I sustained a stress fracture of the fifth metatarsal completely at random last year. No trauma, no accidents, nothing. Went on a five-day drive and returned to go to work. A week later my foot started hurting really bad. I kept working on it and eventually saw a doctor. Misdiagnosed as plantar fasciitis, and continued to work on it with insoles. After a while I had to get an air boot. Before long it was x-rayed and turned out to be a stress fracture with no apparent origin.

The six month healing process was absolute fucking garbage and I would never do it again. Having nearly two months off of work was nice enough, but I couldn’t do much other than lay around elevating my foot. If I tried to get in my computer the pain in my foot would increase tenfold. Crutches to get around anywhere. Showered by laying spread eagle on the floor of the tub, blasting out my asshole with the shower head. Mornings were excruciating as the blood rushed to the fracture site and caused my foot to swell up big and purple. Genuinely the worst injury I’ve ever had to heal from. I never thought it would get better. I truly thought this was the new normal. You’d think a small stress fracture would be minor. Still hurts here and there but I’m about seven months out and doing a lot better than before.

Have to assume I’m just getting old, I guess.