Foot Pain Fellowship

I knelt down by the babbling brook and sighed as my pack slid from my shoulders. It had been a quiet day’s walk, this one, the miles eaten up underfoot as I strode diligently forward. Head in the clouds, my Da had always said, as he’d watched me stride across the small fields of our village.

         Such small fields, I remembered fondly. Such different times.

         I hadn’t seen my village in many a moon, but I had something… different. A mission. A purpose.

         My hand rose unbidden to stroke at the amulet I kept safely tied around my neck. Even pressed against my flesh – uncannily so – it remained ice-cold to the touch.

         Minutes passed before I shook myself free of the meditative trance I found myself in, and I laughingly chided myself for not starting on the camp sooner.

         ‘You’d find yourself with a fungal nail infection near Cheltenham,’ I chuckled, picturing the gleaming, lavish city I’d travelled through at the beginning of my journey and the haughty, tall denizens who called it home.

         Well, home on this side of the sea at least.

         I lit a small fire for my dinner and rolled the smoothest rock I could find over for a place to perch next to it. It would probably also serve as my pillow, I noted glumly. Sleeping rough had started as a difficult thing to do, I recalled. Now it was just a sad, accepted fact of my life.

         I shook out my aching legs, fondly remembering the way my mother used to rub them after a long day out in the fields. ‘How can compression therapy help with foot pain?’ I’d asked her once, with the arrogance of youth.

         She’d laughed, bless her, and told me to mind my manners. Sure enough, my legs had hurt much less when I woke up the next day. I practically skipped out of our little hole, into the pastures.

         I frowned as I remembered that happier time. Had it been kindness, her massages, or manipulation? What she had to do to force me back out onto the field?

         My fingers, unknowingly, stroked the amulet again.

Daughter’s Small Feet

My daughter has such tiny little perfect feet, just like me. As you would’ve read in my other blogs, I am really passionate about looking after my feet and keeping them healthy and clean. I think it’s something that everyone should do, but after a couple of in-depth conversations with my expert foot specialist, I realised that most people don’t take foot care as seriously as I do.

When I had my daughter just over eleven months ago now, I vowed that her feet would remain soft and perfect forever. She has the tiniest little toes. It’s truly adorable. I vowed that she would never get any common foot condition. She won’t experience the pain of ingrown toenails, her skin won’t get hard and she won’t get corns and callouses. I’m disgusted at the thought of these things happening to her, but I have to imagine them to ensure that it never becomes a reality. 

I know that kids these days are more likely to experience developmental problems, although I’m not sure why. That’s why I’ve also vowed that if I need to source children’s orthotics in the Cheltenham area in the future then I will. There’s no shame in wearing orthotics as long as her feet are clean and well looked after. In fact, wearing orthotics is one of the best ways to ensure her feet are looked after.

My daughter is crawling now and soon she’ll be able to walk. She’ll need strong, well looked after feet to ensure they can take her wherever she wants to go. She’s going to be a little adventurous child and I’m so excited to see what she does with her life. I’m also excited to see how perfect her feet remain for the rest of her life. 

Okay, I best be off now. I’ve got to bathe my daughter before she goes to sleep. I’m bathing her in this nice oil that makes her skin, including her feet, very soft.