Angry and Frustrated

Okay, so its like this...I am angry and frustrated. Why you may ask? Well, quite frankly its because my left ankle is in a perpetual state of pain. Sure there are good days and then there are days like today which are absolutely intolerable. Now, I know you may be thinking that I should have trained better or harder or whatever, but that isn't the problem. I always have had a hurt ankle and its in part because I overpronate a lot and I mean A LOT! However, I blame one person, my 2nd grade gym teacher. Now I am almost 29 and it may seem to most a little unreasonable to still be harboring a grudge against someone from my elementary school years, but really a lot of the problems I have are because of her. At least I think so, but you be the judge.

In 2nd grade at St. Johns (yes, I was in private school for a brief stint) the new gym teacher had this tremendously brilliant idea to tie something that was the equivalent in size, look, and feel of shotput to the end of a rope. Now we were supposed to stand in a circle and jump over the rope when it came to us, she would lift it up off the ground periodically. The idea was if you couldn't jump over it, then you were out. I was a girly girl so I was no stranger to these types of games. In the jump rope world that game is called Helicopter Helicopter, except a 6 year old girl is smart enough not to put a wrecking ball at the end of their jump rope. Why? Because a 6 year old girl knows that it could hurt someone. Its a shame that this woman didn't have the reasoning capability that a 6 year old has, otherwise this tale might have a different ending. Well, I am sure you can see how this played out in gym class one day. She lifted the rope, I didn't jump high enough, shotput-ish thing gets wrapped around my ankle. But the story doesn't end there, while I am trying to unwrap the contraption from around my left ankle, she yanks. I fall, then she continues to yank while yelling at me to hurry up. Now I wasn't dragged across the floor, but it was enough to do some damage. After gym class, I had trouble walking. I even told my mom when she came to pick me up from school that my ankle was really bothering me. I had on knee socks so you couldn't see how bad it was, and she told me to stop being a drama queen (in all fairness I used to pretend to be sick a lot, my mom wasn't being callous). It wasn't until I got home and changed into my normal clothes that my mom saw how swollen my ankle had become, it was various shades of black and blue. To give you an idea my ankle was the size of a softball. I went to the emergency room where I was put into a cast for about 2 months because of a dislocated ankle. My parents did go into school to find out what happened, and of course the teacher called me a liar and said I was just naturally clumsy. However, my classmates had a different story to tell. Of course, my parents are nice people and never sued the school or anything, and that woman kept her job.

 So really the only one who truly suffered in the exchange was me, I got the cast and now I deal with a nagging pain almost every time I run. I am sure there are other factors that may contribute to ankle pain, but I always find it interesting that the left ankle is the one that really bothers me and that's the dislocated ankle from my childhood. So there you have it, that's why I am angry and frustrated. I am sure I would have other issues, but the ankle thing really gets to me because I feel like it didn't have to be this way. But, what can you do except pop some advil, ice it, and hope for the best.

Well, Divas is next Sunday. I may check in before then, but if not I will be off resting my ankle because I want it to be as strong as possible for Sunday.

Until next time, happy running!