Frostbite?! More medical musings...

So, everyone saw my rants on urgent care. I won't go there again. Luckily I don't have to... well, except to mention that they charged me $200 in addition to the $100 office visit to tell me (again) that I had an infection. Notice how calmly I said that. I will stop talking now in efforts to remain calm about that whole matter.

Anyway.

My achilles. Literally. It's still messed up after, um, 7 months and a while ago I posted everything I've tried to make it better. EVERYTHING. SO, a few days ago I went to physical therapy to try to get it to 100%. I got convinced that I should try this in conjunction with alternative treatments like rolfing (deep tissue massage or something to that affect), orthotripsy (shock wave therapy) and other things (IE: natural anti-inflammatories, pineapple, ice, etc). Additionally, a new alternative treatment includes Topricin:


Topricin is a topical homeopathic ointment that has arnica (also a homeopathic herb) as a base and is known for healing sports/trauma injuries (thanks to Timmy for finding it for me!) I tried it last weekend and it helped SO MUCH. I was even able to take Bella on a walk!! SWEET! I was so excited that I took her on two walks in the same day... NOTE TO SELF: do not get overly ambitious. That 2nd walk was quite painful.

A few days after said walks: my achilles was feeling generally ok at probably 65% (MUCH BETTER than it has been). But I still had the physical therapy appointment booked. I did NOT want to go. I dragged myself in there thinking, "this is stupid, a waste of time, won't help." I know, horrible attitude. BUT GUESS WHAT. FASTFORWARD- I WAS RIGHT.

GUESS WHAT FREAKING HAPPENED!?!?!?!!?!??!?!

After doing stretches, etc., they finished off the hour by doing electric/ice therapy. IT FUCKING HURT. Like a 7 out of 10 on the scale and I generally have a pretty high pain tolerance. I mean I was almost in tears. I kept asking the PT gal if it was supposed to hurt so badly and if after this hurts like bloody fucking hell, it will feel better. Her response was that, "Yes, it will feel much better afterwards." Oh yeah, I forgot, it's STUPID TO TRUST PEOPLE. So, I hobble out of there (even though I didn't even hobble in...) and can barely drive. It is THROBBING, and not even my achilles but the right side of my foot.

A few hours later? Still throbbing. WTF. So I pull down my sock and what do I find? THIS:

That bitch gave me FROSTBITE on my foot!!! Literally. It was blistered/red like an incredibly bad sunburn. And for the next 3 days, I could barely walk, not wear socks/shoes, basically slept with a bottle of aloe...and of course, completely bitched out the PT center (who, funny enough, happen to be a client of mine...) The PT director is graveling trying to get me to come back and keeps telling me "it's an isolated incident, it will heal, it's just a burn, now we know so please come back." The dude is smoking crack. I was so mad! I mean, seriously?! A freaking cold burn on my foot? I don't really think that was part of the plan to make my achilles feel better but I do have to say that as a result of the painful burn, I haven't noticed my achilles in about 4 days. Perhaps that WAS part of their plan... But, alas, regardless, I do not like the "burn therapy" notion of pain relief. So, I've decided no more physical therapy. I now know that I very much dislike that option and will go the other routes- which is what I wanted to do in the first place. Should have listened to that damn intuition! In the meantime, I won't be doing anything with that foot other than slathering aloe all over it... Seriously?! I can't believe stuff like this actually happens. It's not even really a cool story- if I thought about ever getting frostbite, it would be cooler to say I got it while hiking Rainier!