It happens so quickly – but messes up your life so much!

03 Apr 2016 – The fall (W1)

It was a lazy Sunday afternoon, I’d started to clean the back garden and even done a spot of painting. I headed downstairs and thought I was on the last step. I wasn’t, I slipped on the next step down and landed really badly on my foot. The pain was intense! Very much like stubbing your toe really hard. Since I’d never broken any bones before I had no idea that I’d done anymore than badly bruise my foot. I managed to walk upstairs again, have a shower and have a lie down.

But unlike a stubbed toe – the pain only seemed to get worse and I pretty much knew that I’d done something bad. The pain seemed to come from around my toe and I figured I’d bruised or broken one of my toe bones. In my head it wasn’t a big thing, I’d just get a bandage around my toe and take a few days off work to let it heal a bit. But figured I should go to the hospital anyway to get it checked out. So we headed to hospital, by now, the foot was becoming quite painful. It was a Sunday night – the worst time to go to A&E in the UK! 3 hours later I had an x-ray taken. This is what came back

What I thought was a small hairline fracture turned out to be a pretty big spiral fracture of the 5th Metatarsal! I couldn’t believe it! The nurse then said, it’s going to need a cast. This was the last thing I had been expecting all night! Because it was late at night she put me in a temporary cast to keep my foot still until I could see the Doctor in the Fracture Clinic. It was a pretty ugly cast to be honest, and it was up to me knee! It just came as a total shock to me to all of a sudden have this lumpy heavy thing attached to my leg – and there was nothing I could do about it.

This wasn’t the end of it! Because so many people develop DVT – the NHS has started to prescribe Clexane (blood thinner) to all those with a leg cast! So we had to wait another 2 hours to see a doctor and have blood tests (at 2am in the morning!). I was then given a course of injections which I need to administer myself on a daily basis. They also gave me crutches!

It was 10 days before I could be seen by the Doctor and in that time I was wearing this cast:

Useful Tips for a cast and crutches!

• I started taking bone supplements (Vitamin D, Calcium, Magnesium)
• Upped my intake of protein
• Bought a bath stool off Amazon as it’s impossible to shower without one!
• Bought a Limbo to keep my cast dry (really great product)
• Bought a second pair of crutches so I wouldn’t have to carry both up the stairs (I could leave one at the top!)
• Get a backpack so you can carry stuff around – you literally can’t do much when you first start using crutches
• Plan everything in your head for the next few hours, you don’t want to go downstairs and find you’ve forgotten something!
• Make sure you have some baggy trousers, casts are pretty big!
• Dramatically cut my coffee consumption!
• Stopped drinking
• Lots of Vitamin C is key in the first 2 weeks!
• Eskimo oil capsules – amazing for stopping itching!

So for 10 days I basically hobbled around home doing my work and trying to cook dinner for myself. It’s hard at first then, but your other leg tends to take over and soon enough you find that you can stand on your good leg like those flamingos. Planning is key, make sure you mentally map out what you want to do for the next few hours so you can put everything into a bag and take it with out around the house. Have a central place where you’ll spend most of your time and make things convenient for yourself. Mine was the kitchen and I put plastic bags around for bins and put sugar and tea on the kitchen table so I wouldn’t have to move around so much.

14 Apr 2016 – (W2) Seeing the Doctor for the first time

He cut off my cast and told me that my fracture was quite bad and it would probably take a little longer to heal. He asked if I wanted

1. Have a new cast fitted – one which was a bit more carefully done
2. Have a boot fitted
3. Leave it as it (which he didn’t really recommend)

I asked if there want any advantage over the suggestions? Was any better? He said that the boot and the cast were exactly the same. The only difference was that the boot was removable so you could shower and clean your leg. He also said that I should keep the boot on for 2 weeks all the time (even in bed)  and definitely keep the weight off my foot. He said that after 2 weeks I should start to put a little bit of weight on my foot and gradually build it up. He also said that after 2 weeks I should be able to not have to wear it in bed either.

