Bad leg

I pulled a calf muscle three HOPs ago. I persevered for the rest of the class. It only hurt really when we were jogging on the spot. I was more hopping on the spot (but made to look like jogging), which I think is more appropriate for HOP anyway.

I rested my leg for the week — no running or anything — and it was better by the next week, so I went back to HOP. Big mistake: it happened again, exactly as before. Ouch. I also did super low squats — much lower than normal.

All this extra effort and pulling of muscles made it almost impossible to walk like a normal human being for a few days. In fact, I couldn’t even sleep because my legs were so sore — not just from pulling that calf muscle, but from the squats. My quads were screaming at me, when all I was doing was lying in bed.

The squat pain subsided after a few days, and I could sleep again at night. The calf pain remained, so I still couldn’t walk quite right, and stairs were tricky.

I looked up muscle pain on the NHS website. It said I should have done all sorts of ice packs and compression bandages and stuff. I’d done none of that. It also said I should rest the pulled muscle for two weeks to let it heal. That means missing two weeks of HOP. Oh, what a shame. I really enjoyed not going to HOP last week; I’m sure I’ll enjoy missing HOP again this week. I expect it’ll be awful when I do go back.

I’m ok with Pilates, so that’s something.

I haven’t been able to do any running, so I’ve not been training for the 10k Race for Life on 17th July that I’ve signed up to. I hope my leg recovers and doesn’t go again between now and then. Maybe I should avoid HOP until after the run. 😏