My SO and I were wrestling for control of the t.v. remote last night and I think I broke my pinky toe! It’s kinda swollen and it hurts like crazy and I can’t wriggle it.
I’ve always heard that doctors can’t do anything for broken toes and that you have to let them heal on their own. Is this true?? Is there anything I can do to relieve some of the pain or should I try to go to the doctor?
Oooh, I broke one and they didn’t do anything, really. But I’d still go just in case. My toe healed okay, but now that I am an old hag, I have arthritis in that one toe. Have you ever tried to get sympathy for one toe arthritis? You can’t! People just laugh at you.
So, although I wish you well and hope your toe heals nicely, the small selfishtot inside me can’t help but hope that if you do get arthritis in your one little toe, that perhaps we can be toe arthritis sisters and give each other the pity that we so richly deserve.
Oh, and keep off of it, and if your whole foot turns into a big black bruise, don’t panic. Unless it starts oozing pus and stinking, then you got gangrene. That’s bad.
Carefully put a buddy bandage on it i.e. tie it to next toe. Then make your way to a Doc. At the very least he/she will give you something for the pain.
I broke my little toe once. Hurt like a sunuvabitch to walk.
All the doctor was able to do for me was tape the little toe to the toe next to it. I kept the tape on for about six weeks, going to the doctor every week to have the tape changed.
Finally realized this wasn’t anything I couldn’t do myself, and cancelled the last two appointments.
Take painkillers and tape your toe. That’s about it.
I dislocated and broke my left pinky toe when I was 14 and I had to go to the hospital to have it set. I broke it in such a way that the toe was sticking out from my foot at a 90° angle - picture holding your right hand in front of you - now stick the four fingers straight up into the air and stick your thumb out so it’s perpendicular to the fingers. That’s what my left foot looked like.
There was no way in hell I could have just ignored it and not gone to the hospital. My mother at first told me to “soak it”; eventually she resigned herself to the fact that warm water wasn’t going to magically align my toe into the correct position. At the hospital, they had to give me a shot and then yank my toe out and then push it back in, and I was on crutches for a couple of weeks.
My feeling is that if you think you need to see a doctor about it, then you probably really do need one.
I’m sorry to hear about your toe, really. 
I broke my big toe in two places a few years ago, but I didn’t know it was broken. Two week later it still hurt like hell, so I went and had it x-rayed. The nurses were very nice about it, but said “sorry, there is nothing we can do for it, try not to walk on it so much, and take some tylenol.” :eek:
The good news is, it will heal in a few weeks. 
I can only echo what has already been said. Tape the sucker to your next toe and let it be. Unless its doing something awfully funky, then get yourself to a doctor and have them tape it down.