Joy!

February, a fresh month. Amazing progress. Two months ago I was not able to bear my own weight on my own bare feet! BRS was one of the resources I found that helped me transition from shod-with-support to unshod. I did not join at first because I found it hard to believe I'd ever be able to run barefoot! I didn't even want to try. Maybe some minimalist shoes, but surely not barefoot! When I went from walking barefoot in the house to outside I needed socks, my soles were so sensitive! When I slipped the socks off, the leaves and grass felt like razors to my sensitive skin! I couldn't stand more than about ten minutes. The day I joined BRS was the day I ran 4 miles barefoot and the gravel made me hobble. But I covered four whole miles barefoot! I selected my name, Joy Unshod, because I have such joy anticipating a pain free foot. Which walking barefoot for the first few weeks made me consider as a possibility. And running barefoot made me know as a certainty. The gravel still makes me hobble on the dry days, but after a rain I run with joy! In the past month I ran once in shoes and felt the pain for days. No joy running shod! My husband and I are going to run a 5k the weekend before Valentine's Day and I will be unshod. Surprise, he might be also. Greater surprise? My 19 year old son might be unshod as well! Joy. Yesterday I met my husband in town on his lunch break—he and my 15 year old son and I ran two miles together around a pretty lake in a pretty park. Joy. My foot hurt after the run. I bent wrong on a curve made for water drainage. Joy. A sore foot equates joy? Yes, because it is not the chronic pain, it's a new pain that comes from a misstep! It's normal! Joy.