So, went to the doctor this morning.
Because, like, on Tuesday I was standing at my cutting table, you know, not lifting a heavy costume or anything, just standing, explaining a project to a stitcher and, like, I just shifted my weight onto my right foot and suddenly:
pa-POW!
pain spike in the back of ankle/ side of ankle/ entire formerly-sprained supposedly-recovered ankle department.
Decided to wait and see what happened.
What happened was lots of big fat swollen ankle and limping.
So, two days later, at the doctor’s with visions of, like, torn ligaments and traveling bone shards dancing in my head,
the doctor held my stupid foot in his hand and turned it every which-a-way, and then pinched all along the Achilles area, and then had me press on his hand, “like a gas pedal” and then said tendons and ligaments are inflamed and overworked, want rest, but otherwise fine. No x-rays needed.
Come back if it’s not feeling better in a week
Lay off the jogging. Maybe elliptical instead.
And I was like, “ok, but, like, my Achilles is ok? It’s ok really? I mean, the pain at the back, I didn’t feel that when I sprained it last summer and, I mean, I’m just worried because I didn’t fall or anything, just shifted weight, what happened, did something tear or something?”
And he patted my calf and said, “see how the muscle is rounded here? And between your ankle and calf, you leg is flat, right? Where your tendon is stretched? Well, when the Achilles breaks, this muscle, uh, moves. You wouldn’t see it here, it would be released from its tether and it would be a visible bulge much higher, like, up here near the back of your knee. People say it feels like they’ve been shot. You’re ok. Quit your whining and get up outta my office.”
Ok that last bit might be paraphrased a little.
And, I mean, I knew I hadn’t snapped an Achilles, because, like, I could still point my foot downward and I know how the calf muscle works. But, you know, just wanted reassurance. Didn’t expect to get the Grossest Reassurance Evar. Ew. Calf muscle visibly relocates. Gross. Bleh.
Really happy with the doctors diagnosis.
Was seriously worried I might have to re-title the blog:
Adult Beginner; A Cautionary Tale
So anyway, skipping ballet class until next week, then focus on upper body, not so much plié and relevé.
Smirnoff will be happy with that anyway, he tries to remind us that ballet resides in the expressive upper body, but all we wanna do is spin and brush our ears with our feet in developé.
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That sounds painful! And doctors can be quite a bit unsympathetic sometimes. I take drama lessons at my school, and last spring when we where setting up a play I had to run around in high heels on stage (like not very high heels, but perhaps not the best shoes to go running in for like a couple of hours straight). After a while I was feeling this crazy pain in my calfs, sort of between the back of the calf and the front, sort of like an inflammation but not quite and my mom MADE me see a doctor for it. Of course the doctor was male. And danish. So he couldn’t possibly understand the pain of running in high heels, and I couldn’t possibly understand what he was saying. Because when danish people speak danish they sound like they are having a potato stuck in their throat.. At least to a norwegian thats what it sounds like. He was sooooo making fun of me for coming to him with something so silly (to him at least), and I was soooo thinking he didn’t get to think it was silly ’cause he ain’t have the experience needed to think it was silly! He was all like lecturing-ish telling me like how much stress the unnatural position of the foot in high heels could sometimes be bad, or something like that, was a bit to annoyed to pay attention ’cause like I’m a girl. And a dancer. I know boring stuff like that.. Don’t need it explained like I’m a five year old you know.
Good luck with the recovering of your foot! At least you get to use all that focus that normally goes down to your feet, on your upper body instead! ;)
Potato! Heehee!
I went to the doctor once with a horrible pain in my arm. He moved my hand back and forth and said “well, it’s not tendinitis. If it was you would have punched me.”
Feel better soon! So that you don’t freak out any poor stitchers by collapsing on them! We are a sensitive and frightened lot. Like a room full of bunny rabbits sitting behind industrials.
Get well soon! I’m gald it’s nothing Too serious, when I read “pa-POW” I thought “Oh, no!” :O
Have a fast and good recovery :)
Good that its not too serious:) Get well soon!
One thing that happens after an injury is that the surrounding muscles get tight perhaps because the body’s trying to protect itself. If it’s not too painful, try to get the muscles above and below the injured area massaged or somehow worked on (like with a foam roller or a hard ball). Tendons and ligaments don’t stretch, so when they hurt, that means something that is normally stretchy is pulling on them, and that usually means tight muscles.
Oh, I’m so glad you said that! Have been worrying that pain must be coming from some kind of problem in the tenon, but maybe it’s more like a problem in the attached muscles.
Kind of reminds me of that time when I admitted to someone that I was really worried about my brain, because I had this awful pounding headache, and my friend was like, “no, dorkus, your brain has no nerve endings. The pain is in your noggin, but not from your brain.”
So, like, that was a relief too.
LOL! Many cases of tendonitis do start out with tight muscles, so don’t let it get away from you or else something wrong will happen to the tendon. Good luck!
I completely sympathize with your achilles panic. When I pulled mine I’m like OMG OMG. I had to seriously talk to myself. “Hey numbskull you are a nurse, you don’t have the dreaded torn achilles lump in your upper calf, calm down!” But I had to have my husband, two other nurses, assorted relatives and one MD look at it before I really believed it was ok. And NO of course I am not OCD! Well not diagnosed at least ;-) You just hear so many horror stories about this injury.
Oh good! Like they say, Hypochondria Loves Company
Also, do not walk ten miles on mardi gras day wearing rainboots. That’ll help you not get tendonitis like I did last spring. :)
Heal up girlie, it’ll all be fine.