Foot Exercises to Treat Plantar Fasciitis and Heel Pain.
|Plantar fasciitis can be a frustrating condition to suffer from when it comes to foot pain. On some days it’s severe enough to prevent you from going to work, and yet other days you feel like it has completely resolved. Some will limp for months before seeing a doctor and then not respond to long term treatment consisting of shoe gear changes and orthotics.
Our practice approach has been much different over the past several years, and we are now starting to see this trend become more mainstream as the approach is being studied and used in treating more than just heel pain. By removing your shoes and strengthening the foot you can help resolve the pain from this “overuse” condition that is basically a tendonitis of the muscles in the foot that originate on the heel. I blogged about this study published last year which demonstrates the effects strengthening the foot can have on resolving heel pain.
Barefoot drills and exercises that strengthen the foot, increase ankle flexibility and improve gait patterns are working their way into gym workouts. Olympic runners use them to groove their gait pattern. The elderly use them to prevent falls. All ages use them to rehab nagging knee and hip pain.
Justin Sandherr, 30, a private wealth manager from Atlanta, uses barefoot exercises like spreading the toes wide and lifting and lowering the big toe and pinky independently and simultaneously to eliminate knee pain from a 6-year-old injury. “Regular weights don’t stabilize my knee joint like the barefoot methodology does. There’s a direct correlation: Work the feet, no more knee pain. I won’t play basketball or snowboard unless I’ve been working my feet.”
Retired teacher Susi Erwin, 66, an active skier, runner and two-time cancer survivor from Denver, says she used to fall a lot and once shattered a hip bone. For seven years she has been taking barefoot aerobics classes that start with six minutes of foot and ankle drills.
“It’s not an age thing. I’m fit, but I’m a klutz,” Erwin says. “Now I don’t trip anymore. In fact, I can’t remember the last time I fell.”
Sandherr and Erwin both take classes designed by Stacey Lei Krauss, the founder of the Willpower Method, which has 1,000 certified instructors across the country. The functional-fitness classes often begin with foot strengthening and flexibility exercises, such as toe-tapping or spreading the toes.
Source: Barefoot running may be over, but here’s why barefoot training is still smart – LA Times
Great article. I also think though that if the person has a bunion, the adductor hallucis muscle is excessively stretched, and training it is hard. I like to get people into correct toes so that the bones are in a favorable position, then focus on strengthening.
Excellent examples and a wide array of cases covered !. liked it
Stretching
There is a particular way to do this, so do not rely on the first visualization that pops into your mind
• Sit down on a chair and cross a foot at the ankle
• Using your hands to pull your toes up until you feel that singular stretching sensation along the heel region, including the ball of your foot
• Hold that position for 30 seconds
This exercise alone can make a world of difference to your pain levels, providing instant relief in most cases.
Hello! Useful article. I got rid of plantar fasciitis using similar technique. However, a bit differently. If you don’t mind I’d like to share my experience of how I dealt with plantar fasciitis.
I’m a busy person, so I had no time to see doctors, get acupuncture or physiotherapy. I didn’t know what to do and the pain was killing me, I could barely walk. So, I did a research hoping to find something that could help me. And guess what?
I found one e-book which taught me a lot about plantar fasciitis, it’s symptoms, causes and how to cure it. I followed it carefully and I completely got rid of my plantar fasciitis in 10 days! Can you believe that? I thought it’s a miracle, but then I did some more research about this e-book and found a lot of satisfied people who also claimed that they cured they plantar fasciitis fast. What a finding!
I’m pasting a link below which leads to a review of this e-book:
http://dietandhealthreviews.com/fast-plantar-fasciitis-cure-review/
Have a wonderful day 🙂
Thanks for the post hope it will work for me. Now a days its being tough for me to deal with my plantar fasciitis.
Keeping your feet healthy isn’t only important in running, but in almost everything you do. Even though I’m not a runner, these are great foot exercises that will help me stay on my feet for as long as I can. Thanks for the tips! I’ll implement them into my daily routine.
Thank you for your great post. I’ve learnt some important things from your blog. I’ll bookmark your blog for future visit. keep posting good contents please. Thanks again.
thanks for guide, hope it will work for me
I have been suffering from plantar fasciitis for a few months and it is only getting worse, it so painful.I cannot even think of stretching just yet.However, I have done some research and found 3 stretches that might work.
hello fellow plantar fasciitis sufferers.
I’m going on my second month with this. Tried the exercises, ice, rolling my foot over frozen water bottle, aleve, ice water, hot water, massage.
Felt some relief after a month, went running very easy for two miles, and bam! Back to stage one. Does this ever go away? Anyone ever get a cortizone injection for it?? I can’t stand the pain anymore.
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Thank your for your great post.i learn about plantar fasciitis details from your post.i learn that we should careful walking shoes for plantar fasciitis.thanks for this post.
Stretching and buying the right footwear are vital to enjoying a pain free life, but there’s an injection called AmnioFix (http://shoewow.com/studies-raise-hope-new-plantar-fasciitis-cure/) which has reached stage III trials that could bring relief.