Once again this year, my Mum talked me into running the Bristol 10k, so I have been training since mid-January. It did not go smoothly. There was snow and ice, injury, busy periods at work tiring me out and then before I knew it my old enemy reared its head: summer.

There is a good reason that May is Lupus Awareness Month in the USA. These long hours of daylight and higher UV levels can come as a surprise, especially on cloudy or wet days. I always have a lupus flare-up in May. Which made me wary of the Bristol 10k’s date of 13 May.

Good stuff: I made it! Despite the hot day and having a dodgy ankle I completed the race only slightly slower than last year. Go me! I ran with my brother Adam and my Mum, but mostly I ran with Adam because Mum is better at this running thing than we are. I also learned my lesson from last year and wore headphones so that I could listen to music when my brother and I weren’t chatting. Chatting gets harder after the first few kilometres. Plus, who wouldn’t smile at hearing the intro to “Dr Love” by First Choice?

Bad stuff: I gave myself a worse injury and spent the rest of Sunday with one foot wrapped in ice and propped up on a footstool. I think a combo of nearly-worn-out running shoes and running oddly because of my ankle injury did some damage.

What makes this injury especially annoying is that my plan for this evening was to go on a walking tour called Bristol in Books. I was really looking forward to it. Instead, I limped slowly home from work, took painkillers and put my foot back up on the footstool. It’s not all bad. There’s still Netflix after all.

I’m not giving up on the running. I’m going to give my foot a week to recover, buy new running shoes and get started again. I really do think it’s helping me keep my lupus fatigue at bay. But maybe my next race shouldn’t be one with 12,000 people to dodge around or in summer. I hear they exist.