It Doesn't Hurt That Bad: Running After The Fall
Content warning: this post contains images of blood.
Please come check out Ugly Flamingos at Q.E.D. Astoria on February 6 at 9pm. We have an amazing lineup of comedians and musicians. Tickets are $15.
I’ve had it too good for too long. The universe thought that I was doing far too well, and it needed to show me a lesson. God has struck me with shock and knee pain. Despite the pain flowing through my body, I will continue to show off the feats that a mortal man can make.
For anyone who has had the misfortune of talking to me, you know that I’ve been cursed with the condition that makes me run. I go running five days out of the week. I usually reserve the weekends for my long runs, trying to set new records in time, distance, etc. Winter is always the worst time to run. The cold makes it difficult to catch your breath, and you have excessive weight on you to keep warm. If there’s been snow, that’s another obstacle you need to face.
While New York got some snow earlier this week (on January 6), my punishment occurred on the prior Saturday.
Currently, my long runs are usually between 4 and 7 miles. I’ve been building up to a 10k (with hopes to go longer in the future). My final run for 2024 was interrupted halfway through a 10k, and I wanted to try to make a new best time with my first long run for 2025. Unfortunately, I don’t really have a set 10k route. I know a strong loop to do a 5k in my neighborhood or even four miles, but if I want to go for the 10k, I need to get more creative. Sometimes this involves going running over the RFK Bridge or simply taking another lap on my 5k route.
On Saturday, I decided to take some liberties, twists, and turns to try to beef up my run without needing to do the circuit twice or go over the bridge as the wind blows. I went down streets I wouldn’t normally. I took some scenic detours. I let my music decide when I would turn1.
While I rarely hit a moment of bliss or zen on my runs, I do build up a rhythm. I don’t know that I would’ve had a new personal best time on my run on Saturday, but I was feeling pretty confident in myself. I was nearing my home, but I’d only run for four miles, so I decided to take a turn to try to expand my numbers. I turned down 27th St, and as I got to the intersection with 24th Ave, I suddenly lost my balance.
I wish I could say that the whole thing happened in slow motion, like a series of photographs, but really it was instantaneous. It was like a blacked out and all of a sudden, I was sliding on the pavement. As much as I like to imagine that I was probably flying through the air, I probably just fell straight down.
I didn’t land on the sidewalk. I landed in the street. Luckily, there was no cars coming. I turned and look and saw a stopped cab further down the street, but I don’t think I was in any real danger. I quickly pushed myself up, brushed off some gravel and called my fiancée.
Taking a fall when you don’t have health insurance is an incredibly scary moment. My first thought was that I could’ve broken my leg, but having broken a bone when I was younger, I’m almost certain that I wouldn’t have been able to walk on it if I had.
As I stood up, I started hyperventilating, worried that my injury was going to be much more serious than it probably was. I was emotional, but partially because I wouldn’t get to finish my total 10k. I’ve gotten irritable when I can’t complete the runs that I want to.
I went home, threw out my sweatpants, because the knee had a hole in it. My fiancée cleaned the cut up. I took a shower, and I called it a day. Even though I was preparing to run the next day, I decided that I needed to give myself a rest day.
Despite my leg being pretty jacked up, I still decided that I needed to go out and do comedy on Saturday. I limped my way out to a bar in Brooklyn to tell jokes. On Sunday night, I got myself going to QED in Astoria to tell the same jokes. I also went grocery shopping on Sunday.
Once I got moving, I was able to walk pretty easily, but even as I type this, it can be difficult to stand up or sit down without some pain. I’m trying to keep my leg elevated.
On Monday, I decided that I was going to give myself an easy run. It also snowed, and I needed to wait for it to stop. Unfortunately, roads and the track had also iced over, and I needed to focus harder to make sure I could run. I didn’t push myself too hard, but I ran a mile, and then alternated between running and walking. Once I got moving, I was not in as much pain as I thought I’d be.
On Tuesday, I went back and forth over whether or not I’d go running. I had a meeting in Times Square that I needed to go to, and I wasn’t about to use my morning to go. When I got back to Queens, I laced up and went. I knew that I’d need to run for at least 2 miles to get back in the habit. It was rough starting out, but I think my pain was more caused by needing to dodge the icy patches on the sidewalk and road rather than running with a knee covered in puss.
In the initial aftermath of the fall, I started to be afraid that I wouldn’t be able to run again. Since getting laid off, running is the only thing that I can really control. People say it takes 2 weeks to undo any progress from running, but I’m afraid that being stagnant for too long will kill my motivation. I didn’t want to lose the ability to do the only thing that I feel I have control of. Fear that I’d put the weight back on also came over me. The shock in the fall led to all sorts of self-doubt and negative thoughts coming to me.
Even though I’m still in a place where my leg is hurting and I’m waiting for the scab to heal, I guess the point of all this is to say that I’m not as weak as I think I am. In retrospect, I felt like on Saturday, I was in the middle of the run of my life. Really, I was probably only going to do a 65 minute 10k. Now, the run that I went on Tuesday felt 100 times better, because once I pushed through the pain, I realized that I’d be able to keep on doing this. I’m not going to lose my ability. I’m also going to have a pretty sweet scab to peel off.
1. For example: I will keep on a straight line for the length of this Joyce Manor song, and once the next song begins, I’ll turn right.