Too bad you're in Kentucky. We've got an Achilles tendinopathy (the term tendinitis isn't used much around here anymore) study going on right now.
Anyways, here's the protocol. It's from Alfredson et al., 1998 American Journal of Sports Medicine Volume 26, number 3, page 360. It's called Heavy load eccentric calf muscle training. We just nicknamed it the heel drop program.
The bad news is that it's a 12 week program (see what I mean about the 12 weeks?).
This protocol should be done twice a day, 7 days a week for 12 weeks. During the 12 week program, running is allowed of it can be performed with only mild discomfort or no pain.
There are two eccentric exercises. 1) The calf muscle being eccentrically loaded with knees straight and 2) the calf being eccentrically loaded with the knees bent.
So for exercise 1: stand on a step on your tip toes with supports if possible. Lift up the non-painful leg so now you're on tip toe on the painful leg. Your knees should be straight. Now drop from tip toe to 'calf stretch' position (your heel should be below the level of the step). To return to the starting position, use your other leg and/or supports. Do not do a calf raise on the injured leg.
For exercise 2: the same as exercise 1, but your knee should be slightly bent to emphasize the soleus muscle.
The heel drops will probably be painful, but unless they're debilitating, you're to suck it up.
When you are able to perform the drops without any minor pain or discomfort, you should increase the load either with weights in a backpack or possibly using a calf raise machine (provided you are not doing single leg calf raises on the injured leg to get to starting position).
Each exercise is to be done during your twice-daily sessions and with a set/rep scheme of 3 sets of 15 reps. Muscle soreness is to be expected during that first one to two weeks of training.
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