Sprained ankle! Share your experiences.

January 11, 2024 4:06 PM

I really messed up my ankle, what should I expect?

Yesterday morning (so, about 36 hours ago) I slipped on ice and really wrenched my ankle. I felt like I was literally seeing stars for a few minutes! I don't know exactly the position of the ankle when all of this happened - I was running and it happened fast and I wasn't really aware of what was happening until I was already on the ground - but I think my ankle turned to the outside (i.e., sole of your foot pointing away from your other leg) rather than the usual "inward" turn of an ankle misstep. It was all kind of high speed and there may have been more involved, like the rotation of my foot on the ankle being some weird way too. Whatever it was, it was immediately super painful and I could barely stand up for a few minutes, but the pain faded and I was OK within an hour.

Anyway, since this happened, my ankle has swollen way up (big surprise) all around the ankle (all sides) and also my foot is swollen. I don't know how you measure swollen, but I can fit into my shoes, but people can notice my swollen ankle standing a few feet away, also (someone at work remarked on it). For some reason my quadricep and calf muscle are also sore, but not really bad or painful - I think I may have bent my whole leg funny.

The main symptom/issue I am experiencing is that I like cannot flex my foot. It doesn't hurt if I am just sitting or even standing and putting a little weight on it, but it just will not move. It's like stuck. I have no pain at all just sitting around. But if I try to walk I can only manage a really slow limp because I cannot move my foot the correct way to take a step.

So: is this all normal? Can I expect this to improve over the next could of days? So far I haven't really seen any improvement. I am doing ice packs and trying to keep it elevated - any other remedies?

You are not my doctor, etc. I haven't gone to a doctor because I figure it will be a waste of time and they will tell me to ice it and elevate it.

Hit me with your ankle knowledge!

posted by Mid to Health & Fitness (21 answers total)

Best answer: You need to see a doctor. All kinds of things could have happened. You could have broken it. They might want you to use a walking boot. Etc. I had a terrible foot/ankle sprain and they got me a contraption that iced and compressed it for me (insurance covered it!). Everyone I know, including myself, who had a sprain this bad eventually had to see a doctor -- just do it now and get actual medical advice!
posted by Countess Sandwich at 4:15 PM on January 11 [15 favorites]

Best answer: Oh hi. I have sprained my ankle, a couple times, and broken my ankle. And this sounds like it’s broken, frankly. You should go to the doctor right away or an urgent care, or an ER. If you go to an urgent care, go to a place that will do x-rays because that is what you need right right now, my friend. Sorry, and good luck to you.
posted by BlahLaLa at 4:15 PM on January 11 [8 favorites]

Best answer: Yeah you need to get that looked at. Losing movement is more than a simple sprain.
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 4:22 PM on January 11 [3 favorites]

Best answer: Medical advice I was given at the time: a sprain can be worse than a break.

Proven true for me. I sprained my ankle spectacularly. Just a sprain. Stupidly I didn't believe that and did not pay it the respect it deserved and 50 years later I still experience weakness, swelling, tenderness, and sometimes an ache depending on the temperature and weather. Seek professional advice and heed it.
posted by ezust at 4:43 PM on January 11 [2 favorites]

Best answer: When they x-ray your ankle make sure they also x-ray your foot. The only bone I've ever broken was one of those tiny ones in my foot but I also twisted my ankle really badly at the same time so they initially x-rayed my ankle and said it was just a sprain. Two days of agony later I got a foot X-ray.
posted by mareli at 5:44 PM on January 11 [1 favorite]

Best answer: I sprained my ankle last year and it hurt like hell, and eventually I went to an urgent care where they did some observation/manipulation of my ankle and did not do an x-ray. I think not being able to move it at all in one direction is serious enough to go to a doctor. See if you can find an urgent care that has an x-ray, this is exactly what they’re for.
posted by MadamM at 7:17 PM on January 11

Best answer: Another vote for going to the doctor as soon as possible (or like others said, urgent care or the ER or whomever will be able to do x-rays ASAP).

I know a few people that have hurt their ankles lately, and it has been a more serious experience for each of them than any of them thought it would be.
posted by bananana at 7:20 PM on January 11

Best answer: It really sounds like it's either a really bad sprain, or even a break. I would go to the ER/Urgent Care to get it examined ASAP.

If they do an X-ray and/or a CT scan, and they don't see anything? Insist on an MRI. My broken wrist was only discoverable on an MRI, and then I could get the proper treatment for it. Now it's healed up, 100%.
posted by spinifex23 at 8:49 PM on January 11 [1 favorite]

Best answer: I second others suggesting you need to get it checked out. But even if it is a sprain, no you are not expecting it to get better in a couple of days. It really varies based on the severity of the sprain and the location for how long it will take for you to return to "full" movement. But for me, most of my sprains involved keeping immobilised for around 3-4 weeks. Then slowly returning to full movement with help of physio exercises. Swelling hung around for 2-3 weeks.
posted by daffodil at 9:02 PM on January 11 [1 favorite]

Best answer: The lack of pain is honestly an indicator that you need to get it x-rayed. + the lack of movement, does indicate a possibility of a fracture of some kind. I won't comment further, only that this needs immediate medical attention and at the very least a decent wrapping as a means to reset.
posted by cendawanita at 9:32 PM on January 11 [2 favorites]

