Mystery Diagnosis: Solved

Training Log
Scheduled rest day

Food Log
Breakfast: oatmeal with peanut butter & banana
Snack: banana
Lunch: turkey and cheddar Lunchables, 20oz Diet Coke
Dinner: grilled chicken "zalad" from Zaxbys, milk

This morning, my chest pain was still with me. I thought it would go away over the weekend with Pepcid AC and a non-inflammatory diet, but alas, it actually only got worse over the weekend. When I woke up yesterday, the pain was the worse it had been in the 5 days. So I decided to go to the doctor to get a diagnosis. Even if it was just heartburn, I wanted to have the peace of mind that any other more serious afflictions had been ruled out.

So, I went to the doctor and he diagnosed me with chest wall inflammation, or chest wall pain. He said that it could be caused by a sudden increase in activity, or a blow to the chest. While I haven't received any hard blows to the chest lately, I have ramped up my running mileage and swimming time in the past few weeks. The doctor said that could be enough to do it. And, over the weekend I followed my running schedule like normal, getting a 5k PR on Saturday and running a little under 8 miles on Sunday. Under the guise that I was suffering from heart burn, I didn't want to alter my daily schedule. But, since it was actually chest wall pain - sticking to my running schedule was the one thing from day to day that was actually making it worse.

So, I'm really glad to know it is nothing serious like a blood clot or anything. I left with a prescription for an anti-inflammatory and to rest from running and swimming for a few days. The rest part kind of sucks, because I was really getting into a good groove with my running and my mileage. My plan is to take this week off, and then get in 2 miles on Friday or Saturday and then go from there, slowly building the mileage back up.

And yes, I did have a Lunachables for lunch today.