You will never believe what I'm excited about!

Well, it finally happened.....I lost a toenail. As in el fin, no mas. In my head, I imagined this day would be far, far worse.

After work, I was able to go straight to the pool and swim. I was so excited! Over the weekend I noticed one side of the nail separated from my toe and while I knew the inevitable was close, I somehow managed to convince myself that if I painted another layer of nail polish on the doomed nail, it would miraculously re-attach and be good as new. After applying one coat, I decided to apply a second and then third for good measure. OPI is many things but crazy glue it is not. Within a few hours it was clear the nail had broken up with my toe. I thought about bandaging the toenail before swimming to "protect" it but decided that if wearing heels all day didn't hurt it, tape wasn't necessary. What if the adhesive was too powerful and yanked the toenail off anyway? Ohhh, let me rethink this. I'll just swim. Towards the end of the swim, I felt something weird. I can't quite describe the feeling though. You know how it feels when someone runs their fingers through your hair? Well that's how the second nail on my right foot felt. And I didn't like it.

When I got home, I decided I would remove all nail polish so I could let me nails "breathe" and get a better look at the two damaged nails on my LEFT foot. Wow. The second nail on my left foot is black. It actually looks like a french manicure of sorts. The very top is a happy white color and everything below is a purplish black. There is a purplish spot on the skin to the right of the nail and part of the flesh below the nail is also discolored. I'm not expert but I would say this nail is on it's way out too. Back to the one that is literally hanging by a thread though.

After getting the polish off, I decided to bend back the nail a little further. Hmmm, there's something behind the nail. OMG, it's another nail!!! A baby nail!!!! The nail behind the dead nail is dare I say, normal looking? I was hesitant to touch it but when I did, I could tell it was like a baby...thin, new, pure. I don't know what I thought would be behind the nail I was losing but I imagined something ugly. Something horrid. I was thrilled to see something that is definitely polish worthy is back there!

While Keith had cautioned me not to rip off the damaged nail, I wanted nothing more than to see it gone. I decided I would wiggle it and wiggle it back & forth until it just came off. This isn't too different from what I did as a kid when I had a loose tooth. After about 2 minutes and a helpful tug, the nail came right off. The toe doesn't look too bad either!

Upon further examination, I'm confident I will lose at least one nail on my left foot and maybe two. The middle nail looks better as it was once black but no longer is. Keep in mind the toe on the right foot that has now abandoned me never turned black.

I feel like I've achieved some twised, wacked out milestone. I mean who in their right mind would be excited to lose their first nail. Is this really the badge of honor I've been looking for? Many friends have suspected I'm nuts since signing up for IMTX but I'm pretty sure this seals the deal. And to further prove I've lost it, I'm including a picture below. Excuse the long-ish toenails but I've been TERRIFIED to get a pedi b/c of the nails trying to plot their escape from my body. I've now trimmed and filed all nails and my feet are looking not SO disgusting.

Goodbye right toenail! It was nice knowin' ya!