The Injury Part #2

So I had an appointment with Dr. Smith that Wednesday. I was nervous about the appointment because Dr. Smith is a Chiropractor and I had never been to a chiropractor before. I wasn't sure what he would do to help my hip, but a few of my teammates and coach had all been treated by him and said he helped them recover. So what the heck, lets try it out.

When I got to his office, he had me show him my running shoes, both my new ones and my old ones. He inspected those and then asked to look at my feet. I was a little confused because I was talking about my hip and he was looking at my feet. He had me balance and roll my weight to the front of my feet and back. He then had me put my shoes on my feet, and when he did he pointed out that my feet looked really tight inside of my shoe. He poked at the material on the side of my foot and noticed that it was really taut. I told him that since getting my shoes I'd been having a lot of trouble with blisters. I kept getting them on the insides of both feet -- exactly where he was pointing. Dr. Smith said that because my feet were so uncomfortable and I was in pain from blistering, I may have started to run funny and thus injured my hip.

I have to admit this bugged me. Basically, I went specifically to a knowledgeable running store and bought very expensive shoes to help my running and protect my feet, only to find out that they are squishing my feet and causing all these problems? Oh great... BUT! Dr. Smith took both of my shoes and re-laced them in a way I have never seen before and could only be done by a veteran runner (Dr. Smith of course). I'll have to post a picture at some point, but basically he took my laces out of the first two holes to give my wide feet more room and then twisted the the laces around themselves. I put my shoes on and voila! MORE ROOM! he poked the same spot and the tension was gone. Nice!

Okay, so shoe problem fixed, but my hip still hurts. Dr. Smith had me lay on the table and he did a few motions with my legs. He went through the same process he had at the muscle imbalance clinic. When he got to the test for my left hip, it was strong and I resisted the weight he applied. He did the same test on my right and I just couldn't resist it. He tried again and my leg just fell under the weight. He said, "Oh yeah, that hip is very weak". THAT made me nervous. He then had me lay on my side and he started to feel around on my hip, massaging different muscles around it. He gently pressed on one and my ENTIRE body clenched. Oh yeah... he found the source of pain. Thankfully, he said it was just a tight muscle. My TFL muscle to be exact, see here: Wikipedia - TFL After that Dr. Smith adjusted my lower back and neck --- LOTS of tension in my neck he said. Most likely, because of my job. The adjustments felt WONDERFUL. However, in all honestly, my lower back hurt REALLY bad that night. I found out that was because it was the first time my back was ever adjusted. Uncomfortable, but the soreness was gone by morning.

Now that we found the source of the problem, Dr. Smith recommended three days of therapy starting that day and then seeing him once more that Friday. Therapy consisted of Ultra Sound therapy (same as those used on pregnant women) and Interferential Therapy (see here: Inferential video)This is getting long, so in short, I did three days of short sessions with each type of therapy. Each day the pain lessened and by Friday night it was gone. I saw Dr. Smith that Friday afternoon. He did the same test on my Right hip as he did two days earlier. This time, I could resist his weight! That was awesome to see, because I was doubting if the treatments were doing anything. But they worked! I had strength back in my hip. He did a couple of adjustments again on my back and neck and gave me the okay to run again, but to start out slow and only do 3 - 5 miles. WHAT A RELIEF!!!

To be continued... (STILL!)...