So, next Sunday I will be participating in yet another marathon that I am not properly trained for. Things were going pretty well until a few weeks ago. In addition to the 12 miler I posted about in December, I got in a 14 miler and a 16 miler. That last one was in mid-January. I got up to 8 Yassos, also not too shabby. Then things fell apart.
Got busy, got lazy and got injured. And for the last week I haven't run at all, trying to just recover enough from the stupid injury in order to be able to get my shoes on and start the race.
It's some weird thing with my right toes. And that right foot is bad enough without this new problem. It started about 2 weeks ago, when I noticed that during a short treadmill run my foot felt like there was a small stone in the ball of the foot or like my socks were bunched up or something. But when I took the shoe off, it was more like a big red cyst under the skin, or a blister except it wasn't a blister, if that makes any sense. I tried different shoes, but by the end of the week the cysts or blisters or swelling or whatever it is had spread to several other toes, and the baby toe was particularly a mess. Red and swollen and itchy.
No problems anywhere else on my body so not an allergy.
I think it may have something to do with having to wear snow boots for the dogs walks for much of the past 2 weeks. Maybe those boots are too tight in the toes and that is causing the abrasions? Anyway, Thursday I order a bunch of new shoes online. The ones that arrived, a half-size larger, did not solve the problem, and now I am waiting on a pair that is the same size as I have been wearing but in a D width.
On Friday, I went out to DFW shoe store and found a pair with a wide toe box to wear just for walking around. On that day, the only shoes I could get on my feet to go out were the huge snow slippers that I keep in the basement to step outside in the backyard with the dogs. Awful. Anyway, these new shoes are Merrills, which I have had trouble with in the past but these seem to be okay. More flexible than the Merrills I had before, and a nice wide toe box.
Am waiting for my shoes to arrive so I can try a treadmill run. If they are going to be my marathon shoes I have to test them before the race!
I did have moments of panic last week that I had some weird cystic foot disease, or diabetes, or gangrene. But with rest and wider toe boxes the toes are looking better, so I'm not running out to the doctor just yet. Plus he'd only tell me not to do the marathon and we can't have that. And I am too embarrassed to show my feet to anyone. So they have to get better without medical assistance.
But I'm not very psyched for my visit to New Orleans. I can hardly walk. So I don't think I am going to enjoy it much.
