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Avoid stupid mistakes......

Mark Sisson's Ten Primal Blueprint Laws include the following:

Primal Blueprint Law #9: Avoid Stupid Mistakes

I thought of that this morning. I had the day off and was planning to go hillwalking. Getting my shoes from the living room, I accidentally kicked a sledgehammer that was leaning against the bookcase.

Ouch.

It was sore but I was not sure that it was that bad.....I hobbled about a bit and while it was sore it didn't feel too bad.

I got in the car and drove north. An hour and a half later I changed shoes to head up the hill...it looked sore but not so bad.

I started walking. Did one hill (Morrone) which was about 2 hours, 10km and 430m of ascent. Nothing special but it was good to be outdoors, with nice views of Lochnagar and the cairngorms.



The foot was sore but not that bad....so I did another hill, Ben Gulabin about a 5Km round trip and a 450m ascent. Nice views again.....and the toe was sore but I was walking ok.


When I got home and took my sock off, it looked like this:


I was shocked at the bruising and went to the Minor Injuries clinic, where they X Rayed it.

It is broken - the top, distal bone under the nail. The nurse thinks that walking for 4 hours up 2 mountains was probably not the best idea! Probably the walking and constant motion caused the bruising, irritating a blood vessel.

Oh well! They can't do anything with broken toes....
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Comments

Chris said…
Cheers Paul.

Looks worse than it felt
August 3, 2009 at 11:41 PM
dr. m.c. said…
very sorry about your toe, sport.
i wonder if it would look any different or be any worse off if you hadn't done the walks; if you'd fawned over it, and had a fit rather than "hmm. it feels a little funny"

Would all that bruising likely what would have happened whether you walked or didn't

From what we know about pain, inflammation and the value of movement, it seems like you did pretty much the right stuff anyway. Plus you got in some nice walks.

really sorry about the break though. How ya doing? is it worse now that you know it's officially fractured??

heal well!
mc
August 4, 2009 at 1:36 AM
Chris said…
Thanks for the god wishes mc.

Interesting point about whether it is more sore now that I know it is broken. I don't think it is any worse although it has been sore today being stuck inside my smart shoes for the office.

Bruising is slightly better this morning....

I certainly thopught movement was a good option - if I could walk around surely it coudln't be that bad - although the nurse seemed to think that it may have irritated a ruptured blood vessel and made it worse. Who knows.
August 4, 2009 at 1:46 AM
Drs. Cynthia and David said…
Ouch! My sympathies!

I made a similar stupid mistake not long ago- wasn't watching where I was going and tripped while running down a trail, and fell onto a sharp rock which punctured my knee right on the kneecap. Hurt pretty bad, and kept leaking blood, but didn't seem real bad, so we kept going, another 13 miles of hiking and easy running. Still ok, I thought, until the next day- in fact next 3 days- when I could barely walk at all the knee was so swollen. I would have been very easy prey during this time (not that I'm very difficult prey the rest of the time :) ). You can believe I watch where I'm going more carefully now.

Hope you recover well and quickly!

Cynthia
August 4, 2009 at 2:44 AM
brian said…
That doesn't look too sporty. However, my first thought upon reading you had kicked a sledge hammer, was why does he have a sledge hammer in the house? Are the cockroaches that big over there? :-)

Brian
August 4, 2009 at 6:08 AM
Marc said…
Chris,

Feel better!! A little extra vitamin c will help the recovery also.

Cheers,
Marc
August 4, 2009 at 6:51 AM
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