To me it sounded quite soon, but he was pretty adamant that the bone would heal at it’s own pace and putting weight on it after 2-3 weeks wouldn’t cause any issues. I was a bit torn between a cast and a boot – a cast seemed better as it would make sure my foot was in a single place all the time, surely better for healing? But I’d been wearing a cast for 10 days and it had started to become uncomfortable! So I chose the boot in the end – I liked the idea of not having to wear it in bed and also being able to put some weight on it which hopefully should mean that my muscles start to get used earlier.

My next appointment is May 26th!

15 Apr 2016 – (W2) The Boot

I’m still in two minds as to if I should have got a boot. The problem with the boot is that it’s much bulkier than the cast. You can wear trousers over it so you need to take your foot out of the boot and then put your trousers on and then put your boot on. Which sounds fine, but it’s bloody painful when you do it because you have to re-do the whole boot up and tighten it. So for about an hour after you do it, there was a lot of pain (which I never got with the cast)

The up side though is that it was lovely to shower without the cast and to see my legs again! Also, I could see that I’d already lost muscle control of my toes, they only moved a little so I’ll try and do more exercises.

I’ll update more in a week or two to tell you how it’s going!

18  Apr  2016 – (W3) The Boot Update

So it’s bee two weeks since my fracture. Having the boot means I can see my foot in the clear and can see when it swells and how much my leg is starting to wither away. Honestly, the muscle that was on my leg is just a flobby piece of fat at the moment.

The boot has been OK. But I have noticed a few things with it. First, I wake up in the morning with a pain in my foot – its localised at the site of the bone break. Since I never had any pain in the cast, I can only assume the boot is causing this. The pain normally wears off after about an hour of being out and about. The boot generally feels good during the day and to be honest I’m starting to notice it a lot less during the day. I still feel uncomfortable taking my foot in and out of the boot as it’s always a little painful and I’m aware that I’m moving the bones about, however, I’m going to assume since the Doc did say I can not have it in a cast that or  boot that generally, there is pain to be expected and that it’s to move the foot every so often.

I will also say that I’m getting a little more confident about putting some weight on my foot. Whilst I haven’t done this yet, nor will I until another 10 days, I am feeling that my foot is getting a bit stronger – and apart from the early morning pain, it’s generally good during the day.

What the doctor said about milk

He said milk will not help whatsoever. He did however say that Vitamin D is vital. Since I’m Indian I need to eat more Vitamin D than normal – so the best advice is to grab as much sunshine as possible. So I spent the whole of yesterday out in the garden 🙂 I also am taking supplements. Protein is also a big thing, protein is vital in Bone growth so I’m trying to make sure I have lots during the day. So i’m eating cottage cheese, chia seeds (which also have lots of other goods things) and generally fish or chicken.

25th April 2016 (W4) – I can feel it getting better

Something strange has happened over the last week. I can feel my foot getting better. Before, I had pains in my foot and generally had to be very careful anytime I moved my foot about. But over the last 4 or 5 days the foot seems to have become a bit stronger. I noticed that I could push my foot into the sole of the boot a bit harder and it didn’t ache like it used to. And also, when it was out of the boot, it didn’t ache as much when I let it ‘just be’ (no weight bearing though). On Saturday, I put a small amount of weight on it and, whilst it felt very weird, it didn’t hurt as much as I was expecting. Since then I’ve tried to keep to boot off during a few hours in the evening so I can bend my toes and get used to moving the ankle up and down a little. From this week I will continue to put a small amount of weight on it and from next week will try and start putting more and more weight on it to see how it goes. Just very strange how just a week ago, I was waking up with lots of aches in the foot, and now it seems to be much stronger!

29th April 2016 (W4) – Weight Bearing

Yay! Over the last few days I’ve felt confident enough to start putting weight on my foot! It’s happened really quickly, I was feeling that my foot was better and I decided to try and take a few steps. The first thing was to just stand with most of my weight on my right foot and rock a little onto my left. When that didn’t hurt I had a go at walking a little with the aid of crutch. At first it was awkward and there was some stabbing paints at my heel, but that quickly went away and within 10 minutes I could take little steps. I now take my boot off in the evenings and walk slowly between the front room and the kitchen. Yesterday, I was walking in the office without the boot and whilst by the end of the night it was a little painful, i’m feeling much better about my foot now. I’ve been told lots of stories about the 5th Metatarsal bone taking a long time to heal and not to be WB (I almost didn’t get a boot because I thought it would be better to leave it in a cast for 6 weeks!). But I’m glad I got the boot, the foot is obviously still healing but using the bones and muscles helps to remould the callus and hopefully add some strength to it.

