Nine Months: The End!

Readers, the time has come. I’m fairly sure this will be my last entry, because, well, I am 99% healed.

Last night I ran my longest run yet, 5.5 miles at an 8:09 pace. This is more or less the pace I was running before I broke my leg, and just shy of my usual 6-6.5 miles. Of course, I’m still not running every day like I used to, but I’m doing it three times a week, with elliptical sessions in between. I can definitely feel my leg while running, even in the first steps — it’s not really painful per se, it just feels like something is wrong, but this sensation is slowly getting less prominent.

Moreover, this past weekend I bouldered OUTSIDE. I have to say, I actually barely climbed, half out of fear and half because I spent five hours climbing in the gym the day before, but I did it. Heel hooks with my left leg can still be problematic, but as with running, it’s getting there. And in case you’re wondering, I’m climbing a ton in the gym — four days/11-12 hrs a week. I’m also finally back to my climbing level before I fell. When I came back in May, I felt super strong from all of my pull-ups, but I’m just now realizing that only now has my forearm and hand strength come back. I had a breakthrough/moved off a plateau about 2 weeks ago, and it feels great.

Final Thoughts:

In summary, this has been…not that terrible of an experience. After the actual break, I can think of only one thing that “went wrong,” which was my physical therapist’s wildly optimistic timetable for recovery, which just had me frustrated for most of the spring. I guess I also overdid my recovery exercising a few times, but I think that is inevitable, because there is no way to stay exactly on the line of pushing yourself but not pushing too much. I’m happy to say that I’ve had zero hardware issues, and I have no desire — or need — to be cut open again to remove the screws or, god forbid, the rod itself.

If you are reading this because you just broke your leg, my recovery timetable post is probably the most useful thing on here. Or at least it’s what I wanted to see when I was in my first month of recovery. However, I will also encourage you not to think about nine months from now, because it’s going to feel really far away. The good news is that you will have many, many small milestones along the way to focus on, each of which will be an accomplishment, and will hopefully motivate you to keep pushing forward in your recovery.

Also, my #1 piece of advice, which should be the #1 piece of advice you see everywhere, is to do PT exercises. A lot. NOT for twelve weeks, or sixteen weeks, but until your two legs feel exactly the same. I definitely believe that my consistency with doing PT exercises — which I did at minimum five days a week for a full six months — is why I can run as much/fast as I can right now, which is definitely on the early side of my orthopedic surgeon’s estimate of 9-12 months to “get back” to running.

And on that note, if you are a runner, and are wondering how long it’s going to take you to really get back to it, my sense, based on having run three (bq) marathons and countless halves, is that it would be unwise to plan on anything over a half marathon within the first year of recovery, and that you shouldn’t expect to be anywhere near a PR on that. I suspect it is going to take me over a year to be able to run 6 miles four days in a row.

Well, I think that is all I have to say. I hope that this blog is useful to people, and feel free to get in touch with questions if you want. (Leave a comment) Shout outs to my like, two loyal readers (hi guys!) and my surgeon, Dr. David Lhowe at MGH, who was great. Good luck and best wishes to all of those with broken legs and IM nails with your recovery. You can do it!

 

 

Weeks 29/30/31: On the Road Again

Just over seven months out at this point. You would think that not a lot would be changing at this point in my recovery, but in fact, I have updates!

Basically, my leg is finally getting back to normal. I am bouldering indoors four days a week. Falling is much better than it was a month ago: I am no longer afraid to fall, and 90% of the time, it feels the same in both legs. Additionally, while there are still some moves I can’t do because of my leg — high heel hooks that require a lot of strength (muscles surrounding my knee still aren’t fully developed), or big moves that involve pulling with the left toe — they are fewer and further between. 95% of the time, I have no reason to think about my leg anymore while climbing.

I am also starting to run outside! I’ve gone four times now, with the longest distance being 2.25 mi. I can definitely still feel a difference between the two legs while running, but well, it’s getting better. About a week ago, I ran two miles at a 9:23 (avg) pace. My guess is that my more recent run was maybe done around a 9:10 pace?

Finally, and I mean FINALLY, my legs feel exactly the same while walking. I haven’t had a limp or anything I’d call painful for over a month, but it really took until about week 30 to have no difference in sensation at all between the two legs.

