Viscious cycle of injury

A few weeks ago, I managed to injure myself in the form of a mild calf strain after several weeks of exercise. I dropped my exercise back to just walking for most of the past couple weeks. I also cut the number of sessions back so that I had more rest between sessions. After taking it easy on the exercise for a couple weeks, it was much better and seemed to be pretty close to being healed as of Friday. At least, I felt it was just about healed because I no longer experiencing any pain.

I guess I was wrong though. Friday afternoon, I had an earache and had gone to lie down after taking an ibuprofen. After I’d been resting a while, there was a knock at the door so I rushed to get to the door. That’s when I felt another popping sensation on the back of my leg and had to hobble, or perhaps hop, my way to the door before the person left. Turns out it was the delivery of the board games I’d ordered a couple days earlier. I signed for the package, then had to hobble back to the bedroom where I could collapse.

This business of injuries is very frustrating. When I exercise, I try to take care by warming up and cooling down. And yet, I seem to struggle with minor injuries. Sigh…

I felt a bit more mobile today so thought I might try to go for a walk this evening. The weather has cooled down enough that it’s quite pleasant in the evening. I had to put that idea out of mind because I am simply not up to it. The Scientist had already expressed doubt as to whether it was very advisable this morning, but I found out the hard way after a trip into Perth.  Lego Lover and I had met up with a friend and her young son for lunch at Annalakshmi (a vegetarian Indian restaurant in Perth where you pay what you want). The area was a bit of a mess because they are setting up for the Perth International Arts Festival and streets were blocked off in various places so that regular parking wasn’t possible. I was driving down past one parking area and the road was blocked, well past the entrance to the paid parking lot, so that cars had to make U-turns to get out of there as it had stopped where the exit to the parking lot came out. Anyway, I ended up going back in the opposite direction to find free parking and we had to walk a fair ways to get to our destination. Every time I tried to hurry to cross a road I’d end up in pain from straining the muscle further. The walk back was much easier because we weren’t in such a hurry to be anywhere and could take advantage of benches and rest occasionally as we walked alongside the Swan River. I think I’d had enough exercise for one day by the time we reached our car. In hindsight, it would have been worthwhile to pay the parking fees and limit myself to a shorter walk.

I’m contemplating seeing a physio to help figure out a better plan before I do any further damage. And this time I might actually do it…