Help! Mystery pain & swelling - I'm kinda scared!

[RolliePollie]

I'm wondering if anyone can help me figure out what's going on. I am starting to freak out because I'm having some really weird pain and I have no clue as to the cause. Maybe a tendon or ligament? And I'm assuming this is cycling related, but it didn't hurt on my last 3 rides. I've been doing longish rides (like 30-65 miles, usually lots of climbing) 3 days a week, plus a little bit of time on the trainer. The pain has been there for almost a week now, and it's gotten a lot worse in the last two days.

So here's what's going on...when I get up in the morning, I cannot put any weight on my left foot. There is excruciating pain in the sole of my foot towards the back of my arch, and it kind of shoots up into my ankle. After I'm upright for a few minutes, the pain starts to subside, and pretty soon I can walk with no pain. But if I sit down for a while, the pain will come back. Then if I walk for a bit, it goes away. However, now the pain is moving up the inside of my ankle. And tonight, my ankle is swelling pretty good and it's a little red. If you press on my foot where it hurts when I start walking around, there is no pain. But if you press on my ankle and up my leg, it is tender to the touch, like if you have bad shin splints. Also, now my baby toe and the one next to it are swelling. If I point my toes like a ballerina, it hurts. But I can move my foot all over in other directions and it does not hurt.

Does anyone have a clue as to what's going on? I'm worried about a blood clot! I do have a small old healed up cat scratch on my foot but it never got infected. It does make me worry about some weird infection though. Now that it's the weekend, I can't go to the Dr. And I'm starting to freak out! Help!!!

[KnottedYet]

I wish I could see your foot. It kind of sounds like you have an ankle problem or big time pronation which has given you something like plantar faciitis and irritated the bejeebers out of your "stirrup" muscles on the left and right side of the ankle (posterior tibialis, peroneals, and such).

The swelling toes could be from pronation, which makes your feet act wider across the toes in your shoes and rubs the pinky against the inside of the shoe. Is the swelling constant, or only after you've been on your feet a while?

Your best bet is to see the doc.

If your foot feels hot and is red, the swelling spreads, and if the pain is in your CALF (not the inside along the peroneals, but the meaty juicy calf muscle itself), go to the ER immediately!

If it's bad enough to keep you awake at night, or to wake you from sleep, go to the ER!

Keep an eye on it. If you can get in to an urgent care clinic in the morning or call your doc's office and speak to the weekend on-call for his practice, that would be good.

Better to get it checked out, especially if it's freaking you out.

Then after you are cleared by the doc, look into some wide toe-box bike shoes, more float for the pedals, good insoles, and a medial forefoot wedge.

[Wahine]

+1 what Knotted said. As much as this sounds like a tibialis posterior tendonitis which is not an emergency, there are some nasty things out there that can cause these types of symptoms and should be checked out by a doc. Again, watch the swelling, if the whole lower leg gets swollen, warm, red and painful it's off to emerg. Otherwise, call your doc's office and see what they suggest.

[Grog]

These two ladies are very wise, follow their advice! And it really doesn't sound like a clot.....

My sweet-heart, soon-to-be-M.D. but kinesiologist by training, automatically said "plantar fasciitis?" But it's a much better idea to see your doctor! There is lots of hope for you out there.

He's a big time cyclist and gets some of that type of pain sometimes if he's been doing a lot of climbing.

Good luck. *gentle hug*

[Tuckervill]

I said plantar fasciatis, too, because of the pain on waking, then I read the rest. But it could be that your ankle is injured, which is causing you to compensate in your sleep (pointing your toes), which is causing that tendon to get all comfortable like that. Then when you stretch it out in the morning to walk, yowee. It doesn't cause swelling, though. The swelling means go to the doctor.

Hope it's nothing serious.

Karen

[Grog]

I said plantar fasciatis, too, because of the pain on waking, then I read the rest. But it could be that your ankle is injured, which is causing you to compensate in your sleep (pointing your toes), which is causing that tendon to get all comfortable like that. Then when you stretch it out in the morning to walk, yowee. It doesn't cause swelling, though. The swelling means go to the doctor.

Yeah, docs tend to hear/read the beginning of the "problem" and not always go to the end.

When you see the doctor you may want to start your story with the swelling to prevent them to jump on the plantar-fasciatis conclusion too quickly.

[RolliePollie]

Thanks for the excellent advice everyone! The good news is, I just got up (yes, I slept in a little late!) and it's not any worse this morning and the swelling went down quite a bit overnight. But I still couldn't walk on it for about 10 minutes.

I'm very relieved to hear folks say it doesn't sound like a blood clot! I guess I'll take it easy this weekend, take my Motrin, and go to the Dr. on Monday if it's not any better. It just seems so weird to me that I didn't do anything in particular...like twist my ankle...to cause this.

So I guess I shouldn't try to do a long ride this weekend? Just kidding...I think I'm off the bike for a bit. What a bummer. I was trying so hard to get to 3,000 miles before the end of the year.