Please help. I'm concerned I've been running on a stress fracture for 2 months.

You need an MRI. I had a tibial stress fracture and I passed the hop test with it and ran on it.

Meanwhile, several years earlier I had tendonitis in my FHL tendon of my foot and it was EXCRUCIATING, I absolutely thought it was a stress fracture. Nope, just a thickened and scarred tendon.

There's no way to tell without an MRI.

OP why would you not tell this to your coach? Why are trying to have LetsRun diagnose your injury and why are you reluctant to seek real treatment?

Runner10287 wrote:

OP why would you not tell this to your coach? Why are trying to have LetsRun diagnose your injury and why are you reluctant to seek real treatment?

I talked to him today and am seeing trainer in an hour. he didn't seem that worried about it, but I still need to get it checked out and describe it better...

MRMRMRMR wrote:

You need an MRI. I had a tibial stress fracture and I passed the hop test with it and ran on it.

Meanwhile, several years earlier I had tendonitis in my FHL tendon of my foot and it was EXCRUCIATING, I absolutely thought it was a stress fracture. Nope, just a thickened and scarred tendon.

There's no way to tell without an MRI.

Yeah, that's a good point... I think I'm like: I'm walking on it no problem and running without much discomfort! it must not be a stress fracture!!!! ...but that's not true.

I can pass the hop test unless I bend down real low. definitely gonna get it checked (seeing trainer in an hour as we speak)

Never hurts to get checked and double checked, but in my experience the symptoms of 'Shin Splints' fits perfectly. Person who gets them is usually a very hard worker who ignores their symptoms until they get them so bad they hurt to walk on, At the very end of my website www.thematchmaker.ca there is a link that will allow you to download my remedy for the situation. Follow the steps and they will never come back because you can detect the problem early the next time and use the protocol to solve. Happens in an area that receives the least blood supply yet is used even as you sleep. Good Luck

Use a tuning fork - give it a good ring, then touch the shin bone. If you cry out in pain you might have a stress fracture

I’d always recommend a web forum populated by self-appointed armchair experts for injury diagnosis rather than a training professional. /s

Please go see a physio who knows what they are doing and get a proper diagnosis rather than asking here.

What if someone is a physio, a runner since 1957, and just wants to clarify why the problem is difficult to solve? I rarely get involved in blogs, but this runner with shin splints just wants to gather facts or anecdotal information to help them continue their career as a runner. I notice that you had no problem piping up, not with a solution but to stifle the conversations.

Obviously, I'm going to ask a trainer or doctor (I saw trainer yesterday) but I kinda wanted to gather some basic ideas of things it could possibly be and see if anyone else has experienced this. I've gotten a variety of answers so obviously I'm not going to be able to diagnose myself anyway based on this but I just wanted a general idea of things it could be.

Picking other runners brains is always a good option. Well done. Just remember, taking time off until all is okay, doesn't work if you go back to the same workouts that caused them in the first place (which is 'overuse' and not enough recovery to rebuild what the workouts tore down). Most sports can generate shin splints that use a hard surface and pounding and not enough recovery since there is far less circulation in the area for a hard working athlete to repair. Faithfully keeping a diary that records good and bad days. On good days, go back at least four days and identify those workouts and do more of them. On bad days go back at least four days to identify the workouts that you are not yet ready and don't do them until you are completely healed. The key to detect them is run your fingers along the shin bones and note where the pain starts and stops. After there is no pain, do not increase the workouts for the next three weeks....then you are good to go. I always run my fingers down both shin bones in the morning to make sure I am good .