Woman + Runner + Fighter

Three weeks ago my training was going most excellent. I was up to 16 miles for my long run, in my Vibram five finger KSOs, on all types of terrain: asphalt, sidewalks, dirt trails, gravel, even mud. I was on top of the world, or at least it felt like it as I climbed to the top of the 2,000 foot hill I would be racing up in just three weeks. My time was fast, my feet were in great shape, and I was loving the Vibrams.

And then, it happened.

My training all came crashing down as the hair dryer crashed down from the bathroom sink. Who knew that at 6am, while I made the first attempt in a long time to do something with my hair before driving into work, my training plans would be crushed. The intense pain as the hair dryer smashed my right pinky toe was more than I’ve experienced since I broke the same ankle back in high school. It hurt so bad that I couldn’t even scream. I could only open my mouth and grab my foot. My pinky toe felt like it was severed.

I limped into work and after a few hours my worst fears were becoming reality. Just weeks before my big race, the first real race of the season, my first race in Vibrams, I had done the unthinkable. I had broken my pinky toe. And it wasn’t even a good story. The trauma was caused by a stupid hair dryer! That will teach me to be vain!

I could barely walk during the next couple of days, let alone run. I waited about 4 days before doing a test run. It hurt  just doing a few miles. How can a pinky toe hurt that bad? I did a few miles over the next couple of days. I had an existing doctor’s appointment 9 days after the traumatic event, so I had the doctor check it out. Basically, I wanted to know if running this grueling half marathon the next week would cause any more damage. The doctor said no. The only problem would be the pain and how much I could tolerate.

I was upset, but it wasn’t the end of the world. I still plan to run the race. I will suck up the pain for the half marathon. And hey, it could be worse. It could have been my big toe. Or my leg. Or something worse.  Yet the pinky toe is, as Kramer so eloquently put it, a “valuable appendage.” So here’s to my “little guy at the end of the line.”