 

I also will shamefully admit that I’ve stopped doing PT exercises. I know that my left leg is still weaker than my right — I still can’t skip symmetrically, for example, and of course I can feel it running, etc., but I can tell that it is still getting stronger just through climbing and running themselves. and ellipticalling, which I am still doing. After six months of PT exercises, seriously, I just want to live my life for a bit. I think this is okay.

Weeks 27+28: Officially Discharged

It is strange to me that I am making a lot of progress around the sixth month mark. I would have thought it would have tapered off by now, but no.

In any case, I am making a lot of progress. Depending on my activity level, I still can have over-doing it pain, but I definitely do not have healing/getting over limping pain. More that some days I’ll go to do some one legged hopping, and it will hurt and I’ll back off. I will admit that sometimes I can feel it while walking, but it doesn’t bother me at all. My balance on my left (bad) leg is better than on my right.

I rejoined my climbing gym, which is where I am doing my PT and…where I am climbing. So far so good on that front. I am definitely scared to do any moves that are potentially going to result in a high velocity fall, but I’m gradually easing back into it. I’m surprised that I’m only climbing about 1.5 grades lower than I was before. Though there are a lot of problems that I just don’t work on because they involve something that is going to overtax my leg. (Which you can feel, i.e. I avoid moves that hurt — namely, anything where I have to put a lot of weight on my left foot and pull myself up over to it.) And I can tell that this is basically where the overdoing it pain is coming from — if I weren’t climbing or running right now I wouldn’t have any pain at all. I am trying to climb 3x/wk, and I hope I can keep that up, but we’ll see. Especially since I’ve only been twice since I’ve been back, with a day off in between. This means that I’m running less though, because my leg always hurts a little from climbing and I want to be careful. Ellipticalling my heart out though.

Also, I just go back from seeing my orthopedic surgeon, and I am dismissed from seeing him. Here are my final x-rays, where you can see a lot of bone growth.

You can also see that my fibula has healed right up. (If you recall, there were two fractures there, one around the area of the tibia fracture, and the other down where the bump is above my ankle. There is still a gap in my bone, but apparently that will continue to fill in over the course of the next few months. Oh, and my rod is blue. (8mm hollow titanium)

Week 26: SIX MONTHS

Today is Tuesday, May 10th, and I broke my leg exactly six months ago, on Tuesday, Nov 10th. I cannot believe that it has been a half a year.

While I’ve certainly created a long documentation of my progress, I thought it would be nice to sum up my milestones. Particularly for anyone reading who is wondering how long it takes to recover. So:

• Nov 10: broke my leg
• Nov 11: IM Nail surgery
• Nov 13: discharged from hospital
• One week: got rid of boot
• Nine days: took first steps without crutches
• Two weeks: down to one crutch
• Three weeks: off crutches, going down steps one at a time
• Four weeks: started PT
• Five weeks: walked a mile
• Six weeks: rode the spin bike, alternating feet going down stairs
• Seven weeks: going down stairs without handrails
• Eight weeks: can stand on one toe, started using leg press machine with bad leg
• Eleven weeks: can jump on two legs (landing with 80% of weight on my good leg)
• Sixteen weeks: stopped sleeping with my leg elevated
• Twenty-one weeks: ran about 40′ in running shoes
• Twenty-two weeks: ran on the treadmill for two minutes, went indoor top roping, very little pain, except after climbing. Last traces of limp are mostly gone.
• Twenty-four weeks: switched from spin bike to elliptical machine, went indoor bouldering
• Twenty-five weeks: ran 1 km on treadmill (10.5 min/mi pace), beginning to hop on one leg
• Twenty-six weeks: pain/difference in sensation between two legs while walking is completely gone. Can quasi run down stairs (if I’m in a rush) without pain and without using the handrail. Ran 1 mile in 10.5 minutes. Can side shuffle, do (some) jumping jacks, and run backwards. All of this is new this week. (Note that I can’t do these things at 100%)

Note that weeks 9 – 21 really sucked, both psychologically and physically. I knew that eventually I would get better, but…WHEN?!? Part of the problem was that I was expecting to be where I am now by 12-16 weeks (what my PT had told me). Clearly, this was just a very bad estimate. Which made things worse psychologically.

In any case, this week has been GREAT! On Sunday, I realized that my legs, for the first time, felt the same. I run with a limp, and my legs definitely don’t feel the same when I do that, but I’m pretty excited about having run a mile. It feels as though my leg realized that it had been six months and decided that enough was enough and it was finally going to be officially better. It is hard for me to say if any one thing made a difference. The only thing that I added last week was one set of 50 squats with a 17.5 kg bar on my shoulders (38.5 lbs). I hadn’t really be squatting since the squat bar always has a line at my gym, but this was done with a different weighted bar that no one uses.

