Dear Magic 8 Ball: Will I ever fully recover from this herniated disc?

Outlook is cloudy.

Despite the back pain I am going to forge ahead with my running. Too much muscle loss, too much fat gained. It’s time to get back to business. My friends have an awesome Rim2Rim2Rim trip planned this Fall and I am going to miss it. I have tried not to give it much thought but there is a little tinge of jealousy because this is exactly the kind of trip I have always wanted to do ever since I peaked over the edge of the Grand Canyon on an early morning 20 years ago. I looked over the edge and soaked it all in for about an hour before deciding that in order to really do the place justice, I needed to return at a later date, prepared to spend days here.

It continues to wait for me.

For now I am enjoying starting from square one again. No, really. There is a pleasure to be had there. You have to completely erase where you once were and think of it in terms of returning to the beginning, getting a second (or in my case, third) chance to get things right. There are so many lessons I have learned and this time I am not going to gloss over or ignore anything.

I’m running between 15-20 minutes at a shot a couple of times a week right now. I am hitting new milestones like adding a few more minutes to the run, or running the entire time without a walk break such as I did this morning. I’m even waking up extra early in the morning to run. Last week my husband asked why I kept getting up so early, I told him I was “in training” to wake up early. It paid off. This week I’m up by 5:00 am, grab a cup of coffee and hit the streets. My old routine feels so good all over again.

With this renewed excitement I had another great surprise this afternoon. What runner can resist new shoes? I ask you that. I may not be bouncing up and down but I can’t wait to tear open that box and check out my goodies. Today the FedEx man delivered three pair of shoes from Scott shoes. There is a minimalist road shoe (T2C) in a lovely bright blue/yellow combination, and two trail shoes to check out (eRide Grip2 and eRide Aztec3). I think I’ll check out the trail shoes this weekend up on South Mountain, even if I can only go a mile or two, at least I’m getting out. I am also testing out their Support2 model which, so far, has been great.  Reviews forthcoming.