The broken toe and football without shoes

I was at home, deeply embroiled in work (which isn’t something which happens much these days), when the phone rang. My younger son’s school. This is the first time they’ve ever rung me. In my experience, schools only ring for one reason (or maybe two, if you count injuries and illnesses separately).

And as the woman was talking… Football without shoes… I was just thinking – get to the point! What has he done to himself?!

He’d been playing football without shoes (seriously, who does that? My own son apparently, most days since the start of year 7, I had no idea) and kicked the ball awkwardly. His toe looked ‘a bit wobbly’ and she thought he needed it looked at.

So I abandoned the work and jumped in the car. There was my poor son, in a strange combination of clothing – shorts, Tshirt, blazer and one shoe and sock, looking rather sorry for himself with an ice pack on his foot. His toe looked swollen and seemed to be pointing in a slightly different direction to usual. My son thought he’d dislocated it. The word ‘break’ didn’t come into it. I thought maybe we could just go home.

But then we got in the car and he burst into tears. He’d been holding the tears in. He’d had a ‘one on one with the keeper’, hit the ball awkwardly and then kicked the keeper. It had felt like he’d stubbed it at first, but the pain didn’t ease and then he’d realised it didn’t look right. So he stumbled back towards the school building and was taken to first aid by his geography teacher.

It really, really hurt and he wanted to go the minor injuries unit. The same one we’d been to just over two weeks ago when he’d hurt his fingers and my daughter had been to a month earlier when she’d chipped a bone in her knuckle. Oh the shame!

The nurse checked him over and it was very clear which toe was hurting and where it was hurting as he squirmed and tried not to scream. So we went for an Xray. And he has a small break in the second toe of his right foot, poor boy. I wasn’t actually expecting that. He was supposed to be doing a school drama performance in the evening, so that wasn’t happening!

The toe was strapped to the big toe to support it, but if he didn’t like the strapping, he could take it off. If he wants to run, dance, play cricket or do anything else, he can. It’s up to him how much pain he can take. The toe isn’t dislocated, so there’s no concern about it mending wrongly.

I felt so sorry for him missing out on his drama performance and having to hobble around. He won’t be playing football with no shoes on again in a hurry!

I didn’t manage to get a picture of his X-ray, but this is his swollen toe.

Toe, Son, Broken toe

Author: Sarah Mummy

Share This Post On

11 Comments

  1. Ouuuch, I can’t even begin to imagine how much kicking a football bare footed must hurt. Glad it’s healing well though and that he made it to his drama performances. Hopefully he’ll now always put shoes on!

    Post a Reply
    • Thanks very much. I really hope so! He will have to keep trainers in his school bag at all times if he can’t play football in his school shoes!

      Post a Reply
  2. Ouch hope it heels wuickly! My son also plays football in just his socks when in the garden. He stood on something thorny and was in agony. Why do they do it!?

    Post a Reply
    • Oh dear, that sounds painful. Glad it’s not just my son! Both my sons will play in their socks in the garden rather than ‘waste’ a few seconds putting shoes on!

      Post a Reply
  3. Ouch! I hope it’s much better now and that he’s learned his lesson about playing football with no shoes on….
    You have to wonder what goes through their heads sometimes….My youngest is always reluctant to wear shoes when she’s out in the back yard and is always hurting her feet.

    Post a Reply
    • I don’t think they can ‘waste’ valuable time putting shoes on to go into the garden! Both my boys are the same. Apparently my son can’t play football in school shoes. So he will have to have trainers in his school bag at all times!

      Post a Reply
  4. Oh dear! I do hope it heals quickly. I feel for him too, it’s sooo painful when you hurt your toe, breaking it must be unbearable.
    Nat.x

    Post a Reply
    • It seems to be healing remarkably quickly, thank goodness! He was in a lot of pain for four days, then suddenly seemed to be almost back to normal. He’s walking normal distances now and only limping slightly. I think he might be back to Parkrun on Saturday 🙂 x

      Post a Reply
  5. I must have missed this at the time Sarah. How is he now ? Sounds really painful and just this afternoon my son has been playing football in the garden with no shoes on. I shall warn him next time of what could happen. Boys eh x

    Post a Reply
    • Definitely warn him! He’s OK now, thanks. He still can’t run far, but he’s walking long distances looking for Pokemon Go! It was very painful for four days, then it improved quite quickly. It doesn’t look like it’s in quite the right place and I wonder if that will change 🙁 x

      Post a Reply

Submit a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.