Melbourne

I’ve broken a bunch of toes, mostly by kicking bed posts in the middle of the night. Smaller ones hurt like a bitch immediately but aren’t much of an issue later. Tape it to the next one and admire the strange colours. A big toe is fundamental to your balance, so might want to get that looked at propper.

yeah, that's a hospital trip

Fucking ouch. Definitely trip to the hospital, and don't try and force it/walk on it more than the bare minimum until it heals. You can end up revealing it once it begins to heal if you out too much pressure on it and don't have it professionally treated. Also, anecdote:

I broke one of my toes a few years ago. The toe next to my little toe. It was during COVID times, early 2021, I think. Our house was in lockdown, because another kid went and broke lockdown to go get on the piss with her mates and copped the COVID. It was quite ea hellish time, I didn't even have a decent phone at the time, because I'd dropped my phone and shattered it and was just on a cheap Optus prepaid thing that lagged running 480p YouTube. We were a tier 1 site, so mandatory PCR COVID tests on days 1, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, and 14. All of the workers were isolating, so we had these fucknuts in full PPE who came and sat in the office to make sure we didn't die, but nothing else. No Netflix no leaving, no books, literally nothing.

I think it was like day 4 or 5, I was at the office door talking to a worker who was alright. I was also in full PPE, with a lovely mask, gloves, Google's, and face shield to go with it. I went to take a step in, and without realising, I absolutely rammed my toe into the door (concrete reinforced, about 5" thick), right on the corner with the hinges. I fell to the floor and genuinely cried, it really fucking hurt. The worker didn't really give two shits, all I got was "GET OUT OF THE BLOOD OFFICE". He thought I was exaggerating and wouldn't give me any advice. My toe swelled up and I couldn't bend it for a few days. It hurt to the touch. The home doctors wouldn't come because it was a tier 1 site, the worker wouldn't take me to a hospital, and also convinced me there wasn't really any point calling a doctor or ambulance, or even the nurse on call.

All I could do was ice it with a bag of peas, and hobble around for the next couple of weeks. My toe still has a moderate bend to it now, so probably didn't heal right. It's not a huge deal because it's only a small toe, and I can still bend it, but being a big toe, you should absolutely go get it checked out. I'd you really have something against E/Rs, call the nurse on call (free and 24/7), and ask if she thinks you can hold off until the morning and if it's something a priority primary care clinic could treat

Oh nasty. If you have some tape and you can touch it, try taping it to the next toe, to splint it and protect it from movement. And yep, get to a hospital when you can.