I Broke My Foot. Wah.

Slipped on a curb on my way to the gym, cracked my 5th metatarsal right in half. Shiny new lime green cast. :frowning: Call me crazy but I think I might be missing a few runs. :frowning:

Boo. Hisssssss. Grrrrrr.

You actually have much sympathy from me. I had a broken foot once; I’ve also had compound fractures. I’ll take the fractures given the choice. They healed faster and hurt less.

I’ve felt your pain. I broke my foot stepping off a curb back in 2005 – it was just about the worst six weeks of my life. I don’t drive, and I live up two steep flights of stairs with no elevator, so getting around was a nightmare.

Last week I slipped and twisted my foot, and when it started hurting I was terrified that I had broken it again. So I went to get it X-rayed, but fortunately this time it wasn’t broken, and the pain subsided after a few days.

I’m sorry you’re going through this, and hope that you are able to manage without too much difficulty.

Urgent Care freaked me out with their serious frowny faces and talk of “possibly needs surgery” and “you need an orthopedist today-right now.”

When the orthopedist said “Surgery? What? No. NoNoNo.” I was hardly upset about the cast.

I do live in an elevator building, so it truly could be worse.

Boy this is mundane. What have you broken recently, O Dopers?

A few hearts? Hey - a guy can dream, can’t he?

Sounds like you did good-bad. Mine was a couple pins, three weeks in a cast and another 10 on crutches and then a cane. I cracked the heel and a couple long bones. I was going down some stairs and I though I was at the bottom; I wasn’t. Did three steps at once and landed all of my 200 pounds (at the time) on a flat foot. Had a good doc though and the hospital we had back then (closed/consolidated now) was top notch.

This. This is why I don’t like going to the gym, it can be dangerous!

I cracked three metatarsals in my right foot a few years ago when I slipped and fell off our back stairs in the dead of winter. Had no idea they were broken until my foot swelled so much I couldn’t wear my work shoes. I was given a walking cast which didn’t cover my toes. In order to not miss time from work I had to get permission to wear this tent-like thing over the foot so my toes wouldn’t be exposed. As a result (and because I didn’t take any time off to let them heal) I’ve got a couple of nasty hammertoes on that foot.

When I went to the dr. because I thought I had tendonitis in my left hand back in October, lo and behold I’d somehow gotten a hairline wrist fracture that grew worse as time went on. The tendonitis was actually a large tear in the ligament separating the ulna and radius. The cast comes off today. I may need surgery.

I haven’t driven in over a month and I can’t begin to describe how stir crazy I am.

Wife broke the same bone beginning of this summer. Cast for 4-6 weeks, then a walking boot for 4-6 weeks.

Good luck. At least your summer’s not ruined.

Transverse fractures at the proximal end often need internal fixation but a mid shaft fracture can usually get by with immobilization for a couple months.

Yup, it’s broken right in the middle. And broken on an angle which he said was actually better for healing.

In crafting news, I am getting a lot of crochet projects done. I’m almost done with mittens for my nephew, started a new rugmaking project, and have a half-finished Tunisian-crochet afghan to work on. Also I need to practice my spinning since I supported a kickstarter campaign for a wool mill and am getting a POUND of roving this month.

I picked up “Black House” By Stephen King/Peter Straub (I just finished “The Talisman” which to me was just ok) but I’m having a hard time concentrating on it. I find myself reading the same paragraph over and over… there’s something about Peter Straub that just makes my eyes glaze over. Too much flowery description in a somewhat arch and cutesy, very not-Stephen-King way.

I’m sorry to hear about the broken foot. 5th metatarsals can be tricky, glad they say no surgery. BE CAREFUL.

I once got a stress fracture in my second metatarsal. It hurt worse than the bunion surgery I’d had six months earlier.

I’ve also broken toes because I’m a klutz who wore flip-flops almost exclusively for, oh, 15 years.

Its kind of interesting because it doesn’t hurt at all. In fact I was able to hobble along on it with just a cane, so I was sooo certain it wasn’t broken because it really didn’t hurt, and I am a HUGE CHICKEN for pain so its not one of those situations where a person just tolerates pain. I don’t. The urgent care nurse even remembered me due to the way I screamed and wailed and wept and got shocky over getting a couple of stitches in my finger a couple months ago.

