Upon returning from New Zealand three of my fingers went through a grueling infection. The infection was acquired from a little thing the Kiwi's like to call Bush Lawyer. Our instructor told us they are just as mean and nasty as the lawyers we have here in the US. It's just a thorny vine all throughout the bush in New Zealand. The tiny thorn's grab hold and don't let go so if you continue walking with a bush lawyer stuck to you it rips up whatever it is stuck to. In my case it was my middle finger. I don't know how the other two fingers got the infection but it was quite nasty and at times painful. It started about 3 weeks before I got home and ended a week after I got home.
I thought the nasty, ugly infections were gone for good, which they kind of were because it didn't come back in my fingers....instead it migrated to my 'pointer' toe. I complained to my mom that it was a little tender one day from a blister that had been there and popped. She said it was just new skin and would be tender until it calloused over. The next day my toe swelled to almost the size of my big toe. It was about an inch taller than the big toe too (which for some people is normal, but I was fortunate enough to be born with toes that are slightly smaller than the toe to the left of it, producing a nice gradual descent.)
It was purple and nasty looking under the surface and it hurt like no pain I have felt before. I walked with a limp because I couldn't let my toe touch the ground. It hurt bad enough when I was just sitting down, so I didn't want to add pressure. I couldn't even fit my foot into my shoes. I showed my dad and he told me I had to go to the doctor. So I paid 15 bucks to have the doctor tell me nothing about what it was. He just said to take the prescribed antibiotics and soak the toe 3 times a day for at least 20 minutes each time. Oh, then he shot me with antibiotics in each hip.
I started to soak and soon enough the nasty purple stuff on the inside popped to the outside and the toe began to drain. The pain was gone after that and I could even run again! I'll let you look at the pictures to see what happened from there. I'm happy to say that it is almost completely better now. There is just a small scab looking thing on the top, which the doctor told me I can't pick, and it is still slightly large. Apparently when you have an infection it digs underneath the skin and lifts up some dead skin. I can't really describe it but in all of my fingers and my toe I had a pocket of dead skin ready to be peeled off.
1. The first few days of the infection. Notice the size of my pointer toe compared to my other toes.
2. After it drained 
3. You can see the white pocket of dead skin I was talking about. It
went all the way around the toe.
4. This is how it looks today...almost better! (Still unusually tall)
Christmas Quilts 2017
6 years ago
8 comments:
The picture of your toe on the pink background really compliments the color in your toe. Your toe looks really gross! It would be so cool if your toe stays the same length forever. Think of all the stories you could tell!
Shoot! That alameda person is me-Valerie.
eeewwww!! That looks like it hurts!!
I hope this doesn't mean you won't be able to run with us. I hope you feel better soon!
That is disgusting!
Abby- I will probably never look at that blog post again. How nasty! And I would say that $15 is well worth that doctor visit. Maybe you didn't get a name for your infection, but it sounds like you were in desperate need of some antibiotics if he gave you shots as well as an oral one. You're probably lucky your toe didn't just explode off like a rocket one day. Yuk.
Wow Abby! That was your coolest post yet! I too, am lucky enough to have toes that gradually decend. That was my favorite line of the story :) Doctor's have never told me anything I didn't know either... I loved all the pictures!
You need to add a disclaimer at the top for the faint of heart.
Gross!
Post a Comment