Tuesday, March 17, 2026

"No hoof, no horse"

Lance's hooves are only temporarily out of commission
The title is a well-known saying to any horse person. This horse person has been living with "one toe, much woe" – I talked about it in my February 20 post and it continued to be extremely limiting, i.e. excruciating. On March 6 I noticed that my right foot was swelling, and I thought it showed some increased redness as well. Yikes; would I be okay until my Tuesday appointment with a podiatrist?
But on March 7 there was a change. The soft, unstructured shoes I wore to church were intolerable, so I slipped off my right shoe during study class and worship service. Interestingly, when I carefully put my right shoe back on to get out to our vehicle for the trip home, it wasn't as uncomfortable. After lunch when I pulled off my tights I looked at the offending toe and saw that the scab/callous had moved, and indeed was now just a flap. I showed it to Rick, who pulled off the flap to reveal a rather alarming hole.
He got some antibiotic ointment out of his vet truck and I kept that and a bandage on it. By appointment time Tuesday morning it looked markedly better. The podiatrist said it was clear there had indeed been infection, but the improvement was obvious so keep doing what I was doing. Then he addressed the toe itself, which had obviously been broken and healed bent, making re-injury from rubbing likely. The possible interventions aren't convincing, though, so for now I'm holding off. It's healing.

Enough about the toe already!!! There are much prettier things to look at around here, so let's look.
frog dogs
couch potato
chair potato?
Bernadette popped out of her sheep suit so I had to get her a bigger one
on the town with my honey

a rare morning rainbow in the west
Inglenook sticklebatt singles, done
navy singles, ready to ply with sticklebatt singles
starting plying while keeping my son company



Oh yeah, happy St. Patrick's Day from . . .

8 comments:

Leigh said...

Ouch! That foot looks painful. Anything wrong with the feet impacts everything, doesn't it? Hope it's much better now.

Anonymous said...

Hoping healing has continued and getting around is less painful. I enjoyed all pics, especially flowers as everything is a bit buried, again, here.🙄. Dee

Michelle said...

Thanks Leigh, it continues to get better as it heals, especially if I mostly wear the sandals that don't touch the toe.

Michelle said...

Extremes everywhere, huh Dee? South of us they are predicting a 'marathon heat wave,' which doesn't bode well for wildfire season. I'd be thankful for snow if I were you!

A :-) said...

Holy Crap, Michelle! I would have gone to Urgent Care - but you do have a doctor in the house and even though he's a vet, obviously some skills are transferable. :-) But that looks really awful. I sure hope it heals well for you. I love seeing what, to me, is your early spring. It was SO cold here again earlier this week. Still cold enough yesterday morning with overnight snow and an underlayer of ice, that I needed my cleats to get to the train safely. And it was all gone by the time I got back home.

Retired Knitter said...

Ouch! That toe looks stunningly sore. Glad it is healing. And REALLY glad you have access to initial medical care through your husband. While he treats animals - we are all God’s biological creatures and some conditions are similar enough to benefit from his knowledge.

Michelle said...

I haven't heard great things about Urgent Care around here, A. Anyway, it turned out okay with it opening up on its own, and it IS healing if I keep from irritating it with the wrong shoes or socks. We are DEFINITELY into spring here, and there isn't nearly enough snow in the mountains. 😢

Michelle said...

Elaine, it is hard to describe just how sore that toe was! I am glad for my husband, too, even if he didn't think the toe was infected at first. I won't sue him. 😉