Weeks 18-24 Update!

Wow, I've really neglected my blog recently. Since term started I've not really had much energy or time to do it and it has rather fallen off my to-do list! It is now the half term break so I thought I'd do another update.

Following my last appointment at the hospital, I was a bit concerned about the prospect of possibly having to have a further procedure to remove the screws. I emailed my consultant about this and she reassured me that the procedure was a minor one, would only require about one week's recuperation and was only carried out if the screws were causing pain or interfering with footwear. She also explained that they would be removed approximately one year after the initial operation and the bones would be fully fused and so the lack of screws would not lead to a recurrence of the bunions. I felt very reassured and returned to work at the end of August happily.

The first week or so at work was quite hard and my feet did become sore and quite swollen over the course of the day. I became aware of them feeling particularly swollen and sore on my drive home from work in the evenings. I was trying to find a balance between resting my feet and moving around and I actually found that moving more led to less pain and swelling. Over the course of the half term, I have become less and less aware of them and they give me very little pain any more.

One thing which I noticed from the start was that even when my feet were sore at the end of a day at work they stopped hurting really quickly if I put them up when I got home. Before the operation, if my feet were sore they'd pretty much be sore all night.

Here are some update photos:

I took these one morning when they weren't at all swollen. I think they look great! The toes look very long and thin and the scar tissue looks pretty good too.

Here are the big toe scars. They are also healing well. I can walk barefoot now without pain and am very very pleased with my feet. I have developed a bit of hard skin on the balls of my feet but I am filing and moisturising that which is dealing with it quite well.

When I wear my trainers, I feel no pain or problems with the screws. I recently tried on some smarter shoes which I was hoping to wear to a party and the right lower screw was quite painful then. I'm going to have to buy new shoes to wear and this does also make me think that the screw might need to be removed. Here's a photo that shows how prominent the screw is. As you can see, it is quite visible and now that it has caused a problem with shoes, I'm not so confident that it will be able to stay in. We'll see what the consultant thinks in January!

I'm not sure when I'll update next but if any one finds this blog and wants to ask me any questions, just comment on any post and I'll try to answer them for you!