Of course, I still have a ways to go. For example, I tried skipping last night and that is a real no go right now. I still have weakness underneath and to the inside of my knee, which I can feel when I do either the leg curl machine, or put one leg up on a Swiss ball — to the point where I don’t get the intended hamstring/glutes workout.

Also, I went bouldering this evening. It was better than last time, but there were still some moves that weren’t going to happen due to pain. And then there were moves that weren’t going to happen because of fear. I was really surprised how afraid I was this time. The gym I went to definitely had higher walls, bigger moves, and I wasn’t working entirely on overhang. There is no reason that I should be scared about falling. Structurally, my leg is A+. I think I am just afraid that I will do something else to something else, if that makes sense. It definitely really inhibited my climbing — I just wouldn’t do any big or not a 100% sure thing move, and strangely, I actually almost cried once. Not due to fear, but just because of overwhelming emotions or something like that, I think. In any case, my static climbing game, which I basically didn’t have before, is about to get a lot better.

Not sure if I’m going to have some pain tomorrow because of the climbing, and not sure how many times a week I’ll be able to climb when I return to my home gym, but fingers crossed that it’s 1. none, and 2. a lot.

Week 25: Running (Out of Titles)

It’s getting really hard to find new titles after TWENTY FIVE weeks. I can’t believe it’s been this long.

The bad news: my post-climbing pain stayed with me for a good five days last week. Trying to give myself some time to heal, so no climbing this week. And then yesterday I got some more pain — in my foot (weird), and under my knee. This is either from running or lateral ellipticalling. I think maybe the latter, as I’ve really been pushing hard on that thing.

The good news: my running is coming along splendidly. This week I got up to 7 minutes of running, which I believe was something like 1.1 kilometers. That’s about a 10:12 min mile. Right now I’m running every other day on the treadmill — trying not to overdo it, since I had some pain near my knee after I ran a few days in a row. I have two weeks left here on the other side of the world, and I’m hoping to work up to a mile at a sub 10 minute pace. The limiting factor is most definitely not aerobic capacity, but rather muscle strength in my legs. I figured out that running a 10 min mile pace does not feel unbearably slow because I’m taking tiny strides, which makes it feel like I’m going faster. Also, I’m running with a limp, but oh well.

My quads and glutes are essentially the same strength on both sides — also, both are finally firm again! — so now I really think it’s all about the calf and my foot muscles too I guess. As the internet told me, it seems that the best way to strengthen my calf at this point is doing things like running that actually use it. Which makes sense because toe raises are getting really easy.

Strangely un-bummed that I am still having sporadic pain, because I am now remembering that people on running boards were saying that even at a year, they still have bad days. The difference between the pain now and before is that I’m walking just fine/completely normally, and also, it is definitely induced by doing too much (?) exercise-wise, rather than being residual from the break/surgery. All in all I’m pretty happy with this, and have also accepted the fact that things like running and ellipticalling and climbing are just going to be trial and error in terms of figuring out how much I can do.

Oh, and major news! I am starting to hop on my foot! It is easiest if I hop either forward, backward, or to the outside of my leg. Hopping in place hurts a little more, as does hopping to the inside of my leg. But I am doing it. This is kind of the last non-sport specific thing I could think to accomplish in rehab. Though certainly there is much room to improve.

Week 24: Running and Bouldering

PART 1

I am no longer walking with pain. I have some pain going down stairs, but that is about it. It is glorious.

Here are some thoughts and tips:

