Old ancle injurt and now my big toe :)

Hi

Hmm, I am completely clueless when it comes to aspects of the body like this.

Around 6 years ago I twisted my ankle missing a stair and it blew up like a balloon. I never knew it was as damaged until the next day, however I was in UK at the time and didn't really have anyone to advise so I just iced it and massaged it daily. The issue is this injury has haunted me for 6 years and keeps coming back.

Right so now about 5 weeks ago I was going to the toilet at night and kicked my big toe freakin hard "the same toe on the foot that my ankle is damaged" on the bed. Hmm, it didn't actually start hurting as much as it did around a week later where I actually couldn't wear any work shoes. The days I did it was so extremely saw at night that for 4/5 days afterwards I would wear slops to work.

Now I'm lying here in bed in allot of pain (ye after my surgery too ) however I can't get my ankle comfortable (it is my left foot) I feel I need to turn the foot to the right a little to take that constant pain away and what I have noticed is I can't move my big toe at all, it struck me in my boredom today when I was recovering in the lounge, all the toes next to it move but not the big one, its really weird. It might twitch a little when I move my toes, but doesn't move much.

Any ideas on how to treat this as I'm going back to work soon as really have to start wearing shoes again and I really need to get these injuries resolved.

What would be the least cost effective way to handle this as my bill for my surgery is through the roof and the last thing I feel like doing now is forking out on x-rays and specialist bills again?

Sweeeeeet.

Hey thats a crappy one. You will need to make sure nothing is cracked or broken. Maybe the quack will be able to say without an Xray with some certainty. Your inability to move it could be a cause for concern.

Arg, guess I can get away with another visit to the doc

Rather safe than regret it later. Hang in there...

I dont think an xray is necessarily needed. The injury happened rather a while ago and any fracture would be healed by now. What you may find is that the joints of the foot and ankle have never completely recovered from the sprain and there may be scarring of the ligaments involved. Any decreased mobility of that ankle will eventually affect the rest of the foot, as would any instability. What you really need is something that an xray wouldnt provide which is a assessment of the foot and ankle, including motion palpation of all involved joints to asses their stability and mobility. A chiro can do this, and should be able to restore any lost motion or help restore stability to any unstable segments. Ofentimes mobilisation of the foot and ankle joints through manipulation can work wonders with this sort of thing. After a proper assessment is done your chiro can decide whether xrays would be of benefit

Ah, from the horses mouth Was more concerned with the newer injury of the big toe and its mobility. Unless i misunderstood. As you say the older injury even if it was slightly fractured would have healed by now. If it was, just for arguments sake, and healed on its own but doing so slightly out of its normal positioning thus causing a shortening of some of the tendons, then this could be the cause of some of the current immobility of the joint. Some rehab will do wonders in this case.

Yeah, a mis-healing (shall we say) of any fracture is possible, tho for positioning to be affected the degree of fracture and damage that'd have to have occured would have made it very unlikely that pump would have been able to get thru it without emergency care. More than likely in this case the joints themselves are still affected from the original sprain and the big toe injury simply aggravated or slightly added to the existing condition. Yeah rehab of the foot and ankle will certainly help, and any rehab should include mobilisation, strengthening of the surrounding musculature, proprioceptive techniques, mobility exercises and treatment of any ligament scarring and muscle spasm

I understand, thanks for clarifying. Hoever after all this rehab and stuff i think pump would have been happier with just hearing Xray :laugh:

Haha, that might be true... But Xray would have just been the start...

Thanks, appreciate the help, have some karma

PS: If I massage under the calf right the way down too the back of my foot, its the first time I actually am not having pain in my foot / ankle, I was trying to rub my foot and felt that it worked its way up the side of my achilles tendon just to below my calf. It is like I have to keep putting pressure on there to be able to take some of the relief off my foot.

So I guess you right and getting work done on my foot is the best option. Spike if you know anyone in JHB around the Sandton area, please let me know.


The funny part of that story when I hurt my ankle was I just got to London and needed to start making money from the get go so I did furniture removals at a place down from my house. Now that day I said to myself, hmm, I really don't feel like this (you and 1 other guy moving an entire house) so I said let me pretend to them I hurt my ankle, so what do you know I was carrying some boxes down the stair and missed it and twisted my ankle, hence the reason I didn't know if the pain was as real as it was or if it was in my head... hehe, lets just say, the following day I knew it was not in my head, and so was my job for the next 3 or so weeks

Once again, was a dumbass and didn't let it recover or had it seen too so ja, I think I could have avoided all this if I had just had it taken care of by the professionals back then.

Sweet

Mr pump i dont know anyone up there personally, but take a look on chiropractic.co.za and search your area