Well it seems I'm fated to forever suffer minor injuries whose inconvenience is out of all proportion to their actual severity. You may recall I had a cricket ball hit my toe while batting last week. I thought initially it was just a bruised toe, and the toe itself seems nicely back to it's more normal colour with virtually none of the purple that developed in the first day, but the nail is now a concern as it is painful and discoloured. I won't say I've been in agony because that would be wrong, instead I've got just enough of that consistently low-level pain to keep me awake at night, as the pressure under the nail refuses to go away.
Having rung my old friends at NHS Direct yesterday (0845 46 47, I know the number off by heart now...), they suggested I had it checked, so off to the surgery I popped where I was lucky enough to take advantage of a cancellation. Having taken off the carefully modified shoe and sock (with toe sections cut away to put no pressure of the toenail) he took one look at it and his face did the medical equivalent of a plumber tut-tutting at a stuttering boiler. "Ah, so we've got a subungual haematoma" he said.
After confirming how old the injury was, he said that since by now the fluid under the nail had coagulated there was, essentially, nothing to be done other than wait for it to sort itself out, and in the meantime to stay away from any opportunity to have the nail bashed again. Actually I didn't need him to tell me that last bit. Furthermore, it may be the case (and I suspect it is) that the nail has broken inside the toe, in which case I will have to wait for the broken part to grow out and the nail to fall off and regrow itself. This regrowth can apparently take over a year, so I have no idea (and have yet to speak to anyone who does) at what point it will be possible for me to get back to cricket, and at what point the toe will feel right in terms of sensation.
So in addition to the weeks of discomfort, lost sleep and prolonged grumpiness this entails it would appear a large part of my pre-season prep has been kiboshed by a single delivery. At this point I can't even comfortably put on a pair of cricket boots, let alone run in to bowl and put pressure on that toe, especially since that toe plays a part in my bowling action that is quite literally pivotal.
Pissed off? You're darn tootin'.
1 comment:
Gutted mate! Good to see you blogging, I thought you'd jacked it in! I think once the nails off the skin soon hardens up and it's not that much of an issue. It might be an idea to go and see a foot specialist - they may have a different approach and quicker remedy. Pull the nail out maybe and speed the process up?
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