Beautiful Illusion

Beautiful you say...!

Personal image.

WILL THIS PAIN EVER GO...!

ANKLE/FOOT.

Structure
The ankle joint connects the lower leg to the foot and, in dance, allows for pointing the toe (plantar flexion) and flexing the foot during plié (dorsiflexion). The ankle also allows for inversion and eversion, producing turn-in and turn-out, respectively. The 26 bones in the foot work in concert with ligamentous support and muscular force to create three separate arches, critical for shock absorption during jumps. Structurally, the ideal foot for ballet is considered to be a flexible “square foot”, which has equal-length first and second toes. - Information from...

The foot has the largest number of bones in comparison to the rest of the body and so is very prone to many injuries. Dancers feet are one of the most important parts of the body, if we get problems with our feet or ankles we defiantly know about it!! 

Here's a list of all the dance injuries you can get in the foot and ankle;

Personal work.

  Not so beautiful now! 

This is a great example of 'The Beautiful Illusion.' Ballet is such a beautiful art form and my personal opinion even more beautiful to dance! However, this is what the professional ballet dancer faces in day to day life, the pain behind the beauty! You can see just how prone the body is too injuries and how ballet can really push the body to extremes!

Here is a list of all the dance injuries for the foot and ankle with comments of what the injury can feel like;

Dancer's Fracture - "I landed badly from a jump and now it hurts to walk."
Sesamoiditis - "I have pain underneath my big toe, particularly while walking without shoes."
Hallux Valgus and Bunion - "My big toe points inward and is painful."
Hallux Rigidus - "I have pain with full releve."
Plantar Fasciitis - "My foot hurts when I walk barefoot, especially first thing in the morning."
Metarsalgia - "I have pain over the balls of my feet."
Achilles Tendinitis - "My heel and lower calf hurt, particulary while running or jumping."
Trigger Toe/FHL Tenosynovitis - "My big toe 'clicks' and gets caught' sometimes. I have to use my hands to release it."
Posterior Impingement Syndrome - "I have pain with pointing my foot with releve."
Anterior Impingement Syndrome - "I cant achieve full plie on one side. And when I do, it's painful."
Lateral Ankle Sprain - I rolled my ankle during class and heard a 'pop' sound."

So quite a few problems there! I have personally experienced three of these, the Hallux Valgus/bunion, Metatarsalgia and Achilles Tendinitis. I remember such stiffness and continuous pain with Achilles Tendinitis...you couldn't do anything to escape the pain but still had to continue on dancing. I think that's the problem with most dancer's injuries, we start off with slight pain but ignore it and carry on dancing anyway. This then makes our niggles and pains grow into bigger problems in which we still continue dancing on. Then we end up where we are forced to stop because the problem has become to great and in many cases holts our career and ultimately can result in retirement due to that injury. 

If you have any comments or stories about dancers injuries or injuries in general please feel free to share them on here! Would be great to hear your story! :-)