Achilles Injury -- Been there, done that?
Eat2Live2Run
Posts: 137 Member
Back in March I ran back to back Half Marathons (one Saturday, one Sunday) and during the one on Sunday I experienced pain in my left achilles. I was able to finish the race, but it caused me problems for a couple weeks afterwards. The pain started in my achilles and went up into my calf, eventually my calf swole and was tender to touch, etc. I ended up going to a "doc in the box" because the pain and swelling got so bad. I got a steroid shot, NSAID patch and bloodwork done to test potassium levels. It went away about 5-7 days later and I started running again and working my mileage back up.
This past Saturday I ran the Country Music Half Marathon in Nashville and at mile 6.5 my OTHER achilles started hurting. I ended up having to walk/jog the rest of the race.
I have never had achilles issues before and now all of a sudden all this is going on and I'm so incredibly frustrated. I was really hoping to start marathon training this week, I have pretty lofty goals for the Chicago Marathon in October and now I can't even run.
I'm already starting to lose a little bit of my endurance from the first achilles injury (I could tell during the race) and now I'm afraid its going to just go out the window with this new injury. I took yesterday off and did the elliptical today. I didn't experience any pain while on the elliptical, but now several hours later my leg is feeling irritated.
I'm not sure if the point of this post is to b!tch, ask for advice or to seek sympathy. Running is a HUGE part of who I am, and when I can't do it I feel lost as a person.
This past Saturday I ran the Country Music Half Marathon in Nashville and at mile 6.5 my OTHER achilles started hurting. I ended up having to walk/jog the rest of the race.
I have never had achilles issues before and now all of a sudden all this is going on and I'm so incredibly frustrated. I was really hoping to start marathon training this week, I have pretty lofty goals for the Chicago Marathon in October and now I can't even run.
I'm already starting to lose a little bit of my endurance from the first achilles injury (I could tell during the race) and now I'm afraid its going to just go out the window with this new injury. I took yesterday off and did the elliptical today. I didn't experience any pain while on the elliptical, but now several hours later my leg is feeling irritated.
I'm not sure if the point of this post is to b!tch, ask for advice or to seek sympathy. Running is a HUGE part of who I am, and when I can't do it I feel lost as a person.
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Replies
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I used to suffer from achilles injuries too. I found actually (to my chagrin) that it was because I was heel-striking. I had to change my whole stride, but I haven't had issues with my achilles since...0
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I spent about 4 months last year dealing with Achilles injuries after the doctor told me to stop heel striking to alleviate ITB problems. I'll take ITB over Achilles any day. It's a bear. The only thing that helped me: heat it up before you're going to do any exercise at all and ice it immediately afterwards. And no matter how badly it hurts, use a stick (a rolling pin will do) and/or a foam roller on it first thing every morning for at least 3 minutes. Loosen up the tendon like crazy, work it out with your thumbs - really dig in. You might even bruise a little at first, but it will make a HUGE difference in how quickly you bounce back. And I know you don't want to hear it, but cut back your mileage, at least for now, until you can get back to where you need to be to train properly. You won't do yourself any good anyway if you keep re-injuring it. Good luck. (Oh, and if you have more than 400 miles on your shoes, get a new pair).0
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Back in March I ran back to back Half Marathons (one Saturday, one Sunday) and during the one on Sunday I experienced pain in my left achilles. I was able to finish the race, but it caused me problems for a couple weeks afterwards. The pain started in my achilles and went up into my calf, eventually my calf swole and was tender to touch, etc. I ended up going to a "doc in the box" because the pain and swelling got so bad. I got a steroid shot, NSAID patch and bloodwork done to test potassium levels. It went away about 5-7 days later and I started running again and working my mileage back up.
This past Saturday I ran the Country Music Half Marathon in Nashville and at mile 6.5 my OTHER achilles started hurting. I ended up having to walk/jog the rest of the race.
I have never had achilles issues before and now all of a sudden all this is going on and I'm so incredibly frustrated. I was really hoping to start marathon training this week, I have pretty lofty goals for the Chicago Marathon in October and now I can't even run.
I'm already starting to lose a little bit of my endurance from the first achilles injury (I could tell during the race) and now I'm afraid its going to just go out the window with this new injury. I took yesterday off and did the elliptical today. I didn't experience any pain while on the elliptical, but now several hours later my leg is feeling irritated.
I'm not sure if the point of this post is to b!tch, ask for advice or to seek sympathy. Running is a HUGE part of who I am, and when I can't do it I feel lost as a person.
You're putting a significant amount of stress on your body (back to back half marathons) and it sounds like you're rushing your recovery.
What has your training schedule looked like over the past X months to prep you for that amount of competition?
Insofar as Achilles problems, they can be very, very hard to recover from. One reason is that it's a tendon (tendons are extremely fibrous and have relatively few blood vessels compared to a muscle) and, second, it's the Achilles which plays a huge role in running.
If you are repeatedly injuring your Achilles, I would suggest that you to have a medical practitioner* examine you and that you work with that person until the issues can be resolved.
Good luck with this.
*orthopaedic specialist, sports medicine specialist first and then perhaps a physiotherapist — chiropractors are not medical doctors0