Get an xray, just in case…" The rare occasion when “they” known what they’re talking about. :slight_smile:

Ouch - my sympathies!! I’m glad it’s not especially painful.

I broke my 4th metatarsal (left foot fortunately so I was still able to drive) into several bits about 3 years ago, walking down the stairs. The way I tell it, I had a fight with the staircase. It said there were 7 steps left, I said 6, and it won.

Hurt like a sumbitch. I was lucky it didn’t require an actual cast, “just” a boot, which meant I could take it off and let things air out.

I’m not sure how well it healed though - just recently I’ve started having pain right there when I walk barefoot on hard surfaces.

Look into getting a temporary handicapped placard for your car, if you think you need to limit walking at all. I did - and while I very rarely used it (and when I wanted to, the spots were usually filled) there were a couple of times where it really helped.

I don’t own a car, so that saves me from needing a parking placard :wink: Oh, and by the way I also can’t use public transportation, Dr.'s orders (too much walking, unbalanced standing). Simply put, I’m not planning on leaving my apartment in the next three weeks. I have sick leave coming and, this is NYC, which even more than “The City That Never Sleeps” should be called “The City Where You Can Get Everything Delivered.”

I twisted my foot at a folk festival, running on damp grass, but my knees and thighs got so sunburned that on the next day I didn’t even feel my foot. A couple of weeks later a co-worker said, “Look at your FOOT! It’s all SWOLLEN and you’re LIMPING!”

So I went to the doc. Metatarsal bone had broken – yes indeedy – but rather than put the foot in a cast (“It’s practically healed!”), he gave me a wooden-soled canvas boot to wear for a couple of weeks. OK.

Then I promptly re-broke the same bone when I got out of the canvas boot. On goes the cast. Up to the knee. Stayed in the cast for another four weeks. Then orthotic insoles. Etc.

PAIN IN THE BUTT!! :smack:

I fractured the 2nd and 3rd toes on my left foot back in March when something heavy that was precariously placed on top of something else on top of a cabinet way above my head (thanks, Dad!) fell on my bare foot. Simple toe fractures are not too bad, and oddly breaking two toes at once didn’t hurt more than when I’d broken one. Real pain was breaking my tailbone half a lifetime ago.

I posted about it at the time - a few years ago, I broke my cuboid bone and had a grade III sprain of my ankle when I tripped over a grout line. Seriously. Because that’s how I roll (my ankle.) It still aches now and again, but I don’t bitch too much since my husband’s wreck. Somehow, a sprain and one broken bone seem rather mundane compared to the 23 pieces of metal holding his ankle together since he got his foot entangled in the pedals when he pole-vaulted his patrol car.

My second-dumbest injury was the concussion that happened when my foot slipped as I was getting into my minivan. I cracked my head hard on the door frame, just north of my hairline. When I passed out*, the local police called my husband, who came and got me and assumed that I was passed-out drunk! :eek: The next day, the bruising began to seep down my face, and my whole forehead swelled - I looked like a Romulan with two black eyes, and poor Tony felt like a complete heel for his assumption.

*Thank goodness, in a parking space. I’d tried to drive home, and pulled in to a parking lot when I felt woozy.

Ah yes! I lived in Manhattan for 2ish years in the early 90s and loved that aspect of it. I hear ya on the public transportation, and of course taxis are their own nightmare if you need to go anywhere in heavy traffic - it can be better to walk!

I broke mine this time last year, in an alcohol related accident. I caught it on wine crate. While completely sober and wrapping Christmas presents. Not only did I break my 4th and fifth metatarsals I also dislocated my baby toe so it was at a right angle to the rest of my foot. I also broke my streak of going to yoga every day.

Not the best timing.

I broke the same bone about four years ago, in Pilates class jumping off a box less than a foot high. I’ve been told I need to find a less lame story for my injury!

I was in an air cast for a while but was able to walk on it ok pretty quickly. However after about 6 months the break had still not healed so I had a bone graft and a pin put in. Two weeks in bed plus 6 weeks on crutches, which caused bursitis in my shoulder. Aches from time to time after a run but mostly fine.