Life Report: Mt Ann, Foot Problems and World Games

The Plight of the Toe

I tell people I have a broken foot, but the actual broken part isn't the problem. When the medical office phoned me after my X-Rays to tell me I had a "non-union fracture" in my fifth metatarsal, I put that into a box in my head filed under "not important" and asked if they'd seen anything on the second toe, which was the part that was really causing problems. It wasn't until I got an MRI that I found out something was genuinely wrong: I had chronic degeneration of the medial and lateral collateral ligaments at the second MTPJ and severe second MTPJ chondropathy with reactive bone marrow edema at the second metatarsal head.

In other words, my second toe joint was banjaxed. Also something was broken. But it was the second toe that was the problem.

I knew it was bad since February at the first Team Canada training camp. I made the decision to push ahead with the Team Canada stuff anyways and deal with the foot later. It took until this December to get the MRI. It doesn't really matter, since they would have told me to rest it, and I would have said no. The whole thing felt a little unserious even to me. A broken foot is important and concerning. A toe that hurts seems like something you should be able to get over.

But now the time has come to deal with the foot. I've been resting for two months now. No running. Even walking was difficult for a while. Once I got the diagnosis it was like all the pain escaped from the "not important" box and made it impossible to go on. It's hard to explain how the injury affects me. It's so fantastic that I can still weightlift and go on the spin bike. It sucks so much that I haven't been able to run and play ultimate and go ski touring.

It is slowly improving, though. I have a surgical consult in February; what I decide to do will ultimately rest on...

World Games

I was pretty excited to get the email saying I'd been selected for the 40 person shortlist, but I decided I was going to keep it to myself unless I was chosen for the next 22 person roster. Then Ultimate Canada posted the shortlist (with a photo of someone who looks exactly like me as the background, which was confusing for a few minutes. Who is she??).

It's a very competitive team and I'll be very excited if I get selected. I'll know exactly three days before the surgical consult and so everything works out nicely for making decisions.

We're So Back (to Ski Touring)

On to the important things...

I went on a BCMC trip to Mt Baker with some other ladies! I was really debating this and scared of my foot failing me. However, it hadn't hurt walking in the past week and I have amazing custom orthodics that help manage the pain so much, which I was able to put into my ski boots. I wore my ski boots while working from home on Friday (I'm the best upstairs neighbour in the world) and decided that I would be able to manage the tour.

I didn't really want to go to Canada's fourth territory - otherwise known as the United States - due to everything going on, but I got convinced by photos of the Baker backcountry. The Mt Ann ski tour looked amazing. I've never been to Baker before and I enjoyed the morning drive through the small towns and rolling rural properties immensely.

We got to the free backcountry parking at around 8am, where a huge flock of skiers and snowshoers already congregated at the trailhead, and then we set out to Mt Ann. The sun was up on a blue sky, shining down on the beautiful peaks of Washington's North Cascades and the icy snow crusts of the valley.

The tour goes up and over a small ridge and into a forested gully, which you travel along until you get to the steep ridge ascent up towards Mt Ann. The whole area is a terrain trap, but on this sunny day, the snow pack has been locked in place by the layers of icy crust, so we were able to scamper along the valley bottom in relative safety.

If I was someone who complained I would mention how annoying the undulating, bulletproof tree ice was to ski with skins on... but I have evolved past that deplorable habit as part of my 2025 resolutions. Instead I will only celebrate the opportunity to practice my silly skiing on the slightly sketchy snow bridges over the creeks, of which there were many.

We took a quick lunch break before powering up the final uphill to Mt Ann. I made homemade energy balls the night before, and I'm happy there was a big success (the peanut butter and chocolate ones) and a slightly less big success (the pumpkin spice ones, while delicious, were too soft and flattened into gloppy pucks).

The skin track up to Mt Ann was awesome. Straight up across the slope, one turn, all cardio. We attained the ridgeline and were on the way to the summit.

Unfortunately at that point not all of the group felt comfortable going for the summit due to the icy conditions and the amount of bootpacking going on, and we decided to turn back. The ski down was still pretty excellent, though, in a sheltered north aspect on a steep slope above the skin track. From there we zoomed back down to valley bottom and into the waiting crevasses of our friends, the creek crossings.

The way home was exactly the way we came and then up and out of the gully, then down a zippy little groomer run on the resort straight into the parking lot, which was pure bliss.

I was beyond thrilled my foot held up. I had normal soreness from my boots and from the 15km round trip, but the orthodics had worked and I hadn't dishonoured myself in the eyes of the world and the BCMC. We headed back home and I immediately began planning more ski tours.