As I write this, I am nauseated with fear. One half of my big toe has been black since the week I started PFit. At first I assumed I had dropped a rock on my toe (I built a rock wall the same day PFit started). So this morning, I was reading about this and realized that this horror was caused by running. CRAP!

So obviously, I should get new shoes (which stinks, because other than the toenail issue, I love these shoes). But what's my prognosis here? What should I do about it, and am I still going to be able to run once the (expletive deleted) falls off?

On another note, I have extreme tooth and nail phobias, and last summer, I fell while running and landed BAM! on my front tooth. So now I have experienced two of my worst bodily fears whie running. Great.

Runners should never get too attached to their shoes ... they don't last very long, and when you finally find the one you love, the shoe company that made it is bound to redesign the shoe such that you won't like it anymore. A couple years ago I was running enough miles that I would wear out shoes every two months and I fell in love with the New Balance 762. But the NB 763 was disappointing and I had to resort to increasingly desperate web searches trying to find shoe stores with a few NB 762's left in my size. It was almost as pathetic as the Seinfeld "Sponge worthy" episode.

As for what to do ... regrettably this is a very common problem so there is plenty of info out there about it. Typical of the info is this from the runnersworld.com website. Hang in there!

http://www.runnersworld.com/article/0,5033...9-0-405,00.html