Deja Vu

My run/walk yesterday was a complete fail.  The goal was to move from 30 seconds run/30 seconds walk to 60 seconds run for 15 intervals.   I made it to about the fifth interval before my non-operated hip started in with intense groin pain.  I felt like I was right back to July 2013 with the first hip.

Frustrating.

I am trying to not think too much about it without the definitive diagnosis, but in the back of my mind, I know my odds are not good.  Hip, hip, hooray.

About 20% of people who need surgery on one hip go on to need it in the other hip.   So a large enough percentage to make it something that's a real possibility, while being small enough that it feels like horribly bad luck.

Today I was released from physical therapy until we can determine what the course of action is for the other hip.  Because I am only allotted a certain number of sessions a year, we wanted to conserve the remaining covered by insurance for now.

In other news, I completed a three-session intro to pilates.  I really like it!  It's more strength work than stretching like yoga, and is a serious core workout.

We did some crazy ab stuff in today's session like side crunches from this position:

And whatever the heck this was called:

Have you ever tried pilates?  Did you like it?

Dartfish Running Gait Analysis

I decided to have a running gait analysis done before I got too far into the run/walk program because I knew I know I still had a lot of strength deficiencies and compensations.  But, I wanted an idea of what and where I needed to focus my efforts and how bad (or good!) my running form looked to a professional.

It was pretty simple - I warmed up on the treadmill and then ran for about 3-4 minutes while they video taped me from the front, sides and back.   From there, the trainer was able to analyze my various angles and strides and determine where things might be going wrong.

All in all, my running form is pretty solid.  I am a  forefoot striker, good knee tracking, soft landing and no pronation issues. 

Where it falls apart is with my hips. (OK, is anyone surprised? Not really, right?)  Both hips show strength issues, and on top of that, my operated hip shows a lack of flexibility/ROM.

This shows what's going on with my hips as I land.  In the top left, you can see that my right leg (operated hip) tracks almost to the center of my body, as opposed to underneath my hip (red star).   My left leg does as well a little, but not nearly as much as the right.  The screen capture is too small to see the actual measurements, so just take my word on it.   This is all hip strength related, specifically strength in the lateral (side-to-side) direction.

In the bottom right, you can also see that when I strike with my left leg, my right hip drops.  This is hip and core strength and stability.    Planks, side planks, bridges.

The other interesting thing the trainer noticed was that my stride on my operated side is more shallow - I don't get as much hip flexion nor hamstring activity (less of a knee bend) as I do on my "good" side.   He believes this is a ROM, hip flexor issue.

The non-operated hip from the side:

The operated hip:

All in all, I really got a lot out of the gait analysis.  I want to repeat the analysis in 4-5 months and see if I have made improvements.  I received a set of exercises to work on and a few tweaks to the PT exercises I have already been doing to work on the specific deficiencies.

The Dartfish program is easy to use.  I have a copy of all my images and videos on a CD that I can review at any time.

Don't call it a comeback

When you first make the plans to have surgery, your goal is to get back to where you were before you were injured.  But this is sort of a false premise to go by because you really never can "go back".  It doesn't even have to be surgery we're talking about here, lots of people have nostalgia about a prior point in life and really... you just have to let it go.   Time marches on.

So you've gone through surgery for what then?  It's to have a better future.  Or, rather,  it's to get on the path that you think will lead you to a better future.   It's a risk.  It's a gamble.  But you believe it's your best shot, so go for it.

I am at five months post-op today.  Things are good.  But different.

My repaired hip doesn't make a peep 95% of the time.   I really only notice it when I need to do something that requires a full range of motion or am in PT being reminded of the weakness of that leg.   I can hike, elliptical, lift and do pilates without issue.   I have started a run/walk program, and it feels fine during and after.

But.  Every time I've run, my other hip (you know, the good one?) has been achy.  Then it locked up in PT for a second or two.  And for the last day or so, it's been achy almost constantly.    

If I needed proof that things aren't the same after surgery, there it is.  And that's not to say that surgery somehow caused my other hip to start to have issues, at all.  But two years ago is just that - two years ago. 

And who knows, maybe the other hip will calm down and be a non-issue.  That doesn't change the fact that  I need to embrace the now and accept that is where I am.  And that everything is okay even if it's not.

Summits and trails

The last few weeks, we have tackled a bunch of the various "summits" nearby.  The hip has cooperated with 6+ miles, 3+ hours on the trails, some of which were steep and rocky.   I used to hike a lot before I got into running, so it's been nice to revisit an old hobby.   To celebrate the miles, I bought myself a new hydration pack, the Nathan Intensity Race Vest:

We've also been having some incredible weather.  A few picture from our hikes:

I've been doing the ElliptiGo pretty regularly.  It's a good workout and really does not bother the hip at all.  Though, secretly (or maybe not so secretly lol), I do wish I could ride my bike instead.   It's getting better, but still aggravates the hip flexors too much for it to be comfortable.  

