I did a little bit of running this week. No, my foot is not better. But I'm finding a way to run with it.
Running the trails gives me very little pain. I think this is due to the softer surface of the trails but also the stiffness of my trail shoes. Running on pavement gives me a little more trouble. I had the idea that maybe splinting my foot where the toes meet the forefoot might be helpful. To do that, I used a thin elastic headband and wound it around that part of my foot. Voila! Landing on the makeshift splint took some of the impact off the ball of my foot. It wasn't perfect, but at least I could get my miles in.
Since there's no pressure to train for anything right now, I'm freely taking walk breaks when I need to. It feels good to be back out there and I'm hoping that I can continue to do this while I wait for the tear in my plantar plate to heal.
Will it heal? I may as well pull out the Magic 8 ball. There's very little research done on the treatment of this injury. For now, I'll continue to splint the foot and hope for healing.
