The Untold Toll on the Shopkeeper’s Body

When we started this business, I knew that fabric bolts were heavy. I knew that there would be nothing light about the task.

But, what I didn’t know was just how many hours per day I’d be on my feet and just how hard that would be, when the floor beneath my feet is made of concrete!

I know that I’m not in particularly great shape, physically, but I knew that I was strong. I was used to tossing around boxes and boxes of coupons. I would throw around 40 and 50 pound boxes with relative ease, putting them up nearly above my head and dumping them into a recycling dumpster.

It was an every day occurrence for me. However, what I wasn’t used to was being on my feet so much.

When we opened Quilted Twins, the first year was primarily spent doing some physical labor, but a LOT.. and I mean a LOT of behind the scenes work at the computer. I was running both the Coupon Clippers (.com), now closed down and then, starting and growing this business from the ground up. Hours were spent each day getting fabrics up on the site, finding sources, talking and emailing sources and basically, still sitting behind a computer, as I’m definitely NOT a stand behind your desk kind of person.

So, about 9 months ago, I started to notice that my legs were hurting; especially on days where I would be making a hundred or more packs per day, spending sometimes 3 and 4 hours on my feet, running up and down my 27 foot table, working on those amazing packs we have!

Then COVID hit. Not only were we making packs, but the work of the meeting and greeting the walk in customers fell mainly to Ken and me, as we were trying to limit the exposure of the kiddos and their parents to COVID. We’d send them home and every afternoon, after 2, we’d meet with 6 to 20 people by appointment, meeting every 15 to 30 minutes with different people, often times up until 6 or 6;15.

The mornings were spent pulling, cutting and packing online orders and the mail run would go in. Then we’d meet with customers. We’d go to supper and then we’d try to come back and make some packs each evening.

By the end of May, I was a mess. A thorough mess.

This was one of my worst days.. No visible ankle and my whole leg and skin was incredibly puffy. I was heading over to my son’s house to swim, hoping that getting OFF the feet and doing laps, would help to get rid of some of the swelling. it didn’t.

 I had already tried a foot massager. I had talked to Becky earlier, told her my pain, and she suggested the foot massager. So, I found one on Amazon and ordered one. Then I waited with bated breath until it got here. I figured it would solve all of my pain problems. You can only imagine the disappointment when I put my feet into the slots, turned it on and no relief came at all. In fact, it barely even touched my ankles.

So, I went on a quest for something else.

The Foot massager didn’t really help as I wasn’t really in any pain on my feet… It was my ankles! So, I went on another question, back to Amazon and found these amazing ankle massagers. I have no idea why they are so rare, as they are incredible device. I had to order 2, so each ankle could get massages at the same time.

The ankle massager worked incredibly well to reduce pain, but not really any swelling.

I didn’t notice any noticeable swelling reduction, but it sure felt better!

Then Sarah’s Mother in law came to visit our shared grandkids! (Sarah is our daughter.)

Sarah’s Mother in law is a massage therapist who is also a trained RN. I asked her if she would give me a much needed foot massage.

So, she spent easily 45 minutes with me, and decided that, as a friend, therapist and nurse, that I needed to do several things:

1)      Try to get off my feet a bit more than I was – especially being careful with how much I was standing on the tile.

2)      Continue Ibuprofen, but try to get off of it

3)      Add Magnesium and Turmeric

4)      Stop with the Clark’s Flipflops and buy some high quality shoes with arch support.

So, I decided to attempt to do one new thing each day. By the end of the first week I had added magnesium and turmeric. I also had located some supportive sandals, and ordered them.

By the end of day 4, I had cut back on how many hours a day I was standing up on the concrete floor.

It took about 6 weeks for the swelling to go down immensely.

However, the pain and swelling isn’t over.

Here you can see my feet and how I stand.. It’s creating some pain.

So, I’m appealing to you all, to find out what you might suggest. The problem is that I appear to stand funny (as shown here).. and though I’m wearing my terrific arch support shoes, I’m still standing funny.

I’m open for suggestions. What do those of you who have to stand all the time do to help with the pain? It’s pretty intense most of the time these days. Of course, we’re running hard all day long.

I’m writing this pretty late on Thursday night and the pain is pretty rough.

Please give me some ideas on how to fix this foot pain!

Thanking you in advance…

This was after being on them all day on Thursday. The nail polish is shot, but who has time to redo that, right? Anyway, the swelling is definitely down, but now I have pain. Sigh.

--Rachael

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