Day 14 - It might be time...

I only made it out for a little over 3 miles tonight.  I have been struggling with shin splints since about mid February.  I thought I had them pretty much under control before I ran the half marathon.  They have been getting a little worse lately and I have been trying to decide whether I should take a couple of days off to rest.  Shin splints can lead to stress fractures, which does not sound like a lot of fun to me.  They hurt pretty much every step of the way during my run tonight and it hurts to touch them.  I am going to try and test them out the next couple of days and see how they feel.  They might have just been overly sore from being on my feet for the majority of the weekend.  Trying to complete this challenege is not worth giving myself a long term injury, which would take away from my long term goal of running a marathon this fall.  So, as all smart runners should do, I am going to listen to my body and take a day or more of rest if needed.  Even though it has only been two weeks so far I have proven to myself that I can go out and hit the pavement if I just put my mind to it.  In the past if the weather was crappy or if I was tired from work I would just take the day off and tell myself I would run a different day.  Hopefully this has changed my attitude for the better.  Definitely not giving up, just going to play it safe for the time being and see what happens.  We will see what tomorrow brings...