Professional Triathlete Kelly Williamson is our guest blogger this week.
Learn how years of experience have changed her
perspective on coming back from injury. Something many athletes can
relate to. Gather a fresh perspective yourself and read on.
It is funny how experience (12 years) can change your perspective. I
hear people talk about being stressed out from an ‘off day’ in training,
or a small tweak to the body, and I just don’t see it quite like I used
to. A few years back it always felt like the curse of doom,
career-ending…and while I will still admit that it sucks to deal with
setbacks, I now approach it more pragmatically. What is wrong, how can
it be dealt with, and what can I do in the meantime. I’ve learned that
every obstacle can (and often is) a motivator, and can make you a much
better athlete; but it often depends upon your attitude.
The so called ‘injury’ I am referring to is something I dealt with
last season. I had surgery in September, just two weeks after 70.3 World
Champs, to fix an artery in my hip which had become ‘diseased’ so to
speak. Honestly, I’d not even call this an injury but moreso ‘faulty
wiring’. This was something that symptomatically came on gradually and
was a bit of a puzzle to diagnose; I had no idea it was happening as it
happened. Thankfully, I had the help of an incredible doctor at Memorial
Hermann who diagnosed this very quickly; just one month after I first
saw him. Given that it can take years to diagnose, I consider myself
very lucky in this sense. I physically struggled through the year
knowing things were not quite right, and while we were fairly certain
this was it (endofibrosis of the external iliac artery), we got the
‘official’ diagnosis in September. I had thought long and hard about
surgery, spent hours researching, talked to fellow athletes, done my
homework; I knew I wanted to do this. Once the surgery (and four days
in the hospital) was over, it was back to Austin and onto the recovery
process.
I have had a few other setbacks during my career; notably, a double
compound fracture of my left arm in 2005. This was actually more of an
interruption, as it entailed 3 surgeries in a 9 month time span. This
current issue was unique in that they literally went in and replaced a
small piece of my artery; the recovery was something I took extremely
seriously, following the doc’s orders. Seeing that I am now 6 months
post-op and about to start my 2014 season, I just wanted to highlight,
in retrospect, a few important things I took away from my recovery
process.
1) Focus on what you CAN do. I was told ‘only
walking’ for 5-6 weeks. And, walk I did. It started gradually, the week
after surgery it was 2×15 min walks, very slowly. I built upon those to
where about 3-4 weeks post, I was doing 2×3-4 mile walks a day,
sometimes up to 6 miles at a time. I have always taken this approach to
setbacks. There is almost always something you CAN DO… it’s best to
focus on this, because if you dwell on what you cannot do, you’ll drive
yourself crazy. Needless to say, I loved the walking; it was a perfect
way to feel I had done something yet never feel over-exerted; a pretty
refreshing feeling for someone used to training 20-30 hours a week.
2) Patience & A Plan. While 6 weeks sounded
like an eternity at first, I embraced the downtime and accepted that to
be able to do what I loved, I chose to get this surgery; to make it
effective, I had to be patient and respect the recovery. Additionally I
created a ‘plan’ as to how to add other activities. This gave me
something to look forward to each week; maybe I added light 5lb weights,
or aqua jogging with a belt. It kept my attitude positive to know if I
took small steps, I could see where I would be in 1, 2, 3, 5+ weeks.
3) Embrace the rest. My husband may say
otherwise, but I truly did enjoy the down time I was forced to take. I
was so worn out physically, mentally and emotionally from the season and
the toll this had taken. My body needed this rest, and the 6 weeks of
only walking was likely the biggest ‘forced off season’ I have had in
years. I’d like to think that will work in my favor as the season
approaches, knowing I’ll demand a lot of my body for the next 8-9
months.
4) Perspective. Funny how this
can change so drastically given the circumstances. I did a 5k on my
birthday, exactly 10 weeks post-surgery. It was a good minute slower
than my best time. Did I care? Not at all. It felt amazing, and I was so
incredibly grateful to get to do what I loved again, without feeling
any pain. I’ve gained perspective in numerous ways over my career, but
given that this was a fairly major surgery, I was just so thankful to be
running again, reminded yet again to just be appreciative of the basic
things.
We may not always why things happen when they do, or why they happen
at all; but if we let ourselves accept them, step back, and see the
larger picture, we often figure it out. This one just gave me one more
good story (and scar) to tell people about; personally, I find that
pretty cool. Life would be pretty boring without any scars to show.
Kelly H. Williamson
http://kellyhwilliamson.com
http://twitter.com/khwilliamson
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