• The lateral elliptical is amazing. If you are reading this because you are recovering, I can’t recommend it enough, if you have access to one. Particularly if you use the “X” mode, it is a great workout that really works on your leg muscles, both for stability and strength.
• Generally, my advice is to get on an elliptical as soon as you can — the spin bike is great for cardio, but all it does is build your upper legs. With the regular elliptical, there is still no lateral movement, but it’s much closer to walking/running and you get some calf work in there. I think that switching to the elliptical this week has been huge for me.
• My running is progressing so well, which is keeping me super motivated. It’s almost like the beginning of the recovery process when things moved so quickly. Within five days I moved from 0.2km to 0.8km, and dropped my min/mile time by 4 minutes. I am running with a limp for sure, but it is really cool to have bigger and bigger strides each day, and be able to toe off more and more, as opposed to doing a super exaggerated heel strike. Would not be at all surprised if I could run a mile at a 10 min/mile pace soon. Though my goal is simply to be able to run to the climbing gym (0.4 mi) when I get back. I have no idea if running outside will be different than on a treadmill.
• I have a bump on my knee — and have had since surgery — which feels like the head of my tibia sticking out too far. It prevents me from doing things like kneeling on a hard surface. My physical therapist said that it was swelling, which seemed hard to believe, since it felt so hard/like bone. But indeed, it has gone down. I can probably kneel on a hardwood floor at this point, though it wouldn’t be particularly comfortable. But still, progress.
• If you google tib/fib fracture, you’ll find a lot of people on the internet really really keen on getting their hardware taken out. If not the rod, at least the screws. I am convinced that my surgeon was really good, but these thoughts don’t even cross my mind. As far as I can tell, I have no irritation from the screws, and certainly the rod is just in there doing its job with no side effects. Just writing this here so that people know that not everyone wants their hardware out — probably just a vocal minority.

 

PART 2 (because it slightly contradicts Part 1)

Also, I went…BOULDERING! (indoors) I went to a climbing gym, rented a harness (didn’t bring mine with me on this trip) planning to spend at least half the time autobelaying, but after hating the first two routes I climbed, I was like, I’m going to go see what it’s like to fall. At first I climbed up so that my feet were about 4″ off the mat, held onto some jugs, and let my feet off the wall so that I was dead hanging. And dropped. It was fine. I did this a few more times, getting higher and higher. Luckily this was a pretty short bouldering area. With a pretty squishy mat. (Squishier than my home gym for sure.) I wound up bouldering for about an hour and a half, until I got a flapper. I had at least one uncontrolled fall. And was fine.

Honestly, the real problem was exactly what it was last time I climbed, which is pushing up on the toe of my bad leg. I am not going to lie and say that that didn’t hurt at times, and that it didn’t cause some pain while walking both last night after I went, and this morning. But it was definitely better this time, and bouldering is actually easier on the leg than top roping, in that so much more weight is typically on your arms. At least when you climb overhang, which is mostly what I did. Oh, and I heel hooked, which was a tiny bit sketchy because the muscles/ligaments around my knee aren’t 100% yet, but was pretty okay.

And here are some pics! Also, I calculated this morning that I have probably done around 1400-1500 pullups in the last 3.5 months. Hence my arms, ha. I have lost all of my endurance and finger strength, but my upper body strength is all still there.

Confidence building: not too far to fall, and it definitely won’t be on my leg!

Muscles: in tact! 

 

 

Week 23: Getting There

So I have to admit that going climbing last week created a bit more pain — which I have now recovered from completely. However, the silver lining was that it really helped me figure out what I need to work on most in terms of building strength, which is definitely calf strength in my bad leg. I think that my quads/upper hamstrings might be almost even now. (Though covered in a layer of fat that really needs to go)

As a result, I am really trying to focus on rising up on my toe in as many ways as possible. Since that was essentially what hurt when I went climbing — putting all of my weight on my bad leg’s toes. In addition to using a weighted calf muscle machine, I am trying to find ways to be on my toe and get as much bodyweight as possible over it, practicing toe-ing off in a running stride executed veeerrrryyyyy slowly, etc. Most of these things look ridiculous, but I think they are working.

I am also “running” on the treadmill now for three minutes, and — remembering the “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results” maxim — I am switching my cardio up and am going to elliptical every other day instead of only riding the spin bike. The elliptical might not work my upper leg muscles as much, but it much more closely approximates both running and walking. I still have the tiniest bit of pain/sensation some of the time when I walk — particularly if I toe off harder than usual, or going down stairs. (Going down stairs is going to take a while to go away.) I’m hoping that the elliptical will really help the toe-ing off pain — or that it will build the muscles that will alleviate this, since it requires a lot of toeing off itself. I think that my leg feels about 97% like the other, and it’s possible that the last 3% might take a while? But essentially I would say that I am walking without pain.The other good news is that I can do things that are a bit painful while doing them at the gym, but I don’t have new pain the next day.

