When I set my goal to walk/run 87 miles in the 30 days leading up to the election, I knew I was up for the task because I needed a good distraction. In fact, I’ve been distracting myself with such activity every single day since the third week in April, which is why it is terribly ironic that on Election Day itself, after I’d actually surpassed the original goal by an extra 20 miles, I injured my left knee due to the contact sport known as parenting.

Y’all, it’s a tale as old as (modern) time: I stepped funny sideways to avoid landing on a Lego (c’mon, parents, you know you know this dance) and tweaked my knee in doing so.

The kicker is, I kept on walking the rest of the week (because how else was I going to survive the chaos of waiting for election results?) before Saturday afternoon’s venture made me realize, I’m actually really hurt and need to take some time off from that kind of movement.

Again, I haven’t missed a day of that in damn near seven months (SEVEN MONTHS) and benching my body right now has not felt good. Eliminating my “burn off the crazy” options while also taking away the option even to do something more gentle like my yoga practice has left with me with meditation/breathwork only and let’s be real clear for a moment – I have been emotionally stuffing with exercise for months now and sitting still is HARD.

Also ironic this week is that after a mailing delay, my #RunforRuth RBG swag finally showed up on Monday, Day Two of my No Movement Week (really hoping it is just a week). An injury does not negate the fact that I put in 107 miles in 30 days (and the injury is not from those miles), but it is bittersweet all the same to be in a place of stuck while also trying to celebrate that accomplishment.

Obviously this isn’t my first physical injury ever and clearly I need to bring in some emotional/mental balance in other ways than just pounding the pavement, so in some ways, this is just fine. But since I can’t burn off said crazy in said ways, I’m doing some extra protecting by staying away from social media but for once-ish a day. There’s a lot of noise out there and my feelings of overwhelm plus too much while also feeling like I’m not doing enough are just a little too loud for that particular space right now.

So I’m reading and doing an ecstatic breathwork program and checking my email about 50x a day since it’s the only platform beyond Pinterest that I’ll let myself look at online these days. And I’m trying really hard to be patient while my body works through what it needs to work through to recover.

I can’t really say patience has ever been one of my strong suits, but like my hero who inspired me to move a little more this fall in the first place, I am persistent as all get out so for now, that will have to do.