Road Block

Yup, my road to London came to a dead end in Eugene on Monday. I gave my best effort but fell far short. I made the Olympic Trials final, but only managed an 8th place finish. It's been a long journey and it's certainly disappointing to finish out my 2012 season with such a poor performance. However, the journey isn't over yet. I plan to continue to strengthen my ankle in hopes of qualifying for the 2013 World Championships. I'm heading back to the Bay Area to prepare for yet another ankle surgery. I knew this to be an inevitable conclusion all season, no matter how things went; my doctors were just waiting for me to call it quits for the season. As of now, I have no idea what the surgery will entail... that all depends on what my MRI shows. As of now, my surgeon is suggesting a scope plus a little extra. Apparently the scope is a relatively simple, routine procedure to clear out the stubborn scar tissue that we've been unable to break up during my physical therapy sessions. However, it's not the scope that I'm worried about. I'm worried about that "little extra" that my surgeon has hinted at. "A little extra" refers to opening up my ankle again to attempt to power wash out the remaining sand debris that is still trapped in my ankle over a year later :-/ I don't know how I feel about that. My doctors and I will need to have a serious conversation before any decisions are made.

But for now, I'm just going to live in the moment. This moment is thankful, sad, relieved, blessed, frustrated, tired, ready to eat all the foods I've been denying myself, and excited about my future. As you might think, feeling all these things simultaneously is quite confusing. But more than all of these things combined, the moment that I'm living in is LOVED! Loved by all of you, loved by all the people who read the articles about me, who watched the broadcasts about me, who gave me a nod of recognition. This moment is filled with the love of my parents who came to support me in Eugene, my surrogate parents Kirk and Suanne who literally nurtured me this past week, my little sister, Kelsey, who cheered, tweeted and posted for her "Soupy" relentlessly. This moment is reflective on my high school coach, John Turek, who taught me to be a fighter and who reminded me of who I really am in a simple text this week. In this moment, I'm warmed by the love of my grandma, Helena, who always tells me "You go to your destiny girl!" This moment is consumed with the love I feel and have felt over the last 16 months from my family and friends who have supported me through the most difficult time I've faced in my life thus far.

I grew a lot as a person over these last few months. I'm proud of the person I'm becoming. I truly have a new appreciation for life, myself, and the gifts I've been given. This challenge has opened my heart and my mind. This challenge continues. I shake my head when I try to think about the hardships I will face in trying to compete another track season. I pushed myself harder this year than ever before and it won't get any easier. I learned what it means to fail more than ever before, but I also learned that with failure, comes growth. If you're brave enough and smart enough to learn from so-called "failures," then it was never really a "failure" at all. As I fly back from Eugene with tired eyes and a conflicted mind, it is hard to sort the sad pangs in my heart from the sighs of relief in my breaths. But all that will come. Time heals all wounds and a stubborn, determined heart gets back in the game with a vengeance when the time is right. Well, I am not ashamed to say that such a time for me is not right now. Right now, in this moment, I'm going to take a step back from track. I'm am going to enjoy the many blessing of my life... from family and friends, to the beautiful Bay Area in which I live. I plan to spend some time in the town that raised me, Plano, Texas. I plan to start planning my strategy for applying to business school this fall. I plan to use this moment, which is filled with blessings and love, to become whole again. My attempt to make this years Olympic team consumed so much of my life and I don't regret any of it for a second. In fact, in this moment I AM PROUD!

I especially have to thank my wonderful coach, Edrick Floreal. Using the word "wonderful" actually sounds terribly inadequate for the man that he is and all that he's helped me through. We've had a bumpy year... he gave his all to get me to London. It's hard not to feel like I failed him. There are not enough 'thank-yous' in the world to convey how honored and blessed I feel to have him by my side. I thank the Lord everyday for bringing such an amazing coach into my life!


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Desperate times, Desperate measures

I'm in route to the US Olympic trials and I certainly didn't make it this far on my own! My ankle has been hooked up, probed, rubbed, shocked, and pricked by more machines and magic medicines than I can count. My good friend, James, suggested that I give a little blog summary of some of my efforts. Getting me to the Olympic Trials has truly been a team effort. They say it takes a village to raise a child, but it takes a village plus a whole lot more to breed an athlete... especially one on the mend from a serious injury.

A preview of my "medical village":

#1: Vasper

I began using Vasper just over a month after my injury last year. I whole-heartedly attribute the bulk of my return to the track to Vasper. Vasper gave me the ability to exercise when I could barely walk. So what is Vasper? Vasper is a rehab+training system that combines cooling and compression to force the body to produces excessive lactic acid, which in turn, signals the brain to release additional growth hormone. The presence of the additional growth hormone helped my ankle to heal way faster than my surgeon ever expected. Each time I came in for a check up appointment, my doctor would literally drop his jaw in awe at the rate of my recovery.


#2: Nerve-blocking injection

I'm not even go to try to give any medical jargon here because, well I'm certainly no doctor and odds are you aren't either so lay-mans terms should suit everybody just fine :-)(but if you are a doctor, please please enlighten me.) As you know, I'm still having a ton of pain in my right ankle. About a month ago, things flared up worse than they had in quite awhile; it even hurt to sleep. So 2-weeks ago, one of my doctors performed a nerve-blocking injection under ultrasound. They began by shocking me with somewhat painful signals to test my nerve synapses. When they found the general area that things were going awry, they whipped out the ultrasound probe. The scan revealed balloon looking spots in my a few of my nerve pathways. BINGO! My doctor hoped that by injecting those nerves, he could dull some of the painful signals that my ankle was receiving. So far so good... At least I can get a good nights rest now. (I swear that's my ankle and not a baby in the ultrasound image.)