I haven’t had a goal in a while, but now I have one, which is kind of exciting. I want — and need — to be able to hop on my bad leg’s foot. I can jump with two feet, but I just can’t go anywhere with only one foot. In the same way that back in the day, I would try to rise onto my toes, and despite all of my efforts, I’d just stay on the ground. (It is really the weirdest thing.) I am trying to start doing this by leaning over a workout bench and not jumping over it, but just jumping up very, very, very slightly, using only my bad leg. I use my arms a lot, but it’s a start.

I also am starting to look all the way out to November — or, one year after my break — as a recovery time. Which is actually when the bone is fully recovered/isn’t going to change anymore. (Right now my bone is healed, but not remodelled.) Really curious about falling while bouldering. My balance on my bad leg is pretty great, and I don’t think it’s my ankle muscles/ligaments that are weak. I think I will go climbing again in a week, and plan to test out some very short falls on to both legs to see how I do.

Week 22: BIG WEEK PEOPLE

So, week 22 was kind of awesome. Here are things that happened: I started walking without pain in the afternoons. I ran on the treadmill for two minutes until I had pain, then I jumped off. I did some jumping (lateral, not vertical), and actually landed with both feet evenly weighted. My gym exercises got even easier and I had to invent new ones. And I went climbing! Oh, and I had my five month breakiversary.

As of this week, my leg just feels constitutionally different than before. I wobble a lot less while putting on pants, and as with my good leg, I’m able to kind of adjust my leg if I start to fall over doing that. It feels just as sturdy as the good one while walking, I have no limp at all, and it just feels like I should be able to take off running. Hard to explain that, but trust me, it’s good.

On the other hand, climbing was probably a bit much, and I knew it while doing it. I just don’t have the strength yet to put all of my weight on my bad leg with my foot on something very small and to push up on it. I did it anyway, but I could feel pain a lot of the time. (Also, while my technique and upper body strength were fine, my endurance was obviously not there, and my footwork was terrible! And my forearms are sore!) I was pleased though that high stepping and flexibility were not problems. I had to tell myself that I was having frequent pain and I should just go home about ten times, and at some point I was like, ok, your leg is kind of throbbing, go home! Which clearly was not great. My leg was in extra pain that day and the day after I went climbing, but two days afterwards it is almost back to where it was before. I don’t think I should climb again for at least two weeks/a while. For the record, I spent half the time (about two hours) autobelaying, and the other half traversing low on a bouldering wall, and making sure to either fall on my butt or hit my good leg first before rolling back. Did jump with both feet on the mat, which felt totally fine. Next time I’ll probably try to start dropping six inches onto both feet. What I’m worried about –rationally — is dropping onto my bad foot and doing muscle damage, though irrationally I’m also worried about dropping and breaking my leg again. Though I probably need to be more worried about doing that on my good leg, if I’m afraid of falling on both legs.

I did discover afterwards that my calf (soleus) muscle is more flexible in my bad leg than my good one at this point. I had to work hard at stretching that right after my break, though it’s probably now due to the fact that that leg is still weaker.

The running on the treadmill was pretty awesome though. It’s funny, I ran at a 16 minute mile pace – and covered 1/10th of a mile – which somehow didn’t feel slow at all. I mean, it felt casual, but not ridiculously slow like I expected it to. I do run with a limp, however, which will clearly go away as I build more strength. As with climbing though, I’m not sure if the best way to build more strength is by continuing to do it, or doing other exercises that will strengthen me in other ways.

Also, I am now leg pressing 47.5 kg on my bad side. Unfortunately, I’m at 67.5 kg on my good side, so I still have a 44 lb differential. Which means I’m at 70% of the strength on my good side on my bad side. Not quite sure how to move that number, since my good leg keeps getting stronger too.

 

Week 21: My Physical Therapist Was Just Flat-Out Wrong, BTW

I am in a good mood regarding my leg these days. Yeah, I still have pain. But it is only at the one location (same as last week), it feels better than last week for sure, and no, I do not have a stress fracture. (Eh, 93% confident about that.) No pain at all going up stairs anymore.

In any case, guess what I did this week? On Monday to be precise. I RAN! Okay, I ran two ~40′ lengths at the gym. And more like “ran.” I definitely limp while I do it, but I did it! And in moderation so that I don’t wind up with even *more* pain.

Also, I am getting stronger, and all of my new exercises are becoming easy. Almost too easy. Need to think of new things to do, which is actually not the easiest thing in the world. But that is good. Leg press report: 47.5 kg on bad leg, 67.5 kg on good leg. Realizing that it’s probably going to take a year or so to get the bad leg up to speed with the good leg.

