My Precious

Every runner has a Precious. This is mine.

I’ve been leaning on Advil like a crutch since the ankle went. But if I’m being honest, I was leaning on it loooong before that. And before Advil there was Vioxx, a genuinely amazing prescription NSAID that happened to make people’s hearts explode, which is why you can’t get it anymore. Truth be told, Vioxx was my gateway drug, way back when I first started running seriously. The bottle has just changed labels over the years. The relationship has not.

So before I break up with it on Tuesday, let me pour one out for the little brown caplet. A few things I’ve learned to love about it:

1. It doesn’t just block pain. It blocks the body’s inflammation signal itself. That’s the part that feels like magic and is also exactly the part my surgeon wants switched back on while I heal.
2. The sweet spot is usually 400 mg. Less than that and it’s meh, barely worth swallowing. More than that and the benefit flattens out while the side effects keep climbing. The dose nobody on the bottle tells you is the right one.
3. It works surprisingly fast. Like your Domino’s order, it’s hitting the door right around the 30-minute mark.
4. It can quietly blunt athletic adaptation, especially in ultrarunning. The same thing that hushes the soreness can also mute the signal your body uses to come back stronger. I knew this. I took it anyway.

Which is the whole, embarrassing truth of it:

I know it’s bad for me. I love it, anyway.

I know it helped me run until my tendons exploded. I love it, anyway.

I know I have to give it up completely starting Tuesday for at least eight weeks. I guess I can’t love it anymore.

On a lighter note, a runner’s medicine cabinet deserves better branding. Some names I’ve collected for the Precious:

• Vitamin A / Vitamin I
• Motrin Mints
• Joint Juice Tablets
• Pain Skittles (LOL)
• Nope Pills
• The OG Recovery Stack
• Weekend Warriors

Here’s the actual rule, and it’s onto the protocol it goes. All NSAIDs, Advil especially, stop seven days before surgery and stay stopped through the first eight weeks. The reasoning I got: they raise bleeding risk and can slow the bone healing, which is the entire point of an operation built on osteotomies and hardware.

Last time, on the left foot, the pain got bad enough that I was granted one emergency week back on them, even with the oxy on board. This time I’m going to try to tough it out. Doctor’s orders, and I already promised to follow them to the letter. Even the part that hurts to keep.

We loves it. We says goodbye to it anyway.