Stress Fracture Pain After 7 Years
Hi everyone,
I’ve posted about this before in r/runninginjuries but wanted to post again because I’m still dealing with the same issue.
I’m a 25-year-old male (5’6”, 150 lbs) dealing with chronic foot pain that started after stress fractures in my 4th and 5th metatarsals back in high school around December 2018.
When the injury first happened, I was put in a walking boot, used crutches, and also used an EXOGEN bone stimulator for about 180 days. The acute pain from the injury improved over time, but the pain in that lateral area of my foot never fully went away.
Over the last 7 years I’ve had multiple X-rays, multiple MRIs, a CT scan, and an EMG. Even this year alone I’ve had an MRI to check again and the MEG was also just over a month ago. According to the results of all my tests over the years, everything has come back normal structurally. There’s no clear fracture, tendon inflammation, or nerve issues.
What’s confusing is that I’ve still been able to run at times. There were periods where I could run 15–25 mpw and occasionally even do 10+ mile runs. In fact one week a few years ago in my junior year of college I was able to run 60 miles. But regardless of all of that I’ve never been able to run consistently without the pain eventually flaring back up.
In fact, lately things seem worse. Now even shorter runs can irritate it. Recently I’ve been experimenting with very short “test runs” (12–15 minutes / 1.5–2 miles) because I’m wondering if this has become more of a load tolerance issue than an active structural injury.
The weird thing is during the run I usually feel mostly okay and immediately after I’m often okay too. But then the NEXT day my foot will feel irritated again. And I’ve also been dealing with my shin pain too now. Idk if it’s related but often times when I get foot pain I might also have some shin pain
This year alone I’ve tried physical therapy which sought to improve my ankle dorsiflexion (which did improve my ankle mobility but not the pain in the lateral side of my foot), steroid injection, rest/icing. strengthening work (stuff like calf and seated calf raises, tibialis raises, seiza position stretch, peroneal band work, etc.)
None of it has fully solved the issue. My most recent doctor was so confused by my issue that he basically told me he doesn’t know how to help me considering that therapy didn’t help, the steroid shot didn’t help, my symptoms are inconsistent, and all my imaging/test results look normal. He couldn’t recommend surgery because he didn’t know what there was to operate on.
At this point I’m wondering if I’ve gotten stuck in a cycle of
- running too much
- flaring my pain up
- resting
- and repeating that cycle
instead of gradually rebuilding running tolerance consistently (which is why I’ve been doing my test runs lately). Meanwhile, I have almost no issues with going for long walks or being on the StairMaster for a while.
Has anyone dealt with something similar where imaging was normal, symptoms were chronic/inconsistent, but running impact specifically kept triggering things?
Especially curious if anyone successfully rebuilt tolerance after years of this. If anybody could give me some advice on this I would more than love to hear it.
Thanks.