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When Can I Run Again After Hurting My Left Groin?

I pulled my left groin about two months ago (at least I think I pulled it). I run on a regular basis and was training for a half marathon. Two months ago when I started one of my runs my left groin instantly started hurting. I mean it started hurting on the first step I took.

I continued to run through the pain and barely finished my 4 mile run. I let it rest about 5 days and tried running again, the pain came back.

I have been doing this for a while because the pain starts when I'm running and goes away after a few days depending on how hard I push myself. A little more than a month ago I ran in an 8 mile hilly run and made it but with a huge amount of pain.

I finally saw the doctor three weeks ago because it wasn't healing and he told me to do some pilates because my muscle there was tight and to lay off running for a month. The problem is that I can't see the same doctor again because I'm not eligible to be seen there anymore. But when I saw the doctor he noticed that my lymph nodes in my left groin area were swollen and about 2-3 times larger than the ones on my right.

How do I know when i can run again and when the injury is healed? I want to run again soon but I don't want to re injure myself or cause permanent damage.

What would you recommend? Have you ever heard of this type of injury before and what did you do?

– Katie, San Diego, CA, USA

Answer by Dominique: Hi Katie,
Thanks for your running injury question. I have pulled my groin muscles a few times before. This is usually caused due to ignoring my stretching routines (weakening groin muscles) or overuse/overtraining.
This type of injury is solved by taking some rest and strengthening exercises for the groin area.

It seems like what your doctor prescribed is exactly that: rest and pilates.
Enlarged lymph nodes aren't a typical or expected feature of a simple groin muscle strain. A lymph node reported as 2-3 times the size of its counterpart is a finding that needs an in-person doctor's assessment promptly — not something to mention in passing at some future visit. Given you can't see the same doctor again, I recommend booking with another one as soon as you can and getting this checked properly.

Hope this helps.
Kind regards,
Dominique

Red flags: when to see a doctor

• Swollen or enlarged lymph nodes in the groin aren't a typical sign of a muscle strain. If you get a strain diagnosis alongside a lymph-node finding like this, that combination — not the strain alone — needs a prompt in-person medical evaluation, even if the strain itself is improving.
• A strain that isn't healing on the timeline you'd expect is itself a reason to get reassessed, rather than carrying on with the original rest-and-pilates plan alone. Katie was still dealing with pain after roughly two months of intermittent rest and two failed return-to-running attempts — that's exactly the kind of stalled recovery worth flagging to a doctor.
• If you can't get back in with your original doctor, find another in-person provider promptly. Don't let it become something to mention "if convenient" at some future, unscheduled visit.

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