I got up at the alarm, as planned. I ate breakfast as planned. And that’s about as far as I got with my plans for today.
Every now and then, my left foot will get a shooting pain up through the heel making it impossible for me to put weight on it. The last time this happened was when my parents were in town and we were walking around downtown Boise in the rain. It wasn’t quite as bad that time. I was still able to limp along until we stopped somewhere for a while and I massaged my leg until the pain stopped.
Today was much worse. I couldn’t put weight on it even to limp. I massaged and massaged, but the pain remained. The morning got later and later and I realized that I was not going to be able to go hiking today. I was using crutches to get around the house.
I took some pain killers and ran a hot bath with Epsom salts. After that, I massaged my left lower leg with Vicks Vap-o-rub. I had a smoothie for lunch because there was no way I was going to be able to safely manage moving soup from the stove to the table. I used a backpack to get the smoothie from fridge to couch, as well as water in bottles. I really missed Ambrose while I was taking care of myself. He would have taken care of me. Helped me in and out of the bathtub. Brought me soup on the couch. Maybe even helped with the massaging.
After a second round of Vicks and some rest, the heel pain went away like it had never been there. I have some very tight leg muscles that I need to figure out because I do NOT want this to keep on happening. It’s painful and disruptive. I’ll do more Vicks on them before bed tonight, but I need a long term solution for this issue. What if it were to happen while I was backpacking? That would be super disruptive and potentially dangerous.
I did actually have something similar happen while backpacking. It was ankle pain, but the cause was also tight muscles in my lower leg. Massaging that out helped me keep going. That was the section of the Idaho Centennial Trail along the Middle Fork of the Salmon. The trip where Ambrose couldn’t find where we were supposed to meet, and he had refused to look at maps with me the week before the trip.
I’ve been cautious about the heel since the pain stopped around 3 pm, but it hasn’t come back. I was able to stand and get my breakfasts ready. Three of my eggs broke while they were being boiled. I put dried pear in with my oats. I’m going to need to get more oatmeal soon. The box of oats that Ambrose bought is just about gone; I’m on the last bag. I need to decide if I’m going to order more online or buy it at the store.
One more night of ox tail stew. I’ve got some food set out for cooking on Tuesday. I don’t want to forget the water chestnuts again. Box noodles with cheese, water chestnuts, red bell pepper, jalapeno pepper, onion, curry pumpkin, and canned chicken is the plan.
I’m hoping to go hiking tomorrow since I missed out on today and tomorrow is a holiday. I want to get a hike in this weekend, especially because I didn’t even walk today, though I did step outside to see the sunset.
I did my exercises after dinner. When I finished the shoulder program that I’m doing, I added on some foot and ankle work for the sake of my tender leg. I hope that it helps. I do not want this to happen again tomorrow. Well, ever, but until I figure out the root cause it probably will happen again.
