said, “If this fixes it, then that’ll be great” so he threw me a bone.  After he left I teared up, just wasn’t ready for resistance at that point in time.  Luckily, they gave me a bunch of drugs including a fat injection of Benadryl which loosened me up like a rag doll and got me a little high.

One other thing of note was they were going to give me Cipro and I made them give me an alternate instead. If you runners don’t know about the Cipro/Levaquin tendon connection, Google it.  Lara got really screwed over with Levaquin.  After taking it for just 2 days, her achilles almost ruptured – she’s a cyclist and was out for months. That was a couple years ago and even now, it’s still weak.

There’ve been more stories on the forums from people with achilles ruptures or near-ruptures, so if you ever get prescribed one of those antibiotics, ask for amoxicillin instead.  Btw, the nurses dealing with me had no idea about this, though were genuinely interested in it, so be prepared to educate.

The Procedure
They offered me a sedative and at first I refused, wanting to be around to hear what was said (such details rock my world) but I was warned about potential pain so I got it and was out for the whole thing.  I woke up to the artery/groin-pressing bit, though this time, no hot male doctor, but a nice female assistant.  She was cool though, played me back the film of what the doctor had done, cutting off the blood supply with a coil.

Then Dr. Cohen came back and said he was happy with how it went and that I should call him after I start running again to let him know if it worked or not and if it didn’t, he’ll do the other big one.  I feel a little confused about this, btw, that he’s willing to try the other though he’s not convinced it’s either. But I’ll take it!  Hopefully (please please please) this one did the trick.

Up to my room
After being observed downstairs for an hour, I get to the room at about 5pm and have to lie flat on my back, legs straight until 9pm. I was starving since my last food/drink had been at midnight. But by the time I got to my room and settled, it was too late to get an actual meal.  So they gave me a limp turkey sandwich, no mustard or mayo, with nothing else.  When I told them I’d need another…nope, no food left.  Huh?

A nurse eventually scavenged up some saltines and a frozen Lean Cuisine but I was pissed. It made Hahnamann, the other hospital, seem like a resort.  The other disturbing thing was the big deal they made about catching pneumonia in their fine establishment, so along with toothbrush and shampoo, etc. they supplied a plastic inhaling device they want you to use daily while there.  Doesn’t exactly inspire confidence.

In a positive comparison, however, the bedpan situation was slightly less horrific.  At Hahnamann, I had two hand-maidens, or rather ass-maidens, that wiped the piss off me (seriously, forget your pink bits, your ass ends up soaked).  At Temple, I was given a handful of toilet paper…they actually trusted me to wipe my own parts.  And I was feeling very proud of myself till, in removing the bedpan, I managed to dip my sheet in it.

If you thought there couldn’t possibly be another insane roommate story, you’d be wrong.
If you’re keeping track at home, I’ve had 2 roommates, Ernestine and Roger, both of whom slept with their TVs blaring.  My roommate last night, whose name was a weird one so I can’t remember it, was a 30-something woman with an intimate relationship with the TV…she spoke to it. Constantly.

First was an episode of Law & Order, the plot revolving around some gymnastics coach with a horrible fake Russian accent involved in some kiddy sex thing.  My roomie would interject things like “Take that, you dummy!”  “Praise be the children” and other conversational bons mots.

Then she took a phone call which was hilarious.  From what I gathered, the friend on the phone was going to have a guest, but not just any guest: a lesbian guest – a fact the friend was clearly up in arms about.  So my open-minded roommate was coaching the friend over the phone, “No, you don’t need to be ignorant or mean but you don’t have to entertain her.  I believe in live and let live but no ma’am, you do not have to entertain her.”

She said this about 4 times till I started wondering what her friend generally does when guests come over.  Maybe seats them on the couch while she brings out a ventriloquist doll or rollerblades around the coffee table?  But not for the lesbian, she shall have no entertainment!

The rest of the evening, my roomy kept talking and yelling at the TV “They’re coming back with the razor, oh sweet jesus!” “She need to get locked up, too” “He gonna jump, he gonna jump!”  Eventually, she turned the TV down and I thought, I can sleep to this, it’ll be ok.  So I turn off my light and try to sleep but she’s still yelling at the TV so I call through the curtain “good night!” hoping she’ll get the hint.  She does not.

Finally, she’s watching some game show where you guess words and she scares the crap out of me by yelling “Pig!” to where I have no choice but to say “I’m sorry, but would you mind not talking to the TV, it’s pretty loud.” and she’s miffed but she shuts up.  Finally, I fall asleep and at 1am, the nurse wakes me to take my vitals and I note the TV is not on anymore, yay!

Then at 2:30am, the bitch turns on the TV and that’s it for me.  I do not sleep again.  And it turns out, they’d given her a major sedative so that TV was on for NOTHING, she was sleeping the whole time.  When they took my pulse at 1am it was 46, when they came back at 4:30am, I was so livid it was 65.  Finally, the nurse turns her TV down, and at 6am the other nurse tells me I should have asked her to turn it off.  But after my Roger experience when the nurse wouldn’t dare touch the precious TV, how would I know they’d turn it off?

So three roommates sleeping to 3 TVs, it’s a goddam epidemic.  And this is one more reason this procedure had better work, or else I might end up shoving a TV up someone’s ass.

