Wednesday, May 07, 2008

des hates her toe

About 3 or 4 years ago, I broke my big toe. I was in karate class with xbf before class actually started. We were messing around and I threw a fake kick with my left foot. He caught it, and somehow I pivoted (badly) on my right foot. Then I fell down in pain. When the teacher came in, I told him what happened. He did take it a little easier on me that night, but we all thought I would be fine.

The next day I was off from work, thank goodness. When I woke up, I was still in pain and now my toe was very purple and misshaped. (Somewhere around here I have a picture of it, but I don't want to go through the hassle of digging it out and setting it up. You don't need to see it, you can imagine.) So I called my doctor. My regular doctor, Dr. K (the best doctor ever) was not in that day, but someone else from his practice was so I went in to see him. I quickly learned to hate him. When I said "I think I broke my toe" he didn't believe me. He manhandled my toe so much that I recoiled in terror and pain. Begrudgingly, he sent me for an x-ray. I think he was still skeptical of me even when he saw that my toe had broken in 2 places.

Since it is a toe, there's not much can be done when it breaks, even the big toe (and my big toe isn't really that big). So I got a stupid "shoe" thing that supported the bottom of my foot, and maybe a tiny bit on the side, but had velcro on top so I could remove it*. He didn't give me any pain medication. I couldn't miss work, so I spent my 8+ hour days on my feet. Luckily at this time my coworkers were a little sympathetic so I didn't have to do as much counter work and sometimes I could have a stool to sit on. But it was still a lot of time to spend on my broken toe, even with the stupid shoe. So I called my regular doctor and explained what happened and they called in some drugs for me.

**I've mentioned how awesome Dr. K was many times before, but this is another example. He knew I would never fake something just to get narcotics, and the whole "reacting badly with vicodin" thing certainly helped validate me. This time, they looked at the xrays and were incredulous that Stupid Doctor didn't give me anything for pain. It also didn't hurt that I worked in a pharmacy, so I could get my pills right then.**

So anyway, you can see why I think my toe never healed correctly. Every now and again, my poor aching bones remind me of this. Like today. Yesterday I wore some cute little white strappy heels for a coupla hours. Yes, they are cheap shoes that threaten to give me proto-blisters whenever I wear them, but they are also not padded at all on the bottom. So I spend the rest of that day and (so far) the next day, massaging my poor toe, remembering how I broke it in karate all those years ago.




*I remember that it was December, because I actually had to wear a plastic bag over my foot during rain and other bad weather. I did get to wear exciting warm and fuzzy socks for the world to see, however.

6 comments:

LittlePea said...

Well, is your second toe freakishly longer than your big toe? Mine is. That's the toe I hate. But, this might be why cute shoes don't hurt my feet even after hours of walking around. So maybe I shouldn't hate freaky second toe. I've heard that broken toes hurt really bad and are hard to heal. How badass that you broke it in karate class though.

super des said...

#2 toe is not freakishly longer, but it is regular longer. All my toes are long and skinny, because I have elf feet.

But yeah, I'm pretty badass. ;)

mar said...

my 2nd toe is also freakishly longer, mslittlepea.
and i've broken a toe too. it was my third toe & i had to tape it to the next toe. every once in a while it still hurts. this was 8 years ago.

super des said...

alright peeps. Clearly those of us with a long 2nd toe are smart, so we need to invent a better method of healing broken toes. Let's get on that, shall we?

The Poet said...

hey des,

how long ago did you break that toe? A good surgeon could easily reset that for you. Or, you could go about it the "poor-mans'" way and go to Rite Aid (or other local drug store) and by a brace for it. Ideally you'd wear the braces for a month or so to help the bone reshape... but i dunno what kinds of cute shoes you'll be able to get into with a brace on your toe.

Seek out a pediatrist... heck you might find a cute ans single one... :)

super des said...

Hi Sullivan!
I broke the toe a few years ago. Unfortunately I do not have the insurance (or money) necessary to have it fixed right now. I don't think the braces would help since the bone technically is healed. I should have gotten the brace all those years ago (plus I WORKED at a drug store!).

And I'm not really in the market for a single doctor - I don't think my loving bf would appreciate that! But cute doctors are always a plus.
:)

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