I was reminded of an important aspect of healthy running that I haven’t talked about a whole lot. I have mentioned before that my family doctor practices Kinesiology (1. the science dealing with the interrelationship of the physiological processes and anatomy of the human body with respect to movement.) or in simple terms, mechanics before medication.

My most memorable experience with my doctor (not to be confused with the one most men over 40 would like to forget) occurred after a car accident. A kid entered the expressway and wasn’t paying attention to the construction zone (crawling) traffic and ran into me. Long story short, I was in a lot of pain (back, neck and shoulder) and after heading to the ER at his request to check for a concussion and having been given a prescription for a muscle relaxer and pain reliever (negative on the concussion), I called my doctor back and he set up an appointment. I went in, got my back and neck adjusted (cracked in non-technical terms) and walked out 20 minutes later, pain free. I even ran the following day I felt so good. The prescriptions went unfilled. More importantly, had I gone the medication route, my neck and back may have eventually found their proper location over time, but that would have taken days or weeks – and for an ex-drunk, playing with those types of medications is to be avoided if at all possible (some say “at all costs”).

On another occasion I developed an acute pain in my lower back on the left side. It didn’t feel like a muscle pain because it was deep (I couldn’t massage it out). Again, I set an appointment and expecting some horrendous prognosis, the doctor found that my left leg simply wasn’t sitting properly in it’s socket. He adjusted that and cracked my neck and back – off I went, pain free. I ran ten that weekend and never had to go back.

The point is, at least in my experience and without belaboring the point further, a good bone cracker is a good friend indeed.