Drugs, Buh-Bye, and now what?
I was feeling surprisingly pain-free after the procedure and though they’d given me a self-administering morphine drip, I didn’t use it till about 9pm when I started getting a little crampy. I wasn’t even hurting much at that point but I’m a druggy at heart and never had morphine before so I thought “ooh, I wonder if it’ll get me high”.  It didn’t, it’s just for pain.

As the hours ticked by, my pain increased though, to where by 5am I was going “What’s in this thing, water?!”  But it wasn’t agonizing or anything, just like a really bad abdominal cramp.

This morning, when I was discharged, they gave me prescriptions for Motrin 800mg and Percocet but I’m not filling either of them, the worst pain would have already occurred and I’m fine right now.

So here’s what’s next: I take it easy for about a week and then I start running again!  After a week I call the doc to let him know if the symptoms have abated.  In a month, I get another CAT scan and then make appointments with Dr. Cohen and Dr. Jain to discuss it and if it’s not fixed, it’s back in again for the same deal all over again.

Here’s hoping the thing works!

My new primary care physician, who turns out not to be a runner (Telephone Girl let me down on that one) or even a very likeable person gave me a handful of referrals, among them a mammogram.  So at 6:30 this morning, I went downtown for my appointment but once there, discovered my doctor, who had been in one huge irritating rush with me, had written an incorrect prescription code, so no mammogram.  I don’t feel much like meditating or doing yoga at the moment but I would like to punch her in the face.

That said, she did bring me a glimmer of light: remember how I thought I’d shrunk ¼” and was now 5’3½”? When measured at my primary care’s office, I came out to a statuesque 5’4″.  I don’t believe it but I’ll split the difference and consider myself unshrunk at my usual 5’3¾”.  I realize you people don’t give a shit but it makes me feel a tad less elderly.

Walking and the world
I felt rickety on and off last week but even when “It” is around, I can take long walks, it just means they’re slower.  I managed a few 7-mile walks, not at all aerobic (takes me a couple hours) but they offset the candy I’ve been stuffing into my piehole.

The walks are a high point of my day, providing sweet slices of life.  Saturday’s standouts were a guy walking with a cat lazily draped over his shoulder, a flustered woman trying to hang onto her son’s bike as he learned to ride, and a playful pantomime with a running regular because we were wearing the same top.

Friday I had an odd encounter while waiting at the stop light into the park.  A guy in khakis and button-down shirt with a museum ID tag around his neck struck up a conversation with me about my shoes (NB730s), “Those are real minimalist, aren’t they, how do you like them?” which surprised the hell out of me that anyone would notice.  I said I’m only wearing them for walking since I’m injured and don’t like them that much for running but they’re very comfy.  Then he asked what my injury was, I told him my liver was wonky and we traded a few words about my innards until the light changed and he wished me well as we went our opposite ways.

But the best was on Thursday coming back home.  On the block before mine sits a row of apartments, the back of which are right on the sidewalk. Got this from Google so you can see what I mean:
A young couple had brought out a pretty wooden table with 2 matching chairs and had set them in front of their garage door – she engrossed in a magazine and he, messing with his iPad.  As I walked by, I thought how funny it looked, like they were seated at an outdoor cafe but ya know, in front of their garage on a public sidewalk. It was too good to pass up.

In the name of all that is comedy, I turned around, walked over to the table and holding an imaginary pad and pen said, “Ok then, are you ready to order?”

It worked.  They burst out laughing and I didn’t need to say anything else, just ambled up the block grinning, thoroughly satisfied for having taken a risk.

Running Ifs
I’ve been mulling over what’ll happen if the embolization works and what’ll happen if it doesn’t.

If it works: Coming back should be easier than last Fall’s leg injury.  Even though this’ll be a longer break (6 weeks as opposed to 4) last Fall my leg was jacked up weeks prior to and after the time off.  This time, however, I was in perfect shape beforehand and muscularly-speaking, still am, so I’m thinking it might take the same time (3 months) to return to my previous fitness. No hurry since it’ll be the thick of summer, but I’m optimistic.

If it works – Fall Plans: I was going to return to marathoning with the Philly Marathon in November, but not anymore.  My raison d’être of doing a Full again was to put my high mileage and doubles to the test.  But this has been too large an interruption to fulfill that experiment and I don’t like marathons enough to do one “just because”.

So I’ll likely target a Half but, and I hate to say this because it’s starting to seem jinxed, I sure would love to get back to trying for a sub20 5k. Perhaps the 3rd time will be a charm.

Speaking of 5ks, my Spring goal race was on Saturday.  Looking at the results, I would have won first Masters: $300.  Oh well, next year.

If it doesn’t work: I lied.  I’m not thinking about that.  I don’t wanna.

See you later, friends
Thank you so much everyone for sticking with me through this with all the support, well wishes and attention scattered all over the interwebs. As far as the embolization goes, I’m not nervous in the least about the procedure itself, I trust the doctor and it’s just one night in the hospital.  For a few days after, I’ll be taking it easy much like I do every day of my life, just a little slower – not a big deal in the scheme of things.

But what is a big deal is if this allows me to run again. I need that to be.  So if you have a second to send some positive thoughts my way, I’m accepting any extra health vibes you may have laying around the house or on the floor of your car near the empty Mountain Dew bottle…wherever those vibes reside, I’ll take ‘em. Thank you.

I was gonna close with “And I’ll catch up with you guys on the other side” because I thought that sounded nonchalant and hip, but then I googled it and it means after we’re dead, so I’ll just catch up with you guys later.  xoxo