Driving away from the apartment, I kept on having these huge sighs and it lasted for a couple of days. I guess it was all the stress releasing. I moved into A*'s place. She was ever so kind and gracious. She even let me have unlimited access to the TV with satellite channels!

I was still wondering around on crutches and A* made an appointment with a doctor to see why it was still so bad. We went to the Dr.'s office and sat in the waiting room which was in a separate room from the receptionist. Everyone who walked in said "Bonjour or rather Bonsoir" to the group. Then when they left the waiting room, they said the same thing. It struck me as quite strange compared to an American waiting room but at the same time rather civilized.

The doctor, however was another story. He was very brusque and even abrasive. I was so glad that A* was there with me to know what he said as he had no patience in explaining it to me. He confirmed that it was tendonitis but ordered x-rays anyway, just in case. He also gave me a prescription to get some special inoles made. He said that it was my super high arches that were causing the problem. The price of a doctor visit was 21 euros!

Finally, my foot was starting to feel just a little tiny bit better. It was the first time in quite a few weeks that I had hope that it was going to go away. A few days later, we went to get the x-rays taken. The x-ray doctor made me put my foot into a thousand positions in order to see what was going on and then came back later for one more x-ray. That was the one that made me cringe. I had to sit on my knees with the soles of my feet facing upwards to the machine but with my toes curled under. This was horrid and took a few minutes to accomplish of stretching the foot into position but I made it. After they were developed the doctor came and explained that there were no stress fractures or major arthritis causing the problem. Yeah. The x-rays in total were 57 euros. Not so bad.

The next step was the visit to the podologue (foot specialist). My foot was steadily feeling better at this point but still felt like glass in the arch when I tried to place in on the ground and walk so when we arrived at the podologues office, I was still on the crutches. The podologue said that he had never had someone arrive on crutches before. He laughed and it hurt my feelings but I think that he was laughing with more of a sense that it was cute and amusing rather than in a malicious sense. It was a good thing that he is cute so that I could forgive him. My French is much better now but still not good enough to explain the whole series of events that lead to my arriving on crutches. Anyway, he did all the stuff podologues do and measured my foot for insoles. He agreed that it was due to my having very, very high arches and said that the pressure on my foot was like I was on tip-toes all the time. There was also a bone below my big toe in the pad area that had broken and was causing another part of the pain. He said that it was fairly common thing to happen. He also said to quit using the crutches. It was okay to use my foot and get it back up to speed but of course to take it slowly at first and build the foot and leg back up. Yes, my leg was markedly smaller than the other by now. It cost 120 euros for the three visits and insoles.