Nice legs, shame about the feet

I have been diagnosed with bilateral plantar fasciitis. Yes, my plantar fascia, both of them, are itised. In plain English this means I have tendonitis in both feet in the plantar fascia which is a big, honkin' tendon, or series of tendons, really, that run along the bottom of your foot and keep your toes from parting company from the rest of your foot. So you can imagine the joy that is planting my feet on the floor first thing in the morning after the tendons have spent all night relaxing and curling up all cosy with their bad selves. Yes, that howling noise you've been hearing every morning has been me. Sorry. Thankfully, once the tendons have stretched out again the pain goes away and I'm able to do everything else quite well. Except play the piano. I never was very good at that.

I had my first visit with the podiatrist (chiropodist for my British readers - the rest of you are on your own) yesterday and was told that I walk funny. Most of your weight should be transferred along your foot to the big toe when you stride and I apparently put most of mine on the other toes. Who knew? My feet sure didn't. And I know I didn’t get that memo, so I’ve been walking wrong for the last 50 years and it’s been doing nasty things to the tendons. But frankly, now they've had enough of it and measures must be taken. Ha ha! Measures. Geddit? Never mind.

The good news is that this is the least painful form of the disorder. For most people, who get it from wearing high heels too much, or spending too much time on their feet, the disorder is truly agonizing, while I just have extremely stiff feet and have to walk like Gimpy McGimperson for the first 5 minutes or so.

So it's orthotics for me.

The fitting was not unpleasant. They have you lie face down on an exam table with your feet hanging off the end and they wrap thin cloth dipped in some kind of 'fluid-while-warm, solid-at-room-temp' rubbery stuff around the soles of your feet. It actually feels quite nice. Very spa-like, in fact. It only takes about 5 minutes or so for the stuff to cool and form and then they just pop them off your feet and voila! you have very attractive (if you like mummy-like footwear) molds of your feet in all their glory from which they shape the inserts.

Then, $350 CDN later (gah!) and I had my new, magic, gonna-make-it-all-better orthotic inserts ordered. In three short weeks they’ll be ready and I shall walk like a normal person.

We will now take jokes, jibes and good-natured insults from the floor.