You can’t sprint for an entire marathon. Your body won’t let you do it.

I’m lying on the floor, with an achy back. I’ll skip my morning workout after a bit of a stretch. I’m thankful I have an option to stand up at my desk, I’ll be using this option t today.

This has been a great year for health for me. Despite breaking my kneecap in February, I have been working out consistently, I’ve increased my strength, I’ve dropped to my healthy university weight. I’ve been stretching and caring for a slightly injured shoulder that has recovered really well.

So now, my back has decided to do what my back likes to do and seize up. I should be used to this but it has been so good this year that I forgot how much my back can detract from my day when it hurts. I mean, I am used to discomfort but the dull ache doesn’t affect me like the real ache I feel now.

I was trying to think of what’s different, what I physically did to bring on my current back issues and the only thing I can think of is sleeping in a bad position. That shouldn’t be such a big problem. Then I thought about this year and how the backdrop of it has been so stressful.

There is a constant worry about health and the safety of those in my care. There is the pace of work, the stress of those around us, the state of world politics, the second wave of coronavirus, the change to rainy weather… and the fact that I carry my stress in my back.

It feels like I’m trying to sprint a marathon and my back is the part of my body that has said, ‘enough’. Maybe this is my cue to remember that there is a lot of school year left, and to pace myself a bit. I can’t keep sprinting, but I can go the distance if I remember that this is an endurance race and not a a 100 metre dash.