February 07, 2004
Dr. Foot Allknowing
Yesterday I braved sleet, snow and dark of night to drive cross town at rush hour for my long-awaited appointment with Dr. Foot Alknowing. The guy in the waiting room with me had come several hundred miles to see Dr. A. I took that as a good sign.
Dr A. is a biomechanics geek. He just loves the stuff. His enthusiasm for his subject even engaged someone like me, with the attention span of a gnat, (especially when physics and calculus are involved). He had all kinds of mechanical measures, protractors, gauges, more like drafting devices, with which he busily measured me as we chatted.
I am about to write about my feet, you can feel free to skip this part. What makes me think anyone would be interested... oh please - oh well.
Dr. A. started out with a few compliments. People with fascial pain are usually very strong. You can tell by touching them (said, as he tapped my calf).Their muscles are very firm. That kind of muscle tension can get to be a problem with age. Deep muscle massage, like rolfing ,doesn't reallly help. He thought that cranial-sacral therapy was much more effective. I told him about Tui Na . I do both. Dr A. also thought I was generally well aligned, he was talking about my calf-heel-hip stuff, not my connection to life force energy. I think they're related.
Here's the diagnosis. I have a plantar flexed forefoot . It is often seen in ballerinas. (Ask me if I liked that), especially those who went on pointe before age 11. That was not me, since my remedial ballet stopped before on pointe started. We all know that I would have fallen off, had I tried. Plantar flexed forefoot is sometimes caused by a virus in childhood. It is a deformity. Well, no wonder it hurts.
Actually mine hurts because I have bone spurs on the top of my feet. The big tendon that is strung from knee to toes down the front of the leg, is stretched over the spurs. If it is pressed into the spurs, by closed shoes for example, and plucked by the spur, it gets irritated, swells and causes pain. Several solutions were suggested. Wear sandals. Alot. In the winter, paste a piece of Dr. Scholl's felt on the tongue of a closed shoe, with a hole in it to accomodate the spur area atop the foot. Do exercises that flex the back of the calf muscle. They have a new one for people with cerebral palsy that is very effective. He taught it to me. He also noticed that I have a leg length descrepency, not bad, but it affects my stride and I hit the ground hard with my shorter leg. Quarter inch heel lifts were recommended to prevent possible future hip pain.
I think it was worth it. Dr. A does not think my recent foot pain relief has anything to do with my appendectomy .
No denoument: orange fact dump alert. I take that back. Leaving, I bumped into a client of my shaman's, barefooted in another examining room. It's a big city.