Which brings me to this week’s title. Honestly, I don’t know what my PT was thinking when he said 12-16 weeks to be walking without pain and without a limp. My friend who did the same thing, on November 1 many years in the past (I am November 10, Nov 11 for surgery), said that it took her until April to be able to walk without pain. Maybe he didn’t know that I had a compound fracture? Anyway, it has helped mentally to just throw that out the window.

Also, I got a nice psychological boost tonight when I talked to a trainer at my gym, and he was like, “you have a broken leg!?!?! That explains why you do weird exercises, but wow, I can’t believe how much you work on it and how dedicated you are!” I also told him about no cast, crutches for three weeks and he was like, “you are a very inspirational person,” which is a bit overboard — frankly, I’m more enamored with my surgeon than anyone else — but it was nice to hear. Even if he didn’t really understand the whole rod = load bearing from the get go.

I am definitely getting close to being able to climb, though I am waiting until I have no pain walking just because I’d hate to mess things up right now. I’m curious to see what it will be like when I get back to it. Clearly I’ll need to build some callouses and some grip strength, but I feel pretty strong, and my abs are sick. Provided I don’t let my weight go through the roof, I bet I’m okay. I’m climbing all over the gym equipment these days (with my favorite thing now being dynoing up to the pull up bar), and it feels like my technique is still there. Very curious how I will do on “balance”/slab problems, since my balance definitely isn’t the same on the bad side yet. It is STILL harder to put my pants on standing on my bad foot than my good foot.

Oh right, I bounced on a mini-tramp a few times this week, thinking that that might tell me what landing on a bouldering mat would feel like (indoors!), but it turned out that mostly it was just hard to jump, and it didn’t really simulate landing very well.

I felt like I also had some general life advice for other people in my situation, but I’m forgetting it. Maybe something about be prepared to feel like you are plateauing/have much slower progress as you get away from the initial break. IDK, if it was something more important, I’ll post it next week.

Week 20: It’s Been So Long That I Am Running Out of Clever Titles

Oh man, 20 weeks!

So there is some good and there is some bad. Bad first.

I still have pain and in fact, it feels like new pain. It is concentrated in an area right above the callus surrounding my fracture site, and it hurts when I press on it. Because of this, and because the pain feels like it’s in the bone and because there is very little muscle overtop of that spot, I am slightly worried that it could be a stress fracture? From the day I did some jumping at the gym?

On the other hand, that seems nuts. My bone is healed, and you don’t get stress fractures from jumping forty times. I mean, crossing my fingers that that seems nuts. Also, it does seem to get better during the day? Basically I’m constantly looking for evidence to prove this paranoid hypothesis wrong, which is paranoid in and of itself. Ugh.

Ok, good news. the good news is that, I believe thanks to the new exercises I’m doing at the gym — namely the lunges with 10 kg in my hands and a twist, I’ve gained a lot of strength. I’m now leg pressing 45 kg on my bad leg, which is only 20 kg (44.4 lbs) less than on my good leg. That’s a 56 lb reduction in the differential between legs, which I think is pretty good.

Also, the pain is now concentrated only in that one spot. No pain in the knee or on the outside of my leg at all. Even if it is a stress fracture, that will heal in few weeks, and it’s not that big of a deal since it will be a while before I can run. Really, I just want to be able to climb by May 15. I think it’s possible. Once this pain goes away, I am certain that that will be the end of it and I’ll be pain free.

Psychologically, I think I’m doing okay. Doing a bunch of new exercises has helped keep me motivated, and when I go back and try out some of the old ones, they are so much easier.

One thing I’ve been thinking about though is how thin the line between doing enough and doing too much continues to be. I’m pretty sure that some of my continued pain comes from overdoing it, but I wouldn’t be getting stronger if I wasn’t pushing myself through it. I do feel fortunate to have this time when I basically can’t climb anyway to be able to navigate — at times unsuccessfully — this line. I wish I had advice or anything about how to go about this in a more efficient way, but I really can’t think of anything, as it seems possible to overdo it without even having pain while you are doing the exercise, and then to have a setback for the next two weeks.

Though overall, having just gone back and read Weeks 18+19, I am definitely in a better place this week. Most notably because my pesky knee pain is totally gone, in a way that feels permanent.