Are Ya Kidding Me?

Well, it's back.  That chronic, recurring pain in my foot.  I don't know whether this is good timing or bad timing.  It's bad timing in that it's two weeks from today that I leave for the UK and a 160 km hike.  It's good timing in that I have a doctor appointment this week to have a prescription refilled.  So while I'm there I'm going to demand that he send me for an x-ray.  Because I've come up with a new diagnosis.  I had nothing else to do at 4:00 a.m. so I researched the whole foot pain thing again.  And here's what I've come up with -- Accessory Navicular Syndrome.

An accessory navicular is an extra piece of bone in the foot right above the arch.  Something one is born with.  And you can go your whole life never knowing you have it.  Unless it starts to give you problems.  Like pain on the inside of the foot.  Like when it aggravates the posterior tibial tendon.  That's where the "syndrome" part comes in.

So I lay there in bed poking and prodding my aching foot and damn if I don't think I can feel a more protuberant bone on the inside of my right foot.  Sure, it could be some swelling.  And yeah, it could just be me being delusional.  It's not noticeably visible but it definitely hurts to press on that bone.  The usual treatment protocol applies:  RICE -- rest, ice, compress, elevate.  Ibuprofen.  I found a few physio exercises to add to the mix.  Surgery is a last resort to remove the piece of bone.  

And if the x-ray shows no accessory navicular?  Well then I'm going to demand an MRI.  And if that's negative for anything involving the tendon, I'm going to demand a referral to an orthopedic specialist.  I had the best one some 35 years ago when I lived in Ottawa and suffered from debilitating shin splints. After years of "try this, try that" from my doctor in Toronto, this guy took one look at my bowed legs and recommended surgery to remove a wedge of the tibia to straighten them out.  He told me he couldn't guarantee it would cure my shin splints but he did guarantee that if I didn't have the surgery I would be crippled from arthritis in my knees by the time I was 50.

I had the surgery, one leg at a time, spending six weeks after each in an ankle to hip straight leg cast.  I never suffered from shin splints again.  Had I not had the surgeries I never would have been able to handle the physical training required to get through the police academy.  And at age 58, no sign of arthritis.

So yeah, I'm going to "demand."

Because the advice "if it hurts, stop doing it" just ain't cutting it anymore.