Limping along

I went running on Wednesday morning and got stung by a flying insect just half a block away from my house. I didn't see what got me. I was just jogging past a bush in my neighbors yard, and suddenly I felt like something reached out and pinched me, hard, on my ankle. I looked down to see a bunch of bright yellow bits speeding around my feet. I didn't stop to examine them. I ran faster!

Thirty minutes later, when I'd completed my loop down to the creek and back, I pulled down my sock to have a look. My skin was red, and felt a little hot to the touch, but otherwise looked okay. I couldn't even tell where the stinger had gone in. So, I went ahead with the rest of my day and didn't think about it much. It did itch a little, so I scratched it. But by bedtime, I'd mostly forgotten about it.

Then, in the middle of the night I woke up with an unbearably itchy and burning sensation all over my right foot. I threw off the covers and hopped out of bed. I thought I'd go get an ice pack from the fridge. But, when my feet hit the floor, I almost fell down. The angle my right foot had landed on had sent a shooting pain up my leg. So I shifted the angle and took a small step. The same pain burst from my foot to my brain. I couldn't understand it, and I was still half asleep. So I kept re-arranging the angle of my step and attempting to move forward normally, but all I could manage was a brief tumble forward until I could swing my other foot back underneath my weight.

When I made it out into the living room, I turned on the light. (I didn't want to wake up Sweetie, but of course with all the fumbling and crashing I did anyway.) Suddenly I understood the problem. My foot was completely swollen. It was so fat, that it was frozen into a half-pointed position, and any pressure that changed the angle of my ankle was incredibly painful.

So, I couldn't go running yesterday. And I can't go today either. On-line research suggests it might be a week before it really heals.

So much for daily exercise.