#3: Chinese medicine

The same doctor that did the nerve-blocking injecting recommended that I see his friend who has been working in Chinese medicine for over 45 years and is now retired but will see people as favors. Well lucky for me, I have friends in high places so I could get in ;-) I've seen the guy 3 times total over the last week and half and by my second visit, my ankle literally looked better than EVER!!! I never thought I would see my ankle as small as he got it ever again. He used a series of treatments to draw the swelling out of my ankle and relieve my pain. At my first visit, he began by doing a foot detox. I thought he was going to electrocute me because with out saying anything, he put a rusty looking copper box in a tub of water, then attached wire to the two crude looking bolts on the copper box, then connect to wire to another little machine. He told me to put my feet in the water. I held my breath as he turned on the little machine... totally prepared to be fried! OKAY... so yeah I'm a little dramatic but I was really nervous!!! In the picture below it looks like "beef-broth" as one of my friends pointed out. HA! But according to my Chinese medicine man, the water was changing color as the current detoxed my feet and the color came from fats and yeast that were released from my feet. Sounds a lot less appetizing than beef-broth huh?!


After a 45 minute soak in the tub that didn't actually electrocute and kill me, it was time to soak for 45 in his homemade tea of cooked herbs. On the second visit after soaking, he put my feet on some sort of vibrating + infrared foot massager for 30 minutes to relax my muscles. Then it was time for the real kicker... no it wasn't marijuana he swore several times. But when he lit the herbs on fire in a porcelain bowl, it sure smelled like it. I had to put my foot over the bowl and he placed a paper box over my feet to help contain the smoke. He was essentially smoking my ankle to help release tension and loosen my joint. It worked but whewwww!!! I walked out of there smelling like I had just smoked 100 cigarettes in a sealed room... not a pleasant aroma to be giving off EVER and much less when your next stop is to do a little grocery shopping at Whole Foods. A girl wearing athletic clothes but stinking of cancer sticks is sure to get some disgusted looks from fellow shoppers. And oh boy did I! Two little kids were even pointing, laughing at me, and holding their little noses... awesome! ;-)

At the end of each treatment, the doc slathered my foot in his homemade paste of herbs and spices, then wrapped it in plastic wrap and bandages. I had to keep it on for 3 days at a time. Each time I left a little lighter in my wallet and shaking my head, acknowledging my desperation to get healthy enough to compete at my best. But I have to give two thumbs up to Chinese medicine! Everything he did was all-natural and I've truly seen improvement in my past few training sessions.


#4: Iontophoresis

Ok so again, I can't give any medical jargon, but to the best of my understanding, "ionto" basically delivers a topical low-dose cortisone (or medicine of choice) to the area in which the patch is applied via electrical currents. It feels like tiny pin pricks. We originally started using ionto on my ankle last summer to deaden the sensation of the nerve damage where the bones came out of my skin. When my injury happened, I was told that I would never regain sensation to the top of my foot and base of ankle. Well, actually the nerves began to repair themselves but the signals were all wrong. When anything brushed against those areas, I used to feel like I was being electrocuted. OUCH!!! So my physical therapists at Agile PT used ionto to help calm those sensations. After about a month of treatment, I was doing much better! We now use ionto to treat various spots around my ankle when it's too painful for manual therapy or to just help the general healing process.

#5: Game Ready

If you've ever been in an athletic training room or in a physical therapy office and seen a large red box, chances are you've seen a Game Ready. They're super popular! A Game Ready is an ice machine with attachments for the specific parts of the body in need of treatment. What makes the Game Ready so awesome is it's ability to deliver varying amounts of compression along with cooling. Ever heard the expression: R.I.C.E? Well remember this for your next boo-boo: Rest Ice Compression Elevate. The Game Ready is your one stop shop source to RICE. One of our trainers of Stanford's training room, who is now the head football trainer and just an all around amazing guy, helped me to get a Game Ready of my very own! This machine has been instrumental to my recovery! After long days of practice, I go home and hook myself up to my Game Ready for a least 30 minutes. Sometimes I even sleep with it strapped to my ankle. This was especially crucial last fall as I began a full training regimen. I love my Game Ready so much that I'm hooked up to it right now, after a good long shakeout at the track in Eugene, Oregon!(I wish I was getting paid for every time I just wrote "Game Ready")


#6: Acupuncture

And yup! Ever since 1 month out from my surgeries last year, I've had needles stuck all over my foot from time to time. I did acupuncture every other day for the first two weeks of April 2011 in order to help draw out the initial swelling from the injury and to help my foot regain motion. I still do acupuncture as much as possible, not only for my foot, but for my back, my leg muscles, stress, etc. You name it and acupuncture has a "point" for that! (DROID)... buh bumm ching! (so in case you're wondering... yes that is my attempt at referencing popular culture to be clever... perhaps I failed.) *shrug*



My Olympic Trials in the triple jump begins with the qualifier day on Saturday and the final day, for all the marbles, on Monday, June 25th. Come on crazy treatments... you've gotten me this far...

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