The Boot |
When I was in high school, I once suffered a metatarsal stress fracture at the end of a cross country season that I didn't recognize until beginning winter "conditioning" practices in January for track. To address this, I ended up wearing a "boot" for around six weeks before I could resume running and training for the spring track season. This spring, I find myself back in that familiar time of year and state.
Although it wasn't strictly required, the doctor agreed with me that I would probably get the best and fastest results in healing my metatarsal head injury (metatarsalgia, neuroma, bruise, stress fracture, or whatever it is) by going to a boot to immobilize my foot and make it impossible to put stress on my forefoot for a while. I started wearing it on January 24th so I'm getting close to the two week mark with this clunky "shoe".
Rest and Relaxation
In the meantime, I still feel driven to accomplish something that will benefit my running this year. It's time to rest. I haven't taken any sort of complete break from training (cross training included) in a few years so it might be good at this point to just do nothing for six weeks. We'll see. I'm taking this rest seriously, in that I really am doing absolutely nothing. No weights, no cardiovascular exercise, and I've been driving everywhere. I probably have driven more miles in the last two weeks then I have driven in the entire past year.
This was pretty difficult at first, as I just felt on edge pretty much all the time for about a week. I've finally started settling into my new sedentary lifestyle.
Fixing My Feet
I'm far from a barefoot running fanatic, but I do think modern shoes are to blame for some of the injuries that runners suffer from. Notably, the size and shape of some shoes (women's especially) cram the toes together in a way that forms a foot overtime that probably doesn't exactly resemble a foot with a little room to move and spread. I've been trying to be a little more careful about selecting shoes with a little more forefoot room for a while, as the toll this crowding takes has become a little more obvious to me with longer miles.
Since at least my right foot will be an open boot for the next six weeks, I've decided this is a good time work on spreading my toes out to a little more natural position. The day I got the boot I spotted a well placed and timed ad from the Indiana Running Company for "Correct Toes", the apparent invention of a podiatrist.
With Correct Toes |
Without |
I'm not sure if this device will help my foot more equally distribute forces on it or not but I think it's worth trying. I've been wearing the correct toes as much as possible and constantly on my right foot in the boot. I'll post a follow up photo after some time passes to see if my foot's "natural" position has changed in any significant way.
Hi there...I just started wearing the correct toes today and so I am wondering how your experiment went. And, I hope your foot is better:)
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