Best answer: I did this to my ankle and didn’t see a dr. I should have been on crutches initially and I should have protected it and waited and worked up to walking on uneven surfaces over the next year. I did not wait. After the pain disappeared I resumed simple walks & told myself “just a few minutes off trail” not realizing that not only are the muscles and tendons out of wack but the body’s mental ability to ascertain distance and calibrate control is too. I sprained it 3 more times in the next year and am now rounding out my 3rd year recovering from that which still includes muscle imbalances in my hip etc. I say this to motivate you to a doctor and to follow all instructions and to invest very heavily in pt and follow advice as well as wearing good support braces & high lace hiking boots until _fully_ healed & strengthened. Don’t overestimate when the pain goes away! Learn from all my mistakes!!!
posted by iiniisfree at 1:04 AM on January 12 [2 favorites]

Best answer: My partner did exactly this, slipped on ice and twisted his ankle and assumed it was a bad sprain. A week later we took him to the ER for X rays and it was a break. And then there was a consultation with several ER doctors about whether they would need to re-break it because it had started to heal wrong. So yeah, you should go now and get it checked out.
posted by Rhedyn at 1:21 AM on January 12 [1 favorite]

Best answer: Spinifex23 is right. If they can't find a break, insist they do a scan to examine damage to the soft tissue. My husband hurt his ankle, the doc said that the X-ray looked fine and he should do some PT, and after 8 months of pain, they discovered intense damage to the soft tissue. It's been 4 surgeries and 10 years and his ankle still doesn't work.

I've had 3 surgeries on my ankle myself. We've learned the hard way that this isn't an area of the body that heals well. Go to a doctor now and don't take "it'll be fine" for an answer.
posted by equipoise at 7:33 AM on January 12 [1 favorite]

Best answer: Agree that you should get it checked out, and whether it's a sprain or a break, plan on RICE (rest, ice, compression, elevation) for much, much longer than you're currently imagining. I had a terrible sprain in August, got it checked immediately and was told RICE. I thought it would be a few days. It wasn't feeling significantly better after 2 weeks, so I went in again for a second X-Ray and ended up with a boot even though there was no break. I wore the boot for about a month. Then I switched to a fabric/elastic ankle brace, which I wore for another month. While I had the brace, I did a lot of walking because I was traveling, but I regularly still had to take ibuprofen and ice it because it just felt weird and sore and was not healed even though I wished it was. I stopped wearing the brace and almost immediately re-injured the ankle and my knee because the rest of my gait was still compensating a bit, and I was taking just slightly wonky steps from time-to-time. Ugh. Anyway, it's 5 months later, and my ankle finally feels back to normal except for in a couple yoga poses where I flex it a certain way and am reminded that it is STILL messed up (or healing) somewhere deep in there. Go slow! Rest, rest, rest and plan to stabilize that joint for months.

Also, the doc I saw was great about telling me that sometimes they end up charging way more for the boot and brace than just buying them myself from the internet. It depends on your insurance. So don't hesitate to comparison shop and buy the items that make you feel comfortable at reasonable prices -- they're apparently all the same manufacturers whether you're purchasing from Amazon or a PT office.
posted by luzdeluna at 7:39 AM on January 12

Best answer: Yes, go to a doctor/hospital and get an x-ray!

I've sprained my ankles too many times to count. One time it was not a sprain but a torn ligament which needed proper medical care. The last time I "sprained" my ankle an x-ray showed that I broke my cuboid bone. Didn't even know it existed before I broke it.
posted by amf at 9:39 AM on January 12

Response by poster: Thanks all. Went to urgent care and got xray. Fracture and torn ligament! You all were right.
posted by Mid at 2:13 PM on January 12 [5 favorites]

Wishing you a speedy recovery!
posted by amf at 2:16 PM on January 12 [2 favorites]

Sorry we were right. :( Get well soon!
posted by BlahLaLa at 3:42 PM on January 12 [1 favorite]

I'm so glad you got it looked at. I hope you heal swiftly.
posted by spinifex23 at 6:01 PM on January 12 [1 favorite]

I am glad you went to the doc. Please follow their instructions for weight-bearing exactly. Otherwise you can re-traumatize it. Source: sprained ankle, broken ankle.
posted by intrepid_simpleton at 4:12 PM on January 13 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: Quick follow-up in case others stumble upon this (jk): I broke the fibula, which is the smaller of the two lower leg bones and is not a full weigh-bearing bone - it is more for supporting the movement of the ankle/foot. That's why I could stand without much pain. I had always heard "if you can walk on it, it's not broken," but it turns out that is false when it comes to the fibula. But, probably worse than the fibula break, I had a big tear in the deltoid ligament, which is the big ligament that wraps around your foot and ankle. Tears are not easy to diagnose on an x-ray - they could see that the space between my ankle/foot bones was messed up, but they don't really know how bad a tear is until they go in surgically. I wound up having surgery to fix the bone and the deltoid ligament. On the bone, they put in a small metal bracket that is screwed to the bone and holds the two broken pieces together - I learned that this is now pretty standard for broken bones and leads to faster healing than the old fashioned way. (This is called ORIF surgery.) On the ligament, they took the two torn ends of the ligament, which were all ripped up, cut off the ends to make a clean line, and then sewed the two ends together. As a result, my deltoid ligament is a little short and I have to do exercise to stretch it out. All told, I was in a non-weight-bearing (crutches) situation for 3 weeks, then partial-weight-bearing (boot plus crutches) for another 2 weeks. I am about 10 weeks away from the surgery now and walking around pretty decently with a slight limp/stiffness sometimes. So, it still seems kind of crazy that I had to go through all of this medical process/recovery from a simple slip on the ice, but that's the story, and it all ended up pretty OK.
posted by Mid at 7:01 AM on April 1