Testing times

Two weeks ago, I had my 4th shock wave treatment for this bloody heel spur and plantar fascia-not-quite-itis.  Lars the Osteopath gave me the thumbs up to do some test runs last week so, with his guidance firmly in mind, I tested. 

Three jog-walks, all 30 minutes in length.  The first one was 2 minutes jogging/2 minutes walking, which I did on a football pitch for some extra softness underfoot.  The second one was 4 minutes jogging/1 minute walking on the road.  And the third was 2x15 minutes with 2 minutes of walking, also on the road.  All of which had the Lars stamp of approval.  And they all felt fine.  The first one was ached slightly but there was no discomfort at all with the second session, and both of those felt fine afterwards.  However, although the third session felt absolutely fine during the jog/walk (and actually felt the best of the three sessions), by that evening the discomfort had increased to 3 out of 10 on my personal pain scale.  And when I got out of bed the next morning, it initially was 4 out of 10 which is the highest that it had been since I started the shock wave treatments.

I was gutted.  Even though the discomfort quickly decreased to 2.5 and then to 1, I feared that it wasn't a good sign.  I spent most of Monday morning at work in Shetland (where I am this week) firing off shrieking panicky texts to Adam, Ben, and Lars.  Adam and Ben both said the same thing:  don't panic, it could just be your heel getting used to being used, see what Lars says.  And what did Lars say?  It's clearly not better, these things can take a long while to clear up, be patient, and come back for a 5th and probably 6th shock wave.  Gutted again.

On the slightly positive side, Lars did say that it's okay to keep doing jog/walks as long as they are at a level that doesn't aggravate my heel.  So, with Ben's guidance, I did 30 minutes of 2 minutes jog/2 minutes walk yesterday in torrential rain and 20mph wind.  (Ben didn't suggest the rain and wind, by the way - that was a bonus extra.)  My heel ached a bit (only 1 out of 10) but was fine afterwards and is okay today, and for a brief time, I felt like a hardy Shetland runner again.

I am so close to putting all of this to one side - no more running, no more jogging, no more walking, no more cross-training - and just letting this bloody heel get on with healing in the absence of any impact whatsoever but have been told (with varying degrees of politeness) by Adam, Ben, and Lars that this is possibly just a bit of an over-reaction.  Good thing that they can't see my IT'S NOT FAIR AND I HATE BEING PATIENT face as I'm writing this then.