The sun is already is setting earlier, so pretty soon it'll be dark when I get out of work!  This summer was such a blur. :)

The new toy: ElliptiGO

I have tried bike riding several times post-op and I've found that it's too much hip flexion and just not comfortable.  It also leaves all my hip flexors unhappy for days afterwards.  So that means that I was limited to walking/hiking and the elliptical.   In New England, we have a good six months of true "outdoor" weather and the thought of hammering away indoors this summer on the elliptical to get a good workout in was just unappealing.

I knew I could handle the elliptical motion.  So I did some reading and research and there are a lot of hippie people really happy with their ElliptiGOs.   Yeah, it's not the coolest looking piece of equipment but it seemed like a lot of fun and everyone online said they enjoyed riding it.  

My new ElliptiGO!

From their website:  We got the idea to build the ElliptiGO really out of necessity. In 2005, Bryan lost the ability to run for fitness because of hip and knee injuries. Basically, a lifetime of contact sports and endurance athletics had caught up with him and by the age of 32 he was forced to engage in low-impact exercise. As a former cyclist and Ironman triathlete, he seriously considered returning to cycling to stay fit. However, he had always found the bicycle saddle and riding position to be really uncomfortable and cycling workouts to require too much time. As a result, he started using the indoor elliptical trainer. Although he liked the exercise, he hated being locked in a gym. To solve this problem, he decided to buy a low-impact running device he could ride on the street. 

The first ride on it seriously kicked my butt.  I had to stop a mile in to catch my breath!  Most importantly, there was no hip pain at all.   I am up to almost 4 miles now and am signing up for a 10 mile charity ride in a week.

People report riding bike-like speeds -15-18mph - and distances of 50, 60, 100 miles.  Right now, this seems completely nuts!  

There are quite a few elite athletes who use the ElliptiGO for cross-training purposes.  Here's a really interesting video showing how the elliptical motion is similar to running (but obviously without the impact):

Data!

As I mentioned earlier, I have been using a BodyMedia arm band (now owned by Jawbone).  Here's what some of the data looks like (I don't wear a heart rate monitor and I am bad about recording my food, so I am not using all of the data features it has):

This is a summary of the last 7 days.  It gives you an average calories burned assessment and a summary of steps walked and how much exercise you did over that period.   It also gives you a sense of your sleep "efficiency", which is pretty accurate.  The nights when I get up at 3am and stare at the clock show up pretty clearly in their breakdown.

When you load up data, it will show you a list of "accomplishments".  I don't know what this says about me if all my accomplishments are about sleeping.  Hmmm.

On any particular day, you can look at your data by hour.  Here is my activity and steps on an hourly basis:

What I like about Body Media is that it's like having someone watch me all day and know that my decision to be lazy will be permanently recorded somewhere.  I want my numbers to be good, dammit! I've found myself opting to walk somewhere so I can be sure that I get my 10,000 steps in.  No, I'm not obsessed by data or anything.

Does anyone else use an activity tracker?  Fit Bit, Jawbone, Nike Fuel, etc?

The San Francisco Half Marathon: My final DNS

Over the winter - and pre-diagnosis - I had accepted the fact that I would just have to run through this pesky tendonitis stuff if I wanted to run.   I hit a mileage PR running through pain so why not sign up for a few races as well?   Sadly to say, I DNSed all of them.   The last one was the San Francisco half, this past weekend.  My husband ran the full marathon so I was spectator extraordinaire.

The SF Marathon has four races going on that same day - the full, TWO half marathons and a 5k.  25,000 runners!  And it was a very well-run and well-organized event.

We stayed at the Hyatt at the Embarcadero because I did not want to have to deal with getting to the starting line for a 5:30 start time.   We've stayed there before and so it was familiar territory, as well.  My husband was in the wave right after the elites, so he was officially off and running at like 5:32.  EARLY.   Even with the east coast time zone advantage, it still felt really, really early to be standing out there at o-dark-thirty.

The view from our hotel room.

Starting line.

Once he was off and running, I hung around and cheered on the remaining 8 waves of people (like I said, 25,000 runners!).    I saw the wave start that I would been in... ah well, it is what it is.  Sticking around the start line did mean that I caught the sun rise, which was lovely. 

The bay bridge sun rise

We stayed around the bay area for the rest of the week and ate a lot and drank a lot.  And I didn't do any of my physical therapy...  Back to reality now!

Needless to say, I won't be signing up for ANYTHING until the day of the race.  Signing up for races and not running them is an expensive way to get a t-shirt.