Frustration and despair

Here's a few things that I have learned about myself:

1. I learn from my mistakes, but only if faced with making the exact same mistake. I will happily and stupidly make new mistakes. Case in point: I changed my saddle last week (see previous post). Sunday, I went for a nice long bike ride and restrained my hip flexor. Stupid, stupid mistake. If I had been patient for a couple of days and had my new saddle professionally fitted before my outing, I could have avoided injury... again. Why, why, why did I have to be so f*%#ing stupid?

2. I have a hard time admitting pain. Monday, after straining my hip flexor on Sunday, I go out for a long run. I was aiming for 14, turned around at 5 and nearly had to walk the last 3 miles home. When I walked through the door I called and scheduled an appoinment with my physical therapist. The next morning when I show up at his office and am explaining why I am there. He's asking me questions and I am totally dodging the pain questions. Well, no, I can still swim. I mean I can feel it when I kick... and I guess it slows my kick down.. but (damnit) I can still swim! And I can (hobble) run... sort of, well not really... I guess it hurt (like every freaking step!) during my run yesterday. Here's this person who is supposed to help me and I won't admit a) that I'm in pain, b) how bad it is. And then I get on the table and he starts poking and prodding and when he hits my hip flexor I nearly jump off the table screaming. I guess he can tell it hurts... without me actually admitting it. Is pain really a sign of weakness? And why am I so afraid of it (weakness)?

3. If I ever am able to run again without pain/ discomfort/ some nagging feeling.... I will never ever ever take that for granted again. At this point I would do anything to be normal again. To wind the clock back 15 weeks and start over. I swear I would do better. I hate that I am here right now. In this place of injury. I want to wake up and have it be all over. A learning experience. So I will go to PT and do my exercises and my stretches and I will keep praying that someday I will wake up and this will be a distant memory. I'll look back and think, there was that one time in 2009 that I was injured and had to go through rehab, but otherwise I've been pretty healthy. Someday.

I really really hate this. I know this is supposed to be one of those opportunities for me to have a really positive outlook and they do all the surveys in Runner's World that shows that people with a positive attitude during injury have a higher rate of recovery. But it's so hard! All I really want to do is crawl in a hole and cry. I keep thinking about everything that I wanted to do this year. Everything I've done for the past 3 years. Why now? Why when Boston was just 8.2 miles away? Why when I have 2 IM scheduled and I am supposed to be training? Why me? I hate to be melodramatic and I totally don't blame you if you are rolling your eyes right now. I would be. But this sucks! I don't want to take time off. I want to run. I don't want an excuse to sleep in and be lazy. I WANT TO RUN.