Reluctant Acceptance

This is where I am. Reluctantly, I am accepting the fact that I am not a runner. At the moment. Due to ongoing issues with my broken foot, I have been slowly recovering, but not to the point where running is even an option. I have gradually come back to skating, but even long periods of skating hockey games causes me discomfort and small setbacks. With the Pittsburgh Marathon now just over ten weeks away I am reluctantly accepting that running in the full marathon is not going to be possible. I am hanging onto slim hopes that perhaps I may be able to do the half-marathon as sort of a consolation, but even that hope grows dimmer by the day.

I plan to stay off the roads, treadmill and other forms of running through at least the next month and take it one month at a time. I have found that when I don't run, my foot improves. Skating does damage, but not like running.

As I pondered for the millionth time why this happened, I have also reluctantly come to the conclusion that as an athlete and someone who puts himself in positions of relative danger (let's face it; even running poses risks), this has always been a possibility. Hockey is such a fast paced sport and only now do I fully understand the risks involved and how dangerous it can be even at the lowest levels. What this means for me moving forward I cannot say. What I know is that I have a healthier respect for it and have to be content with the fact that for 13 years, and over 1,400 games I went mostly unscathed. But for one fateful night in October, 2008 I was caught in the wrong position and now the battle is not to get back to marathoning. It's simply to get back to running. I have to concede that I can't put a timeline on this. The body heals in its own way and for now, that has to be enough.