Today I finished my 5th half marathon. But it was a first for me--my first 13.1 miles in the rain, my first marathon without listening to music, my first race since my car accident in 2011.
That accident was one of the scariest things I've been through. A distracted driver made a U-turn without yielding to me. I can still feel the lingering injuries in my wrist and foot.
I was born with an accessory navicular bone in my right foot. That means there's this extra bone sticking out near the insole. During the accident, I sprained my ankle and jammed the bone, causing terrible pain at the slightest amount of pressure.
Even after the worst of the pain subsided, things weren't right.
Several months after the accident, I ran only 1/4 mile, at a slow pace, only to have pain shoot up the outside of my leg so sharply that I limped the rest of the night.
One night I was sobbing about this, feeling robbed of my joy. Running had been my cure for depression. It once even stopped me from going back to self-harm. I didn't know how to handle life without it.
Not only could I not run, but I could still feel the pain in my foot. I felt so helpless. That night, with tears running down my face, I kept thinking of how I wished I had taken a different route home the morning of the accident, avoiding the uninsured driver who left me with a totaled car and painful injuries. Read more »
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