Monday, February 21, 2011

Once Broken, They Never Heal

Luckily, I have only broken one bone in my life--at least, that I know of.  And that bone was in the smallest toe of my right foot.  This took place more than 25 years ago, when The Youngest was a baby.  I had just put her down in the crib for a nap and I had to rush out of the room to get to the bathroom.  (I'm ALWAYS rushing to the bathroom--just one of my 'normal' habits.)  As I was running into the bathroom, my little toe caught on the door jam and I heard a very loud 'crack.'  Immediately I knew the toe was broken.  There was no displacement of bones, but the pain was quite extensive and it began to darken within minutes.  I knew I needed to get to the hospital for an x-ray, but K was working.  He needed to be called home to drive me to the ER and I had to arrange for someone to watch the girls.  By the time I actually got a doctor to see my foot, an hour had passed.  The x-ray confirmed my diagnosis.  Of course, there is very little that doctors will do for a simple, broken toe.  I was sent home with instructions to 'buddy tape' the toe--that is, put tape around the broken one and the one next to it, so that the break would be stabilized.  And I then waited for the healing process to complete.  They don't tell you that broken bones never heal.

As I get older, I realize more frequently that my toe just isn't 'right.'  While I don't have the weather-predicting ability that some people do, my toe will let me know when there will be some sort of change.  Last week, during our February thaw, my toe was SCREAMING at me that change was coming.  Honestly, it felt as if I had a toothache in my toe--it just throbbed constantly.  I told K that we were in for some mighty bad weather and should prepare.  And change certainly came--except it wasn't what I expected.  The 'big' change turned out to be a drop in temperature.  A majority of the mid-west got BLASTED with big-time snow and we only got a drop in temps.  That is all.  I'm really quite disappointed, as something more should have come from the pain I was in.  I guess I won't rely on the 'broken-toe' method of predicting weather changes.

2 comments:

  1. Anonymous10:04 AM

    well, I never broke my knees (but I fell off my bike fairly regularly as a kid), and my knees ache with changes in barometric pressure. My mom's feet hurt when it's going to rain, and she never broke her feet (though I did break my foot, but it doesn't bother me when the weather changes.) She broke her wrist several years ago and that does bother her when it's going to rain, too. I guess the broken bones just tell us about barometric pressure and aren't a cheap alternative to the Weather Channel. ;-)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Yeah, I don't understand how some people can tell what the weather is going to do by the changes they feel in their bodies. And my broken toe is definitely not very accurate--but it does seem to hurt before SOME weather changes. I guess I will continue to rely on the weather channel, too. ;)

    ReplyDelete

Disquis

Being In a Funk

I'm still having a bit of a funk going on in my life. To be expected, I guess. But, it REALLY is affecting me to see my best friend ...