How do you strain your Rectus Abdominus?

So this is a little story about how I strained my rectus abdomens aka my six pack.  Yes I am aware this sounds very very odd and in fact it took 2 days to correctly diagnose me but the verdict is in and I have a strained rectus.  Now, let me tell you the story of how this all happened.  

We have to go back week to last Monday afternoon, as a side note (or so I thought) I took Hercules for a bath around noon and he decided to be a little stubborn about getting down into the tub so it took a lot of maneuvering (read pushing, shoving, pulling a 90 lb dead weight dog) on my part. But look at this happy face once he gets in the tub.

Happy Herc!

Anyhow...so I had returned home with my clean dog and rushed around to get ready to go with Ryan to a doctor appointment.  At 1pm as I was running down the stairs to put the dogs away I noticed a very sharp stabbing pain in my RLQ (right lower abdomen for my non nursing peeps out there) I immediately thought appendicitis vs ovarian cyst rupture but I knew I had to go to Ryan's appointment so I let it go.  I could only let it go for so long, once home the vomiting started.  I had to call Ryan to come home from practice to take care of me.  I very begrudgingly went to the ER.  They too were pretty worried and immediately thought of appendicitis or ovarian cyst. So I got an IV, Dilaudid, and Zofran (i.e. major narcotics and anti-nausea medicines) then at this point once I was quite loopy they did a pelvic exam, LOVELY!  I was pretty loopy but they ruled out ovarian torsion and cyst.  (Yippee!!) So... I went off to CT to look at that appendix.  It was negative but I was still in crazy amount of pain and the nausea was OUT of this WORLD!! So more pain meds, more nausea meds and more IV fluids (apparently Ryan, Sue and I all watched Dancing with the Stars but I don't have much memory of this) Ryan and Sue were both amazing, rubbing my back my feet and then itching me everywhere when the pain meds side effects starting kicking in.  They sent me home thinking it might be early appendicitis and a follow up the next day with my primary doctor.

Which brings us to Tuesday... trip to the doctor, still thinking it's early appendicitis, more blood drawn, sent home to lay around and wait.  By 8pm I have a massive headache and completely dehydrated, vomiting and nauseous like I can't explain and the pain is still there.  So back to the ER we went.  I really thought for sure it was the appendix and they were going to just whisk me off to surgery for an open procedure, which would mean no marathon and no work for a while.  I was not happy I cried the whole way there.  But I saw a new doctor who listened to me as they started another IV (more fluids, Dilaudid and Zofran) and then examined me but he had a different thought.  Then he asked me if anything else happened before the pain started.  I told him about the dog bath, but nothing hurt when I was there.  He said he had a very similar case when he was a resident and it was a strained rectus abdomens (aka - six pack).  So they gave me a muscle relaxer (10mg Valium), pain med (1mg Dilaudid) and nausea medicine (8mg Zofran) and sent me HOME  20 minutes later, they dared to ask if I needed  a wheelchair, UMMM yes please!!!

So on the good side, no surgery! But I am banned from running for about 2 weeks.  I have started PT, Kinetics to be exact and they are doing some amazing work.  They are doing graston therapy, KT taping, and stretches and exercises.  I am allowed to get on a bike tomorrow and hoping to be aqua running or on an elliptical at the end of the week and still running Eugene Marathon!  Which really is saying a lot considering I was on bed rest and in the fetal position all of last week.  I was pretty much going out of my mind with boredom when I was sleeping.  Thank you for all my friends and family who have kept me sane over the last week through this injury I know I have been a horrible patient.  Before I go here is a picture of my tape job, please excuse the mess in the background.