Shin Splints? Back Pain? Hip Impingement? Compartment Syndrome? Frustration! Part I

The numbing sensation began about a year ago. I was doing my usual 3.5 mile run around my college's indoor track. About 2.5 miles into it, a tingling sensation I could only describe as strange developed in both lower legs, localized to the lateral shin area. I would estimate that I had been doing the 3.5 mile runs three times a week for around 2-3 months before this "sensation" began. I simply wrote it off as an outlying random pain and forgot about it.

The next time I ran, however, the tingling sensation began earlier in my run, and progressed to the point where finishing the 3.5 mile run would be uncomfortable, so I stopped after 3. Being a 22 year old who loves to self-evaluate, I immediately went back to my dorm room, plugged my symptoms into google, and wala, I had my diagnosis - shin splints. Sure, there may have been a tiny difference here and there between what different sites described as shin splints, and the symptoms I was experiencing, but not enough to put any doubts in my mind, especially because of the ubiquity of shin splint diagnoses in the young athlete arena.

So I took the many websites' advice; I rested for a couple weeks, took some ibuprofen in anti-inflammatory doses, and iced (which, coincidentally, is also what is prescribed to people who initially have CS type pain also). Sure enough, two weeks later, I was back on the track, and for my first couple runs, also pain-free. The numbing, tingling sensation, however, came back with a vengeance. No longer did it just become a sensation, but when I would attempt to push myself, both my legs felt pressurized and numb, to the point where I simply could not use my lower leg adequately propel my body, and simply had to stop. I thus decided to modify my runs to 1.5 miles. When I would run 1.5 miles, the numbing/now slightly painful sensation would come around mile 1, but I would always be able to finish the last half mile, while sucking up the pain.

I had about 4 weeks left in my spring semester, so I told myself that I would continue running, and then see a doctor when I returned home. Unfortunately, during these 4 weeks is when things took an unconventional turn.