Over the course of my running life I, like many others have bruised and then lost toenails. This wasn’t surprising as I used to play tennis and my toes didn’t always fare well with all the pounding on the court. But after Mountains2Beach the toes on my right foot were more sore than I’ve previously experienced… more than the toenail but the entire toe was sore.
It was so sore that I removed my current nail polish to see if there was much bruising. Not much! That was last week. Wearing shoes hurt, wiggling my toes hurt, doing any exercise or stretch that called for laying on my stomach hurt. Thankfully the pain receded a bit each day. Today it’s almost normal. Yesterday I removed the nail polish again and took a photo of two toes…ugly!
So why share this? I think it’s a reminder that striving towards hard to reach goals is not pain free. I’m grateful that I succeeded this time and recognize that I’d be nursing the same injury if I hadn’t. Or maybe the injury is indicative of my harder effort in this race…as my legs were never worked this hard in my previous 5 marathons. The good news is that it will heal!
When have you worked hard to achieve a goal?
Today I’m personally thankful for: the healing ability of our bodies; the rewards of hard work; and the benefits of fitness.
A couple days post race…doesn’t look bad but it sure hurt!
Ugly! And will get uglier but thankfully it no longer hurts.
