So my fifth toe has been bugging me for about a week. Because of the blizzard and being sick, I hadn't noticed until today that it was still incredibly tender and swollen. I managed to get a podiatrist, because I was worried it might be broken.

It turns out that I have arthritis in my toe. She gave me some padding for it when I skate and taped it up to the fourth toe.

At least it's just a toe (though I fully expect arthritic knees eventually). Has anyone dealt with this? What strategies or practices helped you?

Ooh...yucky. My hubby had a tender large thumb joint for a while, and they diagnosed that as arthritis as well. I'm not sure there's anything they can do for it, other than rest and a painkiller if necessary. I know hubby hasn't done anything in particular for his thumb--just tries to avoid overuse of the joint for the moment. It stinks to 'catch' arthritis so young!

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You can try to knock it out with ibuprofen, but you might want to check with your doctor first, as it takes fairly heavy doses over an extended period of time.

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If you think your skate is tight over that toe, I'd consider getting the boot stretched a bit to relieve any pressure there. Especially since extra padding can make that area even tighter. Good luck!

I technically have arthritis in my hip (along with a bunch of other problems). It's definately not something I would get without skating, since I'm 16. Because of that, they didn't treat as athritis, but they treated all of the other problems. I -was- on vioxx, though, which really, really helped, but obviously I'm not anymore.

If it gets any worse, I would suggest seeing another specialist, or seeing your podiatrist again. If you live near a good sports medicine doctor, you might actually try that, since they would understand the sport, instead of just feet. Short of going to a doctor, motrin might help, but make sure you don't have trouble taking it, and take as few as possible, since, if you take it often enough, it can really screw up your stomach.

Glucosamine. My cousin, who is a doctor, says to take twice the recommended dose (i.e. two "one-a-day" tablets), and it only works for 4 out of 5 people, but he recommends trying. You don't need chondroitin, which is sometimes packaged with it - that has been found not to have any effect.

I also take cod-liver oil tablets, as that can aid joint mobility, too.

It will pass, but it's painful while it lasts, and your toe may be permanently misshapen, so do get those skates punched out if they put pressure on it.

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