The Marvelous Misadventures of a French History Nerd

This weekend, I sprained my ankle at a local concert. Bad enough to immobilize me for a couple of days, but not bad enough to keep me off the internet.

I thought I might take this opportunity to do a little digging on what sprains looked like in the 16th century, and boy are you guys in for a treat! Without going into all the gruesome details, I still plan on having a medicine based episode, I am going to give you a brief overview of what my treatment would have been in the late 18th/early 19th century.

First off, I would have had leeches applied to bring down the swelling. This is also a similar treatment for if I would have smallpox.

But at least this "bleeding" serves a purpose. The doctor would need to poke and prod the bruised area's to feel around for fractures in the bone. This is not as accurate at the xray's of today's medicine, but Marie Curie has yet to make her appearance in history.

Next, depending on whether or not my bone structure feels abnormal, my foot would have been stretched away from and set properly back into my ankle, even though this would have made it worse and I have no bone breakage (doctors can't be too careful at this time). Then my ankle given a cute lil makeshift cast with hard rods or sticks surrounding my afflicted area and bound with either plaster or bandages. Finally, my leg strapped to a bed until further notice.

And no ibuprofen to help!

Now that I have your attention, I have some fun news. My husband is going to join me in the podcast for the second episode. If I like the way he sounds, I may keep him on! He doesn't know much about french history, but we can forgive him. He'll be a fine addition to my little project, and one day I may be able to pay him for it.

The about me episode is up and now effectively only partially true. I am going to be reworking everything that I have already recorded, because I have effectively placed the cart before the horse, the good news is all but one of you is likely relation, or close friends with us.

Thank you for your patience in our journey.