ryan r roth and his photographs

up and down.

I’ve left you in the dark for some time now. My life has been somewhat rollercoastery and all over the place, but in the next few posts, I’ll try to catch you up.

My hip has been constantly improving over the last month. Most days I’ve been able to wake up and do something I wasn’t abel to do on the previous. I started a jogging program some time ago - one minute jog, one minute walk for twenty minutes. Since then I have graduated to a four minute jog, one minute walk for forty minutes. I can normally do that with zero pain. And that feels damn good compared to the way I felt before surgery.

On July 4th, Karen cleared to do my first run on a hill. I chose a small hill (the trail in front of Mount Sanitas). For the first time in many months I had to slow because of my lungs, not my hip. Thoughts of grandeur fired up as I was running up and down that hill. With no pain, my mind was free to wander. I imagined setting goals for myself. I decided to challenge myself that I wouldn’t cut my hair until I was able to run a five minute mile, cycle up NCAR six times in an hour and run up Royal Arch in less than twenty minutes. The triple threat - I promised myself. I met up with Kristen later in the day, I told her my grand plan, beaming with excitement. She brought me back down to Earth. Ryan, you’re still healing - not training, she said. So right she was. Triple threat canceled.
Saturday I tried to run on a hilly course near my parents house. What I did was run right into some pain. Deep pain in my hip that reminded me of pre surgery days. I knew the time would come when the constant improvement would falter, I just wasn’t ready for it. Same thing on Sunday. Today Karen reminded me that I had to rest my body some, had to do my stretches, that I have to be patient.

To be brutally honest, patience has been killing me. I tell myself that I love these walk/jogs - that I love getting better. But I don’t. I just want my body to be how it used to be. I want to run, to cycle, to be in the mountains. I’m sicking of watching races and coaching people. I just want to race myself, to push my heart, I want my muscles to burn and my joints to feel nice. Walking sucks.

Filed by ryanroth at July 9th, 2007 under Life, Young & Hip