Foot Fail

Tired of all the cute kid happenings and pictures? Good, I have an update on the used car of a body I'm working with. I am fairly certain the trouble started when the Ortho had the nerve to put my hip IN the socket after a lifetime of the ball and socket sitting demurely next to each other. Clearly, having the ball in the hip socket is best. That's where it is meant to be kept, but my body reacts strangely to everything. In my hip bone went to it's intended residence and off went my already wacky balance. Typically, I would distort my gait in any way needed to compensate, but my spine no long has the ability to be flexible. As you can imagine it's tricky. Nothing happens in a vacuum and this is the chain of events we'll follow to get to the next. The orthopedic spider web of cause and effect.

As a result of the elimination of my hip pain my feet started to pronate last year. I'd been having ankle pain off and on for a bit by the time I really took notice last February, in physical therapy of all places. My therapist answered that my shoes were collapsing inward because my feet were pronating. This was explained with as much concern as if he'd said my elbow itched because of a mosquito bite. Pronation is extremely common most people have a mild case at some point in their life. I was preparing for a wedding and had bigger fish to fry orthopedically so onto the back burner it went.

It was not until last summer that I even mentioned it to the Ortho. He wrote me a prescription for shoes and inserts to take to his "shoe guy." I tossed that into the black hole of my purse and, as any mother of two would have done, promptly put that errand on the end of the priority list. Soon after I got new sneakers and the problem got a lot easier to ignore. The new shoes had far less give than the old worn out ones and my feet were trapped in a more normal position.

Fast forward to this month when those same shoes are wore out and the problem is much harder to ignore. I tried anyway. There were other things to spend the time and money on. The tendon in my ankle now had a well established habit of swelling and preventing me from baring weight periodically. Usually it does this when I attempt to exit the car or get off the toilet after I've been on my feet a while, fun huh? I ignored it anyway. Until this week when two nights in a row the ankle pain gave way to spasms up both legs. The spasms went on for 6hrs the first time, over 24hrs the next and seemed unaffected by muscle relaxers.

Mike was scared and the internet only fueled his fears (MS, Cancers, etc...). I tried to tell him that it was my CP body's way of getting me to deal with the pronation issue after I'd overdone it once or twice. I still made no move to seek out the "shoe guy" for a day or two. It was a horrific nightmares while the spasms continued through the night that finally gave me a kick me in the butt. I called down and then raced over with Roo in tow that morning. I fully expected to write a check and walk out with some ugly shoes and slowly start to feel better.

As is often the case, I was wrong. The shoe guy was very nice, despite me bursting in the door and spilling my coffee. He simply explained he had nothing in my size and couldn't even order it. Sigh. He told me I needed rigid frame shoes with good heel support, not my usual sneakers. I was on my own to find them in my size, but once I did he could customize inserts for them easily. I had no idea how difficult a task he'd laid at my freakishly tiny feet.

Several diligent searches later and much hair pulling I've got nothing. A boot? I can't even tie a sneaker. Hmmm...orthopedic shoes for children? They start a size and a half bigger than my feet in most cases. Custom pediatric orthopedic shoes? We just tightened out belts for summer and it's not in the budget. Get a new pair of sneakers and hope it gets better for a while? Great plan except with the pain and spasms I'm beginning to fear permanent damage to my feet. AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH! This was supposed to be the easy one to fix.