Here are some helpful tips to combat party-feet fallout:
1) Dowel exercise or tennis ball exercise when you get home
Both of these exercises will help to loosen the connective tissues under the bottom of the foot, which tightens after standing in a pair of heels. It’s best to do this quickly when you get home, but if that’s not possible, make sure you do them the next morning.
If you are new to these exercises, I suggest you use tennis ball; if you are one of our seasoned veterans at AFS, then use the dowel, as it will be more effective.
Tennis Ball
How to do this exercise:
- Sit on the edge of a chair with the tennis ball under your toes.
- Roll the tennis ball from your toes to your heel, applying as much pressure as you can tolerate.
- Roll the ball around in small circles on your forefoot (from your toes to under the ball of your foot).
- Now roll the ball around in small circles on your arch
(from the end of the ball of your foot to the beginning of your heel). - Then roll the call around in small circles on your heel.
- Repeat the above process on the other foot.
Dowel Exercise (Only For the Pro s)
How to do this exercise:
- Stand with your toes slightly over the dowel.
- Slowly walk your feet forwards over the dowel, one small step at a time, stopping at any points that are tender for a count of 4 seconds.
- Continue this slowly until you have walked over the entire dowel. Step back to the beginning and start again.
- This exercise will be uncomfortable to do but it should not be extremely painful.
2) Stretch you calves when you get home
This exercise will help to alleviate the negative effects caused by the high heels of the shoes, which shorten your Achilles and calf muscles. If you don’t stretch your calves when you get home, when you get up the next morning the calve muscle will have tightened the whole foot, which may result in pain in the whole lower limb. This is because the calf muscle inserts into the connective tissues that make up the bottom of your foot.
How to do this exercise:
- Find a wall and place hands on it.
- Place one foot in front of the other so that toes are pointing in the same direction & feet are parallel.
- For first stretch bend front knee and keep back knee straight.
- Hold for 30 seconds.
- Repeat on opposite leg.
3) Try a met dome in your heels
At the clinic, we use metatarsal domes all the time. They help to spread the pressure that heels create across the front of your foot. They stick onto your shoe in front of the heel, or in flat shoes, just behind the ball of your foot.
If you are not sure, ask Daniel or Lachlan to show you how to stick the device in your shoe. We sell these domes at the clinic for six dollars each.
4) Come in if the Pain Doesn’t Settle Down
We’ll be here leading up to Christmas and over the break, if you are suffering discomfort please don’t hesitate to come and see us. We can fix you pain throught a variety of treatmenst including foot mobilisation, acupuncture, interex therapy and ART.
I hope this helps you enjoy your festive period. If you find that you are still experiencing pain, please don’t hesitate to contact the clinic as there’s a number of steps we can take to help you.On Behalf of all of us here at Sydney Foot Solutions have a great Christmas and we look forward to seeing you in the new year!
