Ow! It hurts!

I woke up this morning, stepped out of bed and promptly fell over grunting in pain. The foot that was giving me some shit yesterday just gave way. Putting any weight on it caused extreme pain. I'm not a stranger to pain, I have a very high threshold. In fact, three times in my life I've broken bones and ignored them until peer or parent pressure has made me go to hospital where they've identified the source of the pain as a breakage. Yeah, I know I'm stupid.

But this was proper pain, it really hurt. However, my inner stupidity told me I'd probably just slept on it again and I hobbled to the shower. After this I returned to the bedroom and said bye to TT (I get up at 5.30am to leave by 6.15, she doesn't leave until about 8) She looked at me in alarm and asked whether I was really going to work. I said I had to and she told me I was an idiot and turned her back on me.

I couldn't walk to the normal bus stop so I had to sit outside my house and wait for the bus that went that way instead. It took me over 2 minutes to board the bus and take a seat. I couldn't figure what was going on with my foot. I got to work eventually and spent 10 minutes hobbling around the normal 2 minute walk from stop to work. I turned up and the boss guy said "What the hell have you done?!" I explained I had no idea and being sat at my desk got down to work.

About an hour later I slowly got up and began to hobble down a corridoor. One of the very senior bosses paused me and asked if I'd broken a toe. I said that I hadn't. He asked what I'd done. I had to confess that I had no idea but it did indeed feel very much like a broken toe. "Gout" he says. "Eh?" I say "Gout" he repeats and then continues "Don't look so shocked mate. When I was 28 I got out of bed one morning and my foot felt really stiff. I thought nothing of it, but the next morning I got up and fell over with the pain. Turned out to be gout because it's a hereditary disease and if it's in your genes it can kick in at a very young age, especially if you're not eating too well or you've damaged that leg at all"

Shit! He described me! I forgot about where I was heading and went back to my PC to google it. It seemed almost certain. I called my doctors and arranged an appointment as quickly as I could.

TT had to take the arvo off work to meet me from the bus because I was pretty much unable to walk without support. Went to the doctor who took one look and said "Jeez mate! Mind if I take a photo of that?! It's perfect, classic, acute genetic gout!" I had to laugh despite the pain.

He gave me some pills which he said would kick in within a day or two and made me an appointment for some blood tests to gauge the severity. He also told me not to eat pilchards, sardines, offal or drink any fortified wines. I was fine with that, I don't like any of them. I asked if it was common for someone to be hit so suddenly and explained that I'd had almost no warning signs other than numbness the day before. He said that "when it hits, it hits like a steam train - KERBAM!" Thanks doc.

The pills worked wonders. By this evening I was able to hobble to the kitchen without assistance and do the washing up much to TTs annoyance. I'm not one to sit around. The new TV helped though, I'd spent the afternoon resting in front of it and I think that done a lot of good after two days of ignoring the pain.

Bit of a shocker to discover you have a genetic disease though. I knew my grandfather had it, but my father doesn't and I was too young to really remember much about grandfather.