Regression
I ran a solid 6 miles today. I walked a bit after mile 4, before finishing, not strong, but decent.
For context, in October, after flying back from Denver, I ran 15 miles non-stop using the advantage of my physical shape and the prevalence of oxygen at sea level.
In between those runs, I got hit by a car. The result was 3 fractured ribs, a Grade III AC separation, and 6 ER stitches.
It also took 6 weeks of no movement immediately following the accident, 3 months of PT, another 6 weeks of no movement following the surgery, and only now another round of PT, probably to last two solid years.
When I finished my 6 miler, I felt a strange amalgamation of emotions. On one hand, it represented 9 miles of regression. A decline that I had no control over, forced upon me by an uncaring universe and one gunned red light at 3am on Dekalb and Throop by an out of state driver in a Hertz Rental.
Fuck.
On the other, I had worked diligently for the last half year to even get to this accomplishment. True, I couldn’t do a push up right now, much less the cartwheel and handstand I had been working on during COVID Quarantine, but on the other hand, I was far removed from my first ambulance ride, from my first morphine doped ER bed.
A huge accomplishment by all means. Yet for some reason I feel the weight of regret much greater than the pride of achievement.
That’s because for the longest time, I hated this. I raged against the universe for dealing me a hand I did not deserve. I seethed and stewed in my non-movement; physically watching my form deteriorate, retrained and unable to do basic tasks, while my mental state took a swan dive off a cliff. I almost had a visceral joy at being this knocked down, in between daily crying. It had been a while since the dementors had come to torment me, and I masochistically enjoyed being in the pits.
The worst part might have been how stuck I was creatively. I couldn’t write a single good line, much less a piece about why I was in the worst shape of my life.
The relative fall was even more extreme. Six months before I had been traveling around the world. The last four had been full devoted to the George Floyd protests. I had taken control of my time on this earth. I was building the life I envisioned for myself, taking each day as an opportunity for practice and growth. The physical, the mental, the social, the financial. I was my best healthy living.
And then I was bedridden, confined to the mental cage of despair and disgust. Unending weeks of being physical deformed made my mind cast my existence as punishment, my body as a victim of the universe’s uncaring randomness.
From that abyssal pit of the void, 6 miles was a great place to be!
It has been built from my first ever surgery, thank you doctors. It healed in a sling for 2 months, during which the swelling and discoloration made me worry that I was a monstrous minotaur, doomed to hiding in the back of group photos for fear of the shoulder malformity.
It has been built from months of Physical Therapy, the most boring form of exercise; repeated stretches, rotational movements, and single digit weights. First inches of lift, and then full range of motion, then strength building.
Now I am back to light swimming workouts and barely any yoga, forms of activity I am much more familiar with and enjoy.
Yet I am nervous that I will not work as incrementally as I ought to, to avoid reinjury or long-term strains. Once again, I will have to face my limitations. The reality of my regression. To progress, I will have to be patient and diligent. I will have to integrate rest and recovery. It will be an arduous process but I have much faith that next year I will be in full health!
The Goal:
[Half] Ironman 2022.
Handstand/Cartwheels!
Full Yoga workouts
