Road to Recovery Week 9 Recap

The road to recovery from plantar fasciitis continues, but I’m grateful to have had a good week of workouts!  How was yours?  By the way, shout out to everyone who completed the Chicago Marathon on Sunday!  I heard the weather was rough, but you all still did an amazing job!

It’s the start of a new week and while I am finally finished with physical therapy(!), my recovery from plantar fasciitis continues.  I’m still dedicated to getting rid of my heel pain for good!  Sharing these recaps of the recovery process helps keep me accountable, and it also keeps me motivated to keep blogging!  I hope you enjoy following my progress.

I’m linking up with HoHo and Wendy for the Weekly Wrap! I’m also linking up with Marcia, Patty, and Erika for Tuesdays on the Run,  Debbie, Lora, and Rachel for the Running Coaches Corner and Annmarie and Nicole for Wild Workout Wednesday!

Weekly Wrap: Restaurant Week and Battle of Germantown

Restaurant Week at Sampan

Last Wednesday, a few of my fellow women engineers at work got together for dinner at Sampan, a trendy Asian fusion tapas restaurant.  Six of us were able to come out (the great thing is that that is only half of our group!) and we had such a great time!  First off, the food was amazing!  It was a seven-course meal and each item would come out so quickly that it was hard to fully enjoy the meal, but the flavor was on point!  Beef satay, short rib, salmon, edamame dumplings…my personal favorites!  I tried to take a picture of our plates but it came out too dark…take my word for it, it was delicious!  I would definitely go back and try a few more things.  But more important, it was great to get together with the ladies outside of the office/plant and just talk and enjoy ourselves!  Everyone seemed to really enjoy, so we’ll have to get together again soon!

Battle of Germantown Festivities

On Saturday afternoon, we ended up heading to Germantown for the re-enactment of the Battle of Germantown which I believe took place between the British and Americans in 1777.  I ended up being a little late to the battle because I was having lunch in Chestnut Hill with my sister and lost track of time.  I didn’t have the best views of the battle, but wow do they go all out!  The firing of the muskets and cannons was really cool and I enjoyed seeing the kids in the neighborhood full of excitement.  The “soldiers” were very committed to their roles, though they did joke around a bit and pose for pictures mid-battle every now and then.  I didn’t realize that it would be such a detailed production; they did a great job!

After the battle ended (with victory for the British), we headed over to Grumblethorpe for the “Battle Bash”.  There was Evil Genius beer, a full menu of food, and live music.  We had never been to Grumblethorpe so it was really cool and the gardens were beautiful!  All of the soldiers were hanging out and I couldn’t resist getting a picture with one of them!  Philadelphia has SO much history so it was really nice to learn more about it in a cool way.  It was definitely a highlight of the weekend!

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Workouts for the Week:

Monday 10/1:  1-hour yoga class.  One of our regular yogis is leaving the company so we celebrated in her honor and had Federal Donuts (yum!).  We did lots of hip work that my body apparently needed.  The first class was very gentle but we picked things up a notch in the second half – we did a single leg balance on a block and somehow I was able to stay upright!  The foot pain is still an issue, so I did some calf stretches on the steps.  I also did 3 sets of 15 ankle hops, side-to-side, as part of the return to running training.  I went to bed with a night splint on my left foot.

Tuesday 10/2:  My feet felt a little better.  Had 1 hour of yoga class again.  We did a lot of twisting in class which felt very tight for me, but my body needed it!

Wednesday 10/3:  More foot pain, yay.  I did some calf stretching before going to work and iced my feet during lunch.  After work, I was back for spin class and it was another intense class full of sprint work.  I may have pushed a little too hard on my left hamstring, but the pain didn’t last too long.

Thursday 10/4:  My left knee felt a little sore, probably from spin class.  I did some more calf stretches but no workouts.

Friday 10/5:  Had the day off so I went to barre class for the first time in months.  The studio is so friendly, and they really welcomed me after a long absence.  So…everything was hard!  I kept the 2# weights, but eventually, they were a struggle.  We did lots of plank work that was killing my core!  And we did a lot of thigh work at the barre, which was good, but man has it been a long time!  Fortunately, my feet felt okay in class.  I’m going to try to go once a week for now!

Saturday 10/6:  The foot pain has been obnoxious so I started doing the toe yoga exercises again – that really seems to help.  In the morning, I went for a long walk, which ended in a mile-long run, to have 4 miles total.  I ran the mile pretty fast at a 9:30 pace, but not gonna lie – it started out with a pretty nice decline!  Unfortunately, I had some drama with a street harasser during the walk…I talk about it on my Instagram page.  A little while later I headed to the Battle of Germantown and got in even more walking.  I probably should have worn my Oofos since my shoes with inserts weren’t that comfortable!

Sunday 10/7:  Didn’t do much, some toe yoga, some calf stretches, and 3 sets of 10 clamshells.  It’s clear that I need to keep these exercises up daily…

Week 9 Report Card:

With 2 yoga classes, spin, barre, and a walk/run, I’m very pleased with how active I was able to be this past week!  But I will runfess that over the weekend I indulged in WAY too many Twizzlers, though I abstained during the week.  So I need to not ruin all of my progress with that darn candy lol!  My foot pain continutes to be a nuisance and I did contact my primary care doctor to determine next steps, so I need to make an appointment with him in the next week or two.  If I need custom inserts, let’s get the inserts.  I’ve been holding back on the return to running because I just don’t want to be too hard on my feet…so I’ll continue to listen to my body.

With all that said, Week 9 is getting an A- from me!  I wanted to start the month strong and I think that I did!  I really want to do everything I can to stay fit, manage stress, and get off of this road to recovery!

How was your week of working out?  Ever deal with harassers while working out in your neighborhood?  Did you run Chicago?