Friday, October 10, 2008

FIRST ATHLETIC INJURY

There’s nothing more pathetic than old people doing an organ recital: my ouji hurts, my falapagus aches, my glutiglopilus is inflamed. Yuck! That’s why it’s with great reluctance and self-conscious rectitude, I describe my first athletic injury.

This is my (drum roll) first athletic injury since starting my two- to four-mile-a-day walking habit. Yes, an athletic injury—no scoffing, please. Since I only go to the doctor every five years (where the doctor tells me I am just fine and have the blood pressure of a teenager), my athletic injury is self-diagnosed. But I’m 100 percent sure of my diagnosis, courtesy of www.mayoclinic.com.

The Mayo Clinic website describes the sensation as a “sharp pain in the inside part of the bottom of your heel, which may feel like a knife sticking in the bottom of your foot,” otherwise known as plantar fasciitis. It’s been coming on gradually for a couple of months; but it hurts the worst when I first get out of bed in the morning, when I’ve been standing for awhile, or when I get up after I’ve been sitting. So it seemed more like a condition that hurt when I wasn’t walking, rather than when I was. But on Wednesday, when I got out of bed, it was more like a Bora Bora machete was sticking in the bottom of my foot than Mayo Clinic’s knife analogy.

So I’m doing all the self-treatment exercises (cold packs, towel stretches, calf stretches). And I even went so far as to crawl into the back of my closet and resurrect a pair of black EasySpirit oxford/tennis shoes that I had bought for some trip or other and wore only twice.
UGLY SHOES

They are easily the most comfortable pair of shoes I have ever owned; but even for a non-vain person, they are also easily the ugliest shoes I have ever owned. However, because I wanted to get better, I put those ugly shoes on and wore them to work yesterday. And today. And I didn’t walk 2-to-4 Wednesday, or yesterday, or today. (I can feel the mental illness creeping in already.)

So tomorrow morning, bright and early, I expect to be cured. I’ve iced, I’ve stretched, I’ve worn the ugly shoes. I expect to rise from my bed a cured woman. I’m not much of an athlete; three days should be enough to cure me of my not-much-of-an-athlete injury. If I need to, I'll even walk my 2-to-4 wearing the ugly shoes.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hi I'm Jeanine's coworker, Apryl.

I was just reading your post. My mom has the same thing and she actually had orthotics made and she's cured. She has to wear them in her shoes almost all the time, but it's a small price to pay for a lifetime of comfort. Good luck with that, I hear it can be VERY painful!