Okay… elsewhere it says that beans are probably okay. Whatever.
Wow. That was fast. I already got the uric acid results-- I only gave the blood about 2.5 hours ago.
Mine is 4.9 mg/dL. Standard range is 2.6 - 7.2 mg/dL. So NOT elevated. As I sit here with a Toe on Fire-- a new amazon original series.
Have you injured the same sided leg in any other way? Maybe a bruise or a sprain or even a scratch? Sometimes something like this will set off a gout attack in either same-sided fingers or toes? Or sometimes extreme stress will trigger an attack. I think I inherited this from my Mom.
I have had sciatic pain on that side off and on for a couple of years. I’ve had my share of stress.
Wikipedia explicitly mentions that beans and other plant based sources of purines do not cause gout.
That’s good. I like my pinto beans.
I’m still at level 10 pain-wise. Sometimes it backs off to an8 for a few minutes. I guess sleep is out tonight. Again. 
My father had gout, and the colchicine was a wonder drug for him.
He ate all of the wrong foods between the ages of 26 and 46, because he spent nearly half his time in the Soviet Union*. He ate lots of organ meat soup, and organ meat dumplings, and chickens with stuffing make from organ meats, lots of tongue sandwiches, lots of sausages, and wursts (he didn’t worry about kosher in the Soviet Union is the 50s, 60s and 70s).
BANG! GOUT
He ended up being so sensitive, that a second cup of coffee, or salad dressing with a little sherry could set him off, and yeah, nuts, too. That was just the last few years of his life, though. He wasn’t diabetic, but he died of pancreatic cancer, so who knows what was happening.
*The secret to my parents’ long marriage was that they each allowed the other to take research grants, and travel internationally to do work. My brother and I got single-parented by one or the other of them about 1/3 of our lives, but it was very different from having divorced parents, when the parent caring for you initiates making homemade mother’s/father’s day cards to send to the parent abroad, and wakes you up at 3am for a happy birthday phone call.
Thelma, ask for pain meds. You shouldn’t have to have that level of pain.
Colchicine is best for acute attacks; allopurinol is more for prophylaxis. Dad would have been put on allopurinol if he’d had a 3rd attack.
Stronger anti-inflammatory meds usually work best, especially indomethacin. For really bad cases a short course of steroids can help. In any case, let the doctor evaluate it and make sure it is really gout.
I hope she can do it over Zoom.
Weird night. Possibly TMI follows, but I got nuttin’ else to do at the moment. 
I took 400 mg IB around 7 pm but only took one more 200 mg when I went to bed around 11. Pain at a 10. Managed to fall asleep from sheer exhaustion. I woke up around 2 am, pain still at a 10, and took another 400 mg, figuring enough time had passed. Within about half an hour I started to feel very weird. (I told you I was The Princess and the Pea.) I felt like I might throw up. I felt chilled and got back into bed, pulling all the covers over me. Got shaky/trembly. Got up again. It’s like all the IB I had been taking finally kicked in and I was feeling it. The pain level in my foot/feet FINALLY came down to about a 4-5. But the weird way I was feeling disturbed me. I NEVER did any recreational drugs-- I just can’t stand the feeling of being drugged.
I hate when stuff like this happens-- feeling physically weird in the middle of the night when you’re all alone. 
Anyhoo, I checked my blood sugar and it was 93, which is perfect for me. I took my temp and it was 98.5, so at least for now, the chills weren’t the sign of a fever. I took my BP, which was 173/82. Too high, but then I was pretty anxious. Sat and did some deep breathing and took it again: 151/76, still too high, but coming down.
The foot pain is now at about a 3, I don’t feel like throwing up any more, but still a teeny bit shaky and queasy. Oddly, this hasn’t precipitated a panic attack, which would be typical for me.
I’m soooo grateful the pain has finally gone down. Not gone, but holy shit-- not off the charts like it was for the previous 36 hours or so.
I need more sleep-- only got a couple of hours… don’t know what I’m going to do right now… later…
For those who bought the enhanced version with the Director’s commentary…
I lay on a heating pad on my bed for a while, which is one of my pre-bedtime rituals. One of my cats crawled up into the crook of my arm to snuggle. I love it when she does that. I told Alexa to play some meditation music. Pain headed up to a 6, then back down to a 3. BP now 134/68. (I never checked my BP at home, only my blood sugar, but about a month ago at my annual Senior Wellness Zoom appt, the doc said get a cuff and start doing it, so I do.) Other cat has now come back in the house. Gonna head for the barn and try to grab some zzzs.
This is ThelmaLou’s world…
you’ve already considered/discounted gout as well as plantar-fasciitis as culprits? it’s what i deal with … having been diagnosed with dvt*(deep vein thrombosis). while i do ‘manage’ the condition adequately … in my case, the only cure would be surgery(coronary artery stent)*. and, yes, this entails the sobering discomfort of the above described symptoms.
If not gout, yeah, consider your AI. The antihormonals are brutal. Glad your BP went down and hope you got some more sleep.
My brother inherited gout from our grandfather. Fortunately, I did not.
They would both endorse Josh Billings’ statement that, “The best medicine I know for rheumatism is to thank the Lord that it ain’t gout.”
(Billings was a 19th century humorist, contemporary with Mark Twain)
Breaking news: Just had a Zoom appt with my PCP’s office. She’s going to put me on a one-week course of prednisone then Zoom with me again in a week. If all goes well, she will put me on Allopurinol. She said even though my uric acid level was normal, it might have been higher earlier in week when the attack first hit.
The IB I took at 7:30 this morning has fully kicked in and my pain level is 0-1, thank God.
When I had the sciatic pain a couple of years ago, my first thought was DVT, and I had something (can’t remember-- sonogram? x-ray? to rule it out). This pain is so totally centered on my big toe that I’m thinking it’s not plantar fasciitis.
According to my fitbit I slept about 4 hours in two 2-hour chunks.
BrotherCadfael, just wanted to say I loved your TV show. Haven’t read any of the books though… I’ll bet you have. 
ThelmaLou, I don’t have anything to add as you’ve received lots of good information already, but just wanted to say I’m sorry you’re dealing with this.
As soon as I read comments in the neighborhood of “big toe, extreme pain,” I was pretty sure it was gout. My dad suffered from it terribly when he was younger and I remember his pain levels were acute. I hope you recover from this attack soon and don’t suffer any more in the future. I know my dad got it pretty well under control. I don’t think he’s had an attack in many years now.
Take good care and I hope you are better soon!
Next time you talk to your dad, would you ask him how he got it under control? I’d be interested in knowing. What does/did he do when he felt an attack coming on, did any topical remedies work, does he take tart cherry juice as a prophylactic?
As we get older, we add to our compendium of knowledge based on our diseases and the diseases of our friends/family. That’s how I became knowledgeable on kidney transplants, diabetes, heart attacks, non-Hodgkins lymphoma, breast cancer, and XLH (x-linked hypophosphatemia).
I appreciate the good wishes.
Not to scare anyone, but I just read this article in the NY Times about a strange symptom of covid-19 that appears in the toes: Covid Toe.
Well, I came in here to say I hope you don’t have gout. Now I have to add I hope to hell it’s not that other option.
Shit, this fucking disease has more weird symptoms than anything I’ve ever seen.
Excuse my language. I’m just so sick of all this worry.
Hoping for a good outcome for you ThelmaLou.