FAQ: Colleen, how do you handle the mental side of injury?
It’s honestly a fair question. As an athlete, being injured, taken out of the game, forced to stop doing what you love and what you do best is really really tough on the psyche. Athletes are supposed to be tough. If you get injured, that shows weakness and fallibility. Injury takes you off your perfect athlete pedestal and shows how human you are.
Last week I was aqua jogging and letting my thoughts swirl when I had to doggie paddle over to the side of the pool to write this thought down in the notes app of my phone:
One of my greatest challenges is believing I have been given all the talent I need and letting my work ethic compliment and amplify that talent instead of sabotaging it.
I have come to realize that many of my struggles with injury stem from a lurking lack of confidence in myself and my abilities. I’m often not confident enough to “listen to my body” when it is giving me warning signals and even SOS signals. I’m so tough and so persistent (and so no confident in myself) that instead of slowing down when something feels off, I just keep plowing forward, terrified that I will “fall behind” if I have to skip a couple runs or workouts. What inevitably happens is that instead of skipping a few miles right away, I let things get so bad that I have to take a few weeks or more off my feet, setting myself further back than I would have if I had been smart at the onset.
You would have thought that after 10+ years in this sport and 29 years on Earth that I would have figured this whole thing out by now. At least that’s what I think should have happened. Why am I still struggling with injury? What is wrong with me?
One of my support personnel, John, explained it to me in a way that totally flipped my way of thinking about my body upside down. I’ll try to relay the message here.
For some reason, there are athletes who seem to be able to run endless miles without getting injured. These athletes will get overtraining syndrome before they sustain an injury- they are that durable. Other athletes go through these injury cycles where they put in some training, then some more hard training, then pull up injured, have to hop in the pool or on the bike to maintain some aerobic fitness, then when the injury heals they can run and do workouts again, hopefully just in time to be able to race. The incredible thing, though, is sometimes you see athletes who go through this cycle and then have great races where they set PRs, qualify for other bigger races, etc off of pretty meager training. The way John explained it to me is to say “Isn’t that actually so lucky that someone could do that little running training and still compete with someone who was doing almost twice the average mileage per week and never got injured?” There are many ways to get to the starting line. Instead of the narrative for me being “poor me, I always get injured,” now I’m trying to say to myself, “I need to trust my talent and be grateful that I can compete with some of the best runners in the world while running less mileage than most of them.”
Now you might be sitting here thinking this doesn’t necessarily apply to you. But no matter what level you’re competing at, maybe this is the overall message we can all keep learning and relearning: comparison is the thief of joy and whenever we spend energy wishing we possessed what someone else seems to, we have less energy to spend being grateful for all that we have and learning how to use those tools to our absolute best advantage.
Right before going home for Christmas in 2021 I pulled up in a workout with a sore hip. One minute I’m running around, warming up, doing drills and strides, the next minute I’m limping around the track and have to stop completely only 2 reps into the workout. 5 weeks later and I’m finally able to do some light jogging again, but it’s gonna be a long road back to race fitness. Before this setback I had slowly built up my mileage and workout intensity after a big injury last summer. I was juuuust starting to get my swagger back, building confidence in my body every week. This injury really feels like it came out of nowhere and kicked me to the ground HARD.
My response to not being able to run was different than in the summer though. Usually when I’m injured I would… wake up at 6am, hit the pool for an hour, then the gym for strength training, get some food, work on emails and run my small biz in the afternoon, then head back to the gym for an hour on the bike or elliptical before going home, making dinner, and going to bed. Those meals most definitely did not include any sugar, any fried food and definitely none of my beloved red wine. I remember tearfully telling my coach one day this June, “I have no joys in my life right now. No Kevin (he was in Portland with Pie), no running, no ice cream, and no red wine.”
That’s no way to live.
This winter when I got injured the first thing I did was shut myself down completely. No cross training, only some light stretching and muscle activation. I went home for Christmas and enjoyed a week with my family eating whatever I wanted, playing cards with my grandma, baking cookies with my mom and sister, frying potatoes with my dad, and drinking wine with Kevin. If my body is telling me it’s overwhelmed and overworked, I need to honor that for once.
I’m not saying that if you get injured you shouldn’t cross train. I’m just saying that maybe running to the gym for 2 hours a day isn’t ALWAYS the best response and may not be the most effective way to allow your body to do the healing it needs to.
One thing I DO know for sure is that limiting your body’s fuel during injury is a serious offense and should never be a coping mechanism no matter what. This is something I have definitely been guilty of doing in the past- I told myself that if I can’t run that means I can’t afford any “extra” calories from foods that aren’t packed with nutrients. This policy would leave out foods that might give me joy and comfort like a weekly glass of wine or bowl of ice cream. This policy can also easily slip into a caloric deficit where you are actually burning more calories than you are taking in on a daily basis. When your body is stressed it burns calories. When your body is healing it needs calories and nutrients to do that important work. The absolute WORST thing you can do to your body during injury is not give it the fuel it needs to heal.
If you want to read more nutrition tips (and even bust some nutrition myths), I have interviewed a few dietitians and nutritionists for my website in the past and have compiled those interviews HERE.
The other thing I’m doing during this injury is spending more time with my mind. I started a daily meditation practice again and have been diligent about sitting down for at least 10 minutes first thing in the morning to be quiet and present in my body and mind. I’ve also tried to be more conscious about my thoughts and catch myself being mean to myself. I heard Alexi Pappas say that if we want to change we have to start with actions, then thoughts, then feelings. It has to be in that order. So I start with the meditation as the action, then I become aware of my thoughts and feelings from there. If I don’t want to do my rehab exercises, I start by doing them because I know they are good for me, then my thoughts and feelings about them change after I have completed the action. Actions, thoughts, then feelings.
Bottom line: Being injured sucks. If you’re dealing with an injury right now, I’m sorry. I know how it feels, I’ve been there many times before and I’m sure I will be there many times again. What keeps me going is that I love to run. I love the feeling of being in superb shape and no pain, when running feels less like running and more like floating. I love feeling dead tired after a badass workout. I love the running community.
So I go to treatment, I do my exercises, I learn, I meditate, I mess it up, I learn some more, and I figure it out.
If you’re looking for my best tips, here they are:
Keep your support system close. You are not alone in this. You don’t have to do this by yourself if you don’t want to.
FUEL your body while it is going through the healing process. It’s not a time to restrict, it’s a time to reinforce.
Cross-training can give us a physical boost, helping the running to come back easier when you can. It’s also a mental release, giving us a shot of those important happy hormones. However, too much cross training can become a problem and do more harm than good.
Be kind to yourself. Pay attention to the thoughts in your mind. Would you say that to an injured teammate or friend? Learn to talk to yourself the same way you would talked to someone you love.
What you may now perceive as your weakness could also be your superpower.
Be confident enough to listen your inner voice and honest enough with yourself to say “This is not something I should push through. That doesn’t mean I’m not tough and it doesn’t mean I don’t want it bad enough, but I’m playing the long game.”
That being said… I don’t have all the answers. I’m figuring it out too, just like you. And I’m trying to be more patient and loving with myself as I go through that process because I have a feeling that I’ll be doing that the rest of my life.