So for anyone reading this, by week 3.5 my foot was strong enough to start bearing weight. My advice at the moment is that you should start to notice when your foot is stronger, if you have a boot, try and wiggle your toes each night and every so often push into the sole of the boot. When that action starts to feel OK and stable (it doesn’t hurt, or feel weird) then start experimenting with putting a little weight on it, and see how you get on!

05 May 2016 (W5) – Getting better, but cautious!

I’m now in limbo land. Over the past 5 days I have been regularly walking without my boot on. Very slow and with a limp, but the foot can bear my full weight now. I can even balance clumsily entirely on the bad foot for a few seconds. However, I’m very aware it’s not healed properly. The wrong twist (or someone stepping on it) is incredibly painful. The issue now is that whilst i’m at home I obviously like being able to walk about normally (all be it with a limp) and to be able to carry things with both hands. I can also sleep without the boot on now. This is all really positive, but I am aware that putting too much stress on it, is probably not a good thing. So for the half the day I keep the boot on, and I’ve reverted to keeping it on at night. That’s 8 easy hours that I can keep the foot still and in place and I don’t get annoyed by it.

Currently I can walk on the foot for around 3-4 hours without the boot, and then the muscles get very tight and I need to put the foot back in the boot. But the sharp stabbing pains that used to be there when I put pressure on my heel have now gone.

For now relatively happy with progress!

12th May 2016 – Ups and Down

I’m fast approaching the 6th week of my accident, and things are looking really good! Since last night, I’ve not worn my boot and my foot is feeling OK! The last week has been all sorts of ups and downs, in my last post I had just regularly started to go longer times without my boot and putting full weight on it. However, there were a few days where my foot was very sore. I think this was because I was using my foot normally. When you first start bearing weight on the foot, you’ll not be walking normally, you’ll be walking in a way which reduces the stress on that foot, and not using your regular walking muscles. So now that slowly you start to use them, they moan and ache until they eventually capitulate and start to strengthen.

I remember when I was first told I needed to have a cast and the nurse said it was 6 weeks, I was horrifed! After reading other people’s experiences, I’m very happy it has happened within 6 weeks – I still have a way to go, for example, my calf muscles on my left leg are very tight in the morning so need to figure out how to stretch them. Tonight I’m going to head out my shoes on both feet for the first time! Yay!

May 26th – Discharged

So it’s been 2 weeks now since I wore the boot! And things are getting better (slowly!). The transition to barely being able to put weight on my foot to being able to stand on both of them seems relatvively quick now, but the progress from being able to walk and being able to walk normally looks like it’ll be a bit of a long slog.

So – two weeks ago I took the boot off for good and decided that I would start wearing shoes again. The first time everything had to be slow. I used to take my crutches with me just so people knew why I was walking slowly. But after a few days I just walked without them with a bit of a limp. There is definitely a difference between walking without shoes and walking without shoes. The first time I put my foot in a shoe, it was quite painful to push it in. Walking on it involved a fairly noticeable limp and you don’t walk ‘normally’. But I’ve made sure to keep walking on it and to go out for a bit of a walk everyday.

This has helped and now I can walk fairly normally (still a bit of a limp) but I can tell this is starting to go away. I walked about 2 miles on Sunday before my foot got really tired. My foot still gets tired but now after a fairly long day of standing or walking on it.

Went back to the fracture clinic today and had another xray taken. Here’s the how’s the bone has healed (First pic is 1 week in, second is 7 weeks in)

How my bone has healed after 7 weeks

Basically, you can still clearly see where the break is, but the insides you can see a whitish haze which is the new bone building up. The doctor said it’ll be another 4 weeks before I can play any sports again, so I  just need to keep walking on it and using it until the bone is completely filled in and i’m ready to break it again!