I'm finally walking again! My feet are healed and I'm out of the wheelchair and walking without crutches!
It is such a blessing. It's been a long ordeal. Thank you to everyone who prayed for me! Sorry I didn't blog through it. Not sure why, maybe a touch of depression and lack of vision--seemed like there was nothing to say accept "I'm still muddling along waiting to heal." It also seemed like things were so undecided and up in the air most weeks that I barely knew what was up myself.
In case you missed it, in mid July I stepped into a hole unexpectedly and injured my left foot. I wrote about it in my last post. My right foot was slightly sprained at the same time.
My right ankle healed quickly from that fall but then partway through the recovery of my left foot, in a sort of freak accident I sprained my right foot again. Thankfully both feet are now healed.
We're still not sure all of the details of the injuries to my left foot. My podiatrist x-rayed it four weeks ago when I was finally able to see him. He said there was a widened area on the fourth metatarsal bone which seemed to indicate a healed fracture. That is consistent with where the initial bruising and worst pain was (and where it still hurts after I've been on my feet for a while). I asked about the 2nd metatarsal. He did not think there was a fracture there. He said the pain in that spot might have been from a strained ligament. (As I mentioned in my previous blog post the radiologist who interpreted the first x-ray said there might have been a fracture on the 2nd metatarsal.) There were also no doubt various other, mostly undiagnosed, soft tissue injuries and strained places. An MRI showed a small healed tear in a tendon. Since it was healed by the time of the MRI the podiatrist said it might have been from some other time.
The podiatrist ordered therapy to stretch and strengthen everything. So I've been seeing a therapist a couple of times a week and doing therapy on my own twice a day.
About two weeks ago I started walking with crutches. I tried a cane too but that didn't give enough support. Then last Monday the therapist said I walked better without either one and she wanted me to put more pressure on my left foot so she took me off everything.
There have been a lot of firsts since then. The first time I stood at the sink to brush and water-pik my teeth was thrilling! By the time I was done though my legs were near collapse. Clearly I will need to pace myself. (Don't worry it wasn't the first time I brushed my teeth! During my recovery I did it at the kitchen table.)
Tomorrow it will be a week since I got off the crutches. I've had a lot of other "firsts" as well. Such as making dinner and driving myself to the therapist appointment. John was particularly thankful for those two.
Here are a few photos from our ordeal:
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| Our bathroom doorway is too narrow for the regular wheelchair we borrowed. So John rigged up this contraption to get me into the bathroom to take a shower. The first time we used it, it worked flawlessly. The second time, though, was not so good! It collapsed under me. The orange strap must have been a little loose and one of the chair legs came off the platform. In my attempt to keep from falling and to protect my left foot I ended up spraining my right one. I'm glad I wasn't hurt any worse. But coping with two injured feet was definitely a challenge. After that a friend lent us a "transport chair" that is narrow enough to get through the bathroom doorway. So I was able to have showers without incident. The transport chair only has small wheels though, which meant I was not able to propel it myself so I still needed the regular wheelchair for everything else. |
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| A friend sent me a care package to cheer me up. It included this kit to make these happy little pansies. |
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| Another project I worked on is a scrapbook of my years at university (Cal Poly San Luis Obispo). It's not quite done. I'm hoping to finish it before the holidays. |
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| One of my foot exercises is to pick up small objects with my toes. Here I am picking up a large paperclip. |
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| We got this "peddler" to use for therapy. We didn't realize we already had one in the attic. John found it later when he was looking for something else. So now we have two. I suggested we could use them together. It might be fun to sit side by side and peddle together while watching tv! John didn't seem excited though. |
