The Cost of Fashion

There is no question that last week I was sporting the hottest shoes at the Christmas party BUT at about 4am when I was enjoying a wonderful post-party (alcohol and excessive food induced) snooze… I paid the price for fashion! A disabling charlie horse woke me from the deepest of sleeps and I laid there screaming in agony. I’m pretty sure it was the poor arch support in these 3 inch heals that caused my calf spasm. I believe the shoe manufacturer is ethically responsible for placing a warning label on the shoe box that 1) these shoes should not be worn in excess of 5 hours, 2) dancing in the shoes is strongly discouraged, 3) attempting to catch a cab while wearing these shoes in snow storm is strickly forbidden!

This holiday season I learned a valuable life lesson, that runners can’t spend excessive amounts of time in 3″ heals and not expect repercussions… this my friends is why I only dabble in the world as a fashionista and spend a majority of my time in Sketchers or my Saucony running kicks! My calves are conditioned for running but not on my tip toes!

The knot in my muscle probably only lasted about 30-60 seconds but it felt like a 1/2 hour! I tried to flex my foot to work it out… this only caused more torture so I just laid their taking shallow breaths hoping it would be over soon and moaned in pain (I’m sort of a drama queen so you can imagine the theatrics). Unless you’ve experienced a charlie horse while sleeping… you probably won’t sympathize with me… it’s hard to accurately describe the pain… but it’s pretty bad and probably one you would wish on an enemy!

For the next 3 days I wore flat shoes and definitely was on the short-term injured list… which meant no running since walking was somewhat of a challenge as my entire left calf was tender to even touch from the charlie horse. Then of course there were more holiday parties (yes… I continued to wear these shoes… so at this point I have no one to blame but myself)… to avoid further injury I decided to take some time off from running (10 days to be exact but who’s counting).

Today was my first day back to running after my hiatus… and it was brutal! I went exactly 6K in 40 minutes! For people who run with me regularly… this is a snails pace compared to my regular 6K in 30-32 minutes! It wasn’t the injury in my calf that slowed me down… because that is completely healed now… but more the 10 days of absolutely no exercise, continuous bad food choices, consumption of alcohol, holiday parties and lack of sleep that made my run so difficult. It’s crazy how quickly you can destroy a training schedule… today I felt like a sloth… first time in a very long time that I didn’t enjoy my run!

In the end I have to ask myself…

Were those shoes really worth it? Honestly… they were!

Am I glad I gave in to all tempations the last 10 days and just enjoyed the holidays? Without a doubt!

Did it suck this afternoon to gasp for air after only running 3 minutes in the cold winter air? It sure did! But I figure… at least I went out and ran!