This might get a little gross
Random crap happens to me. Random, pain-inducing things. Like getting run over by a car on my bike. Or getting bit in the face by a brown recluse. Or simply slipping in my kitchen, wearing fuzzy socks and winding up with a broken foot. … I could go on, but this gets long enough.
Some are my fault. (Never hold on to the back of a moving car while riding a skateboard. Sure, Michael J. Fox made it look easy in “Back to the Future,” but even at a lowly 20mph, it’s just not a good idea when there are pebbles on public streets that can make you lose your balance. Jumping off and trying to run to catch yourself will result in a face-slide and perhaps a somersault or two, so don’t try that, either.)
Others really are random acts of injury.
Carrying laundry upstairs the other day, I reached the top landing and heard a very loud, “POP!” Dropping the basket and cussing the kids in my head, I looked down to search for the toy I must have stepped on, only to find carpet.
“What the…” I sat on the floor, grabbing my foot. My second and third toes were locked in a rigid “V” position with what felt like the worst foot-cramp I’d ever experienced. Rolling it over, I found a nickle-sized ball forming in the ball of my foot, centered below the two toes.
“Well… This is new,” I muttered. Pushing the laundry to my room on my knees, my kids followed, barking behind me. (They thought that was a very fun game, playing “Bolt” with Mommy.)
Asking the kids to give me a minute (I don’t like them to see me express pain), I closed the door and pulled myself up with my bed. I tried to put pressure on the “cramp,” but the pain was a bit too much. Figuring it’d just have to work itself out, I attempted a few ways of walking around my bed (where I’ve learned I can comfortably fall). Every angle that I tried to place my foot to take a step left me with shooting, burning pain and face-planted in my comforter.
“Unacceptable. I have things to do today.” I crawled to the bathroom and pulled out an ace-bandage. Clenching my teeth, I wrapped it and re-wrapped it even tighter, until the gap between my toes was nearly closed. With a deep breath, I pulled myself up using the door frame. Triumphantly, I was able to hobble on my heel across the room and back to the bustle of the kids and the pets in the house.
Passing Luc’s room, he saw my bandage instantly and raced to investigate. “Oh no, Mommy! Did you hurt yourself?”
“Yes, but I’m okay.” I rustled his hair.
“Mommy? Can I please have some juice please?” He didn’t mention it again as I limped after him, fulfilling juice and snack and car and Dora and shoes and outside and sprinkler and bubble requests throughout the day.
The next morning, without a bandage, my toes had only a small gap between them. The bump showed signs of bruising on the ball of my foot, but was smaller than the day before. “Progress.” The bandage was only on a few hours that day before I was comfortable enough to hobble on my heel or side of my foot without it.
The following day, my limp began to subside.
Yesterday, however, I woke up with a change. I didn’t even notice it at first, since I thought it was improving enough that I was over inspecting it. It was feeling good enough, in fact, that I found myself pacing my room on what was supposed to be the first of several business-related calls I made that day. It wound up being my last, as I started to lose feeling in my toes. A cold sensation changed to tingling, as if my extremities were falling asleep. As it crept deeper into my foot, I felt my palms begin to sweat as my heart-rate elevated in a panic. Luckily already on the last leg of the conversation, I was able to amicably part ways rather than lose-my-shit on a business call.
Dropping to the floor, I finally took a close look at the oddly injured area. A new bruise ran like a stripe on the inside of my second toe. Rolling my foot over, I found a large, fresh, purple blotch in the center of my foot, about an inch below the original, diminished knot.
“What. The. FUCK?!?!” With now a complete loss of feeling in three toes and the tingling sensation even deeper in my foot, I fled my room and raced to the phone. The fact that it didn’t hurt (other than the prickling feeling that’s associated with losing circulation) made the sweat start to bead under my shirt and on my face as my panic attack escalated.
“I think I have, like, a blood clot or something,” my voice shook as I concluded my saga to the poor woman who picked up the phone at the appointment-desk. “Or maybe my foot is dying.”
“I’m sorry, but I don’t have any appointments available today.”
“I don’t care that you don’t have any appointments available!” I shrieked. “Call Kettler. I’ll send him an email. I’ll drive to his house! Don’t make me do that!!”
“Let me have you talk to a triage nurse, hold on.”
After rattling off my story to her, I was in. Could I be there in 50 minutes? Hell yes, I could.
I threw my plans for the day out the window as I raced toward my doctor’s office.
My husband met me to keep the kids occupied with reading and videos, rather than my touting them around the office. I, on the other hand, limped after test-orders, from room to xrays to room.
Once the morning was successfully beaten, I got the answer I was … well … not really waiting to hear at all.
Apparently, I had a cyst.
A big, funky cyst that attached itself to a tendon in my foot.
When I walked upstairs, barefoot, with a measly load of laundry, it popped. And all hell broke loose in my foot.
Seriously.
My agony. My swelling. My bruising. My gimpified limp. All for a cyst.
Ew.
At the end of this, I’ve decided not to post any pictures. Sorry for the long-winded verbiage with absolutely no benefit to the time you spent to get here. But I thought everyone should know that you can get a cyst in your foot. And it can f* you up.
The reason, per the doc? “They just happen.”
The cure? “Stay off it, and use ice.”
Awesome. That’s what I was doing before I dropped a co-pay.