I never put ice on the injury, which worked out in my favor because I did read it could make it worse. ER doc said wear the boot 24hrs and the ortho surgeon can't see me for 2 weeks. I took off the boot last night while I was sitting on the couch because it was hurting me more than without it. Now that I you mentioned it I will try and do that a little more. I thought it gave me a little more relief in bed last night, but I woke up just as much.

I've been offered pain meds, but I have a long commute and can't take them. At this stage I'm ok with dealing with it. I am able to elevate it at my desk all day.

Another thing that I was wondering about it showers. I'm finding each day that I have to put the water cooler and my foot turns splotchy blue/purple and red. Almost leopard like. Is this another RSD thing?

Cold or cool air/water can trigger RSD symptoms (for some people even warm or hot can do this too). I haven't been able to take a shower in years now because the impact of the water on my RSD areas is very painful. I have to take warm baths instead...which actually helps soothe the RSD pain as well. The splotchiness is definitely normal with RSD.

I know when I wore the boot I thought I was getting a little relief at the beginning...but it's short lived relief because you are not putting as much weight on it and it is protected from other things that can flare the pain (like cold, air movement, etc). It's worse for the RSD in the long run because immobilizing makes the pain worse and makes it harder to recover the function (definitely possible but very painful). RSD is a use it or lose it condition so I would suggest at the very least trying to move your foot back and forth/up and down, etc while you are sitting to keep that movement. You don't have to do this constantly...but as much as you can stand it just to keep you from falling into the vicious cylce where it hurts to move it, so you don't, and because you don't the pain gets worse making it even harder to move it.

Hi, Jenn. Sorry for what you are going through. It sounds like rsd to me too and I agree you should be thankful for a young doctor that caught it. Not alot of drs know about this yet. Mine started from a fracture in my right arm in 2008. To make a long story short, I didn't get relief until they completely numbed my arm with a nerve block and sent me to pt the same day. i also had my shoulder broken free......sideline..........Anywho, I think this helped to "reset" the nerves in my arm somehow. Don't know if this works commonly, but helped me after other nerve blocks, meds, etc. Good luck and pray all goes well for you. Hugs, Suz66

I'm now 3 weeks into this foot issue. Only mild pain so far, but These pictures show the funky colors we get to see. This mostly happens after I take my cam boot off and place my foot on the floor (non weight bearing) for about 5 mins.

The first pic was last week and the last 2 are from this weekend.

Any thoughts or opinions? Is this what you see in RSD?

Attached Images

	CIMG0254.jpg (100.6 KB, 55 views)
	CIMG0256.jpg (99.9 KB, 53 views)
	CIMG0262.jpg (197.3 KB, 61 views)

It does look like what I see sometimes. It's weird because sometimes the color difference is subtle (like a slightly more red/purple color) and sometimes it is drastic (dark red/purple). It is worse if I have immobilized the foot at all (when I was wearing a boot I had a lot more days with the color changes and with the leg getting ice cold). I remember going to physical therapy for pool therapy and the temperature difference was so great that to my right (non-RSD) foot the tile on the floor felt really cold...but to my left (RSD) foot it actually felt HOT. And these things were worse with the immobilization and the boot. Even once I stopped wearing the boot, it took a few months of physical therapy before they got to the point where I only had them with bad flares.

Now I get the same things in my upper body too...but because I make sure not to immobilze the symptoms of color and temperature change only come with flares