-Bill

David- I have noticed the squeaking you speak of. It is as if the top of my foot is creaking instead of the regular smooth movement. I ran 16 miles after I noticed the pain and luckily a couple days later it is going away. The most helpful thing has been to massage my legs. I got into the habit of coming home after a long run and not taking the time to rub down. My body is letting me know that it needs some attention. I’m glad I caught it and I’m glad others have taken the time to post about their experience.

Run on!

-Shaun

I did see a podiatrist. The foot lack of arch and the shoe combined with the distances and speed that I ran served to cause swelling and irritate a nerve in the foot. I didn’t have a neuroma. I didn’t have a stress fracture.

I spend a lot of time elevating the foot. I did Epson salt soaks. I did anti-inflammatories. The swelling is nearly gone. I’m back to running with different orthodics, a modest two miles to start. The jury is out on whether or not my feet will like them. The pain that characterized the injury is gone. Right now, the tendons on the toes 4 and 5 give me noticable discomfort on running. That could be from some of the remnant swelling. Perhaps, my foot is just getting back to normal and sensitive tendons are part of the continuum. I know when the foot was injured my body felt like it was doing all kinds of compensation from the thigh down to the toes.

Oh, I returned the newer shoes and the newer version of the shoes that I ran 300+ miles in without foot problems.

I am dealing with extensor tendinitis right now (as far as a self-diagnosis goes). I got this on the first hard track workout (intervals) after putting arch supports in a new pair of shoes. I think the supports changed the mechanics of my foot strike. Namely, the arch supports are putting me more on the outside of the foot (towards where supination occurs) than normal. My foot wasn’t used to that.

Oh, I put in the arch supports after having a bout with shin splints. I probably overcorrected for my low arch with the arch supports when a new pair of shoes would have been an ample solution. My old shoes had over 300 miles. Oh, the part of the foot that hurts is pretty much directly above the front edge of the arch support.

My new idea for dealing with running related injuries is not to try too many corrections simultaneously.

I had a huge knot there between the bones, which Naproxen and regular icing have reduced. However, I still have what I can only describe as squeaking muscles around the site of the swelling when I flex my foot up and down.

Anyone else noticed this weird squeaking? Its not so much a noise as a feeling, so grating might be more appropriate…

I suffer from what I just learned to be extensor tendonitis, with a half marathon nine days from now.

Again, thanks for all of the great information.

I did 2 months of physical therapy 3x per week and that did help to stretch tight muscles and retrain my body to take the stress off of my foot. I did end up getting 2 cortisone shots into the tendon area at the top of my right foot…ouch. Three years later the tendons will still swell and bruise if I overuse them and or lace up too tight.

My dr. said it would have been alot easier if I would have just broken my foot – it heals up faster.

So – take it seriously – baby those feet when you need to!

It is clear that I have done such damage that I must get a cortisone shot which I have scheduled for early April. Also stretching, strengthening and massaging together with no tight shoe laces.

BTW, I had one leg shorter and the orthotics fixed that but I don’t think it had anything to do with my extensor tendinitis but it sure helped back and sciatic nerve pain.

While I can play tennis without much pain, I can’t sleep without a splint. This is actually pretty serious stuff.