Tuesday, February 18, 2014

I Wasn't Such A Badass After All

I guess I should have been nervous as I made my way to the imaging center in Columbus Circle, but the truth is, I felt like a major badass.

It had all started a couple of weeks before when I felt a nagging pain in my left leg on a long run. I was halfway through my training plan for what would be my very first half marathon and feeling strong. An injury was definitely not on the schedule, so I did what any runner would do and pretended it didn't exist.

That worked until it didn't, and I finally convinced myself to go get it checked out.

I wasn't exactly jumping up and down at the thought of going to see an orthopedist, but I wanted to run in the race, so I got adult about it and called a doctor that came highly recommended.

A cheerful receptionist asked me to describe my problem, and when I told her it was a running injury she said, "Hon I think you would be better off with a sports medicine doctor who treats athletes like you," and rattled off a name and number.

Athletes like me? I'm an athlete?

And I started thinking that maybe this whole doctor thing wouldn't be so bad after all.

On the day of my appointment I sat in the waiting room of my brand new sports medicine doctor and looked around at all the lean, fit people, thrilled to be a part of such athletic company. When I got called back to the exam room and told the very young and very good looking doctor about the pain I had been feeling, he told me he thought it was probably shin splints and then spent 10 minutes talking to me about distance running and marathon training. It seems he was similarly obsessed, and similarly afflicted with shin splints.

"It happens to us runners. It's no big deal," he said.

Us runners.

I left the office with a prescription for an MRI to confirm his diagnosis and the distinct feeling that with this injury I had just joined a special club of runners.

I felt like I had arrived.

I was almost excited when I walked into the imaging center a couple of days later, expecting to once again be sitting among my fellow runners in the injury trenches.

I wasn't.

Frozen in the doorway, I took in the other patients scattered around the room. The elderly woman in the wheelchair with an IV pole attached to her arm. The frail young man, head criss-crossed with scars. The boy with casts on all of his limbs. The cluster of somber faced women - some without hair - sitting by the doorway marked "breast imaging." A doctor in a lab coat murmuring something to a crying woman.

I took myself and my running injury to an empty chair in the very back corner of the room and sank into it as my leg gave a dull, pathetic throb.

I didn't feel so badass anymore.


13 comments:

  1. i was with you for every badass emotion. and as a fellow - i can't even say it - athlete? i am familiar with pretending things don't exist, until you just can't.
    i hope it all went well and you're back on track.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. This actually happened a couple of years ago. Luckily the MRI was all clear, and I ended up running in that very first race. I think pretending things don't exist is a hallmark of runners. The whole "nothing can stop us" and all that. We're a strange breed.

      Delete
  2. I've had that "Holy cow! That person thinks I'm a badass!" moments. Ahhh if only they knew.

    It's just a subset of another club -- those people in the MRI waiting room are badass in less obvious ways. Rawr!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. If only they knew indeed...Those people in the MRI waiting room are so badass. And now because of your "rawr" I just started singing Katy Perry's Roar, which will now be in my head for the entire rest of the day.

      Delete
  3. Omg an MRI for shinsplints? For your sake I hope that's all it was, but this is a perfect example of what's wrong with the medical profession if a sports orthopedist needs anMRI to tell him if you have shinsplints :o

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hahaha because of where the pain was and how much of it I was feeling, and because I was training and upping my mileage every week, he wanted to rule out a stress fracture. Turns out it really was just shin splints that I ran on for way too long without a break, but I was glad for the peace of mind.

      Delete
  4. I had a similar experience when I had an IT band injury. It blew my mind that the doctors were talking to me like I was a runner. Me? A runner! Crazy stuff.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Wow--what a twist in your experience. I liked how you told this story.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I like the perspective of this narrative, nice job.

    ReplyDelete
  7. I felt the same way when I went to my orthopedic doctor for my hip (of all things!). I was by far the youngest ne thee and I believe I have at least a decade on you:)!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Nothing like a good reality check! An MRI waiting room is definitely not a fun place to be. So glad you had a good result.

    ReplyDelete
  9. A nice feeling of validation and solidarity despite the pain and uncertainty of an injury. I hope you're okay; ouch!

    ReplyDelete
  10. You may have not felt like a bad-ass athlete at that moment, but I'm always impressed with your stories of running. They almost (almost) make we want to get out and run too. It's not that you're not quite inspiring enough; I'm just that lazy -- so even making me think about running is a great accomplishment. Also, you're a bad ass reader and writer, so you have that going for you. Hope all is well.

    ReplyDelete