If you came to my house, you could be mistaken for thinking that somebody had died. The place is full of so many flowers that it looks like a funeral parlour. I know it sounds dramatic and everyone gets injuries, but to devote your life to something and then have it snatched away is a bit like suffering a bereavement. You've lost something that's part of you. It's devastating. Heartbreaking. I've cried a lot.

I had high hopes for the heptathlon at the Olympics. My winter had gone really well and that's the frustrating thing - suddenly, this incredible thing is gone and you did all that work for nothing. Now I have a stress fracture of my right ankle and I'm going to be on crutches for another six weeks. Before this, the worst thing that had happened to me was when I was 13 and a glass panel fell on me as I went to a fancy-dress party; I cut my arm and had to go to hospital. My dad tells me I also fell off a roundabout and gashed my head open, but that's it. I'd been lucky until that Monday afternoon at the Olympic Medical Institute (OMI) a fortnight ago today when the scan results came in.

I'd been competing at the Hypo Meeting in Götzis, a picturesque Austrian town surrounded by snow-clad mountains. It was a big deal, the biggest heptathlon before Beijing, and all the girls were there, apart from Kelly Sotherton, who was recovering from illness. I was second after the first day, but the vague niggle I'd had beforehand was getting worse. It got really bad in the high jump, the second event of the day, and I think the damage started then. I had some treatment, felt fine and then set a personal best in the shot. In the 200 metres I think the adrenalin masked the pain, but in the home straight I felt I was going backwards. I struggled to push off and when I finished I couldn't walk.

I had to pull out. I was not going to risk anything. Not now. Not in Olympic year.

That night, back at the hotel, I was distraught. I'd never pulled out of a heptathlon and I was anxious, not knowing what was wrong. I went to my hotel room and cried. My grandparents were over that weekend. There had been a story in one of the papers saying how, when I was young and wavering, my grandad gave me a pound for every personal best. I spoke to him and he said, “A pound! It was a fiver. Everyone in the village thinks I'm tight.” I said, “All right grandad, I've got other things to worry about.”

I flew back early on Sunday and went down to London with Neil Black, the physio, the next day. The MRI scan took 40 minutes, the CT one five. I hobbled from the hospital to the OMI and sat in a room. Paul Dijkstra, the UK Athletics doctor, gave me the verdict. “You have a stress fracture in your navicular and a stress fracture in your metatarsal.” I couldn't believe it. “It looks like the Games are out.” It blew me away. All my family had been telling me it would be OK and, deep down, I'd been thinking the same. Neil had to leave to get me some tissues.

I had to stay down in London because I needed a bone density scan on the Tuesday. That was horrible because the OMI rooms are like student accommodation. Neil took me out to a restaurant that night. It was a blur. I don't know how he coped. I was crying all the time and my face was puffy and red. I don't know what the waiter must have thought.

Paul said that if it was just a stress fracture of the metatarsal then it would not be that bad and we could try to make the Olympics. It was the one in the navicular [in the back part of the foot behind the metatarsals] that was the problem because it's a funny place and the blood supply down there is rubbish.

I didn't want to make it worse and break it. We could have tried to speed the process up by staying off my feet for three weeks, instead of eight, and then having an operation to put screws in to hold it. It was a massive gamble and I was not tempted at all. I desperately wanted to go to Beijing, but not at the risk of ending my career at 22.

The response has been incredible. I was so glad to get home to Sheffield and my family and Andy, my boyfriend. I have had texts, e-mails and cards from all over. Paula Radcliffe passed on her number and I'm going to ring her. She's had a stress fracture in the past and is fighting another one now. She's intent on making Beijing but it's completely different for her. I want to talk to her about rehab and how she coped. Nathan Douglas, the triple jumper, missed the World Championships last year with a hamstring and he rang. That was nice. Everyone says “keep your chin up”, but you don't want to listen. He understood that. He said people told him he would be back but all he could think about was the missed opportunity.

Kelly has posted a couple of messages on my Facebook page. I'll cheer her on now. She's said she wants a gold and there's no reason why she shouldn't get one.

I think Tatyana Chernova is one to watch and then there's Lyudmila Blonska. That's the top three, but I don't know the order. I don't know if I will be able to bring myself to watch it. I didn't think anyone was amazing in Götzis, so it's going to be difficult to sit at home and stop thinking “that could have been me”.

Having been so active, I am bored but I've got new goals. I won't compete again this year, but want to get back for winter training and be ready for the indoor season. Then there are the World Championships in Berlin next summer. Without those to target it would be very hard.

I've got a structure now. I sit on a magnetic bed for an hour a day and an Exogen machine twice a day for 20 minutes. Someone posted a message on my website saying, “It's not how far you fall but how high you bounce.”

There are lots of things to be inspired by. I'm doing weights and core exercises, though I can't put any pressure on my feet.

I don't go out much because it kills my hands being on crutches. I look for positives. I've been able to find time to see Sex And The City at the cinema. Andy has bought me the complete box set of Smallville, series 1-6, and I can drink more.

I've been so touched by people's kindness. I know I'm far from unique and try keep some perspective. I believe things happen for a reason, although it's hard to fathom what that is, but hopefully I'll look back in four years from an Olympic podium and be glad this happened. Maybe I'll be tougher. Obviously, this was not meant to be my time.

Shattered dreams

Zara Phillips will miss her second consecutive Olympics this summer after her horse, Toytown, was found to have an injury last week. She missed the 2004 Olympics because of a leg injury to Toytown.

Alex Partridge missed the 2004 Olympics when he suffered a collapsed lung a month before the Games. The rower was replaced in the men's coxless four by Ed Coode, who then won gold.

Hermann Maier, the Austrian skier, won two gold medals at the 1998 Winter Olympics but was unable to defend them four years later after fracturing a leg in a motorcycle accident.

Iwan Thomas won silver in the 400 metres relay at the 1996 Olympics but missed out on selection for the individual event of the 2000 Games because of a stress fracture to his ankle. A further injury kept him out in 2004, too.

Harry Kewell, the Australia footballer, missed the chance to compete in his home Olympics in Sydney in 2000 after suffering an Achilles injury.

Pete Sampras and Steffi Graf both missed the 1996 Olympic tennis event when among the favourites after suffering, respectively, an Achilles and knee injuries.

Sergei Bubka, below, broke the world pole vault record 35 times but won only one Olympic medal, in 1988. He won the world championships in 1995 and 1997 but withdrew from the 1996 Olympics because of a heel injury.

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