Thursday, March 3, 2011

Why I could barely walk

I already suspected it, but the official word is in:

I overdid it. Again.

I saw the foot specialist, Ken Holt, who approved of my New Balance 1064 running shoes and said my orthotics looked fine. I told him that I did three miles on the treadmill on Sunday, two running and one a mixture of hills and running. I should have stopped after the second mile.

It was only the second or third time I had run two miles without stopping, and I need to stay at that level until I'm comfortable. The first time I did it I had the right idea: After the treadmill I went on the bike for a while. I don't know where I got this cockamamie idea that I had to throw in some hills. Holt said that first of all he doesn't like treadmills because they provide an unnatural movement, and second of all hills would have definitely irritated my knees.

I guess you could say I have a stubborn streak. On the positive side, maybe it helped me get out of that coma.

I did manage to walk Maddie yesterday and today and to go to yoga. Yoga probably helped me, but I felt out of sorts. The neuropathy in my feet – a result of chemotherapy – persists, causing a sensation difficult to describe, part numbness and part like you're stepping on glass shards. I take a drug called Neurontin, but it doesn't work that well, and I'm told they don't have anything really good for it at this point.

Add this to the pain in my knees and legs a general all-over malaise from feeling overweight, and I could not quite achieve that peaceful feeling.

I can control (or try to control) things like pushing myself too hard, but problems like neuropathy and other side effects are out of my control. The thought did cross my mind that maybe my yoga funk was due to decreasing the prednisone; your body gets a little rattled when you decrease because it has learned to depend on the medicine.

I decided that being in the moment meant allowing myself to feel the way I felt.

In any case, I'd rather be alive to have limitations to deal with than not be here at all.

2 comments:

Julie Goodale said...

I love what you say about controlling what you can (pushing too hard) & acknowledging other things that you can't (neuropathy). It's so hard sometimes to accept the difference between the two.

Nelle said...

My son had really bad neuropathy but he was fortunate it went away after several months. Is there any chance that yours might improve? Ronni you have made such great strides after what you have been through. I hope, in time, you find that you are able to do all that you want, you certainly deserve it.