Weddingbee Blog

I’m ’bout to get real on ya. A new item has popped up on my list of concerns as I near my wedding day, and it’s got baggage.

About a year ago, I noticed a slight swelling in the ball of my right foot and saw a podiatrist, but he couldn’t find anything. A month or so ago I noticed it was worse, and there was a new development: a strange lumpy bit that popped up whenever I stood, right between my 2nd and 3rd toes. I went back to the doctor, got an MRI, and was diagnosed with Morton’s Neuroma - an enlarged nerve, likely caused by my profound flat footed-ness. It’s treatable, and not uncommon. I received a cortisone (steroid) injection in an attempt to reduce the inflammation.

I have a complicated history with the steroid family. At 19, I was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease that affects my eyes. Basically, my immune system decided that my eyes are foreign objects and attacked them as if they were a tumor, bacteria, or a similarly undesirable interloper. The result was chronic inflammation inside my eyes - which, when untreated, causes damage and/or blindness. The most common treatment for inflammation is steroids, so for many years I used steroid drops and took steroid pills. Not “pump it up” steroids, silly. The other kind.

I’m what doctors affectionately call a “steroid responder” - meaning I’m hypersensitive to the drug and, consequently, its myriad of nightmare side effects. Some of those include anxiety, mood swings, puffy face, weight gain, insomnia, depression, and even forced menopause (which I experienced at 21 - yeah. Hot flashes as an undergrad rule). It came to a head when I was over-prescribed drugs to counteract the side effects of a particularly long course of the steroids, and ended up unconscious after a numb few weeks of my life of which I now have no memory of, whatsoever. My doctors starting injecting the steroids directly into my eyes instead, which kept the medicine localized, so the only side effects I have are cataracts and glaucoma (both of which I’ve had surgery for, cuz I’m clearly 80 years old). For 4 years, I also had to also take a low-dose chemotherapy pill to suppress my immune system. Staying on the chemo any longer would be too hard on my body, and I couldn’t take steroids anymore, so we needed a new plan. Serendipitously, a study on a new, implantable steroid drug for my disease was just beginning. Bausch & Lomb funded 3 years of my eye care, the drug passed FDA approval, and the implants have been the most effective treatment yet. They last 3 or so years each, and when they run out, I simply get them replaced. Over the last 5 years or so, I’ve had 7 eye surgeries. I’m bionic, yo.

Wait, wasn’t this supposed to be about my feet?

Right. So, I asked the podiatrist if I should be concerned about side effects, but he assured me that it was local so I’d be fine. Great! That night, I started feeling really nervous. And irritable. The whole weekend of my Chicago bach-shower-lette parties, I was a nervous, sensitive wreck, and had trouble sleeping. I wrote it off to wedding-related nerves, although it seemed unreasonably extreme. It took me 4 days to pinpoint it as the same feelings I experienced over 6 years ago, the last time I took steroids. Then I panicked: How long would this last? Did I really have to go through this again? It was a very rough week, and it’s just now starting to die down a bit.

In the meantime, the swelling of the ball of my foot around the nerve subsided, but the nerve itself has not. In fact, it seems bigger than ever, now that the foot around it is normal-sized again. The extra cushion that the swelling used to provide is now gone, so it hurts the nerve when I stand and walk barefoot, or wear high heels.

My mind raced.

Did the podiatrist miss?

Did the ’roids quell the swell in the tissue around the nerve, and is that why they affected my system so much?

Will I need more cortisone injections to calm the pain, and will the side effects ruin my wedding?

Will I be able to stand and dance on my wedding day next month without pain?

I’m going to see the podiatrist again in the next week, so hopefully I’ll have more answers, and therefore, less worry.

I know many of you have similar concerns or health issues, and I feel for you. In many ways, I’m grateful to my illness because it has made me a much stronger, more resilient, and determined person than I ever was before. It makes me grateful for every time I clearly see Mr. M’s smiling face, Paco’s wiggly tail, or the snow-capped mountains outside my house. It has taught me many lessons over these 11 years.

I wasn’t sure whether or not to share my story here, but it is a relief to get it out: Miss Meatball is broke, but also broken. Will you love me anyway?