My feet have been causing me all sorts of trouble over the last couple of years. I've fallen and stubbed toes and overtrained -- just all sorts of stuff that have caused me pain.
2 years ago I really, really got into running. In hindsight, I probably was increasing my weekly mileage too quickly but I have problems with restraint when it comes to running. Anyway, one day after one of my long runs I noticed that my right foot, heel and calf were acting funny. Everything was tight and sore. The pain went away after some rest but would reappear periodically in the form of just throbbing heel pain. Nothing too major but definitely annoying.
A couple of months later in that same year I fell and did some damage to my right ankle. I went to the doctor and he did an x-ray - I had just sprained it pretty bad. But, the x-ray also showed I had a bone spur on that foot. He also threw out a word: plantar fasciitis. He told me not to worry about the bone spur yet and to go do my physical therapy and get myself better. I did do my physical therapy but I'll be honest - I probably did like 20% of the at home work and then had to suddenly stop due to the combative HR person at my place at work. You see, this was a work injury so they were footing the bill. In hindsight, I should have stood my ground and finished my PT (they told me I definitely needed more) but I let some HR guy who is absolutely the most difficult person in the world get the best of me and instead of dealing with his attitude I quit going. Anyway, when I met with my physical therapist I mentioned to her that the doctor had said in addition to the sprain I had something called plantar fasciitis. She explained it to me and I realized that that was the cause of the pain that I had started experiencing.
Cut to:
1 year ago, I hurt my toe on my right foot. This one happened at home. After confirming with 2 different orthopedists that I just had a long road of healing in front of me, they also told me that I had plantar fasciitis. They also told me some physical therapy would help me out tremendously. This time I didn't do physical therapy due to some insurance and money retraints.
If you don't know, plantar fasciitis is irritation and swelling on the bottom of the foot and manifests as lots of heel pain. My bone spur is most likely the culprit of mine. Also, my Physical Therapist told me I have really tight calves which also contributes to it.
So what's the point of all this? I've been recently back into the working out game full force. And due to all of this, my foot has flared up again. And from what I've read on the condition, I should count my blessings that I don't have it as bad as some people - apparently it causes immobility from the pain. So I need to get a handle on this now. From the knowledge that I gained at my physical therapy and information online I need to incorporate a stretching program to see if I can get a handle on this pain. I really don't want it to become an "issue" because to be honest, I'm sick of being sidelined due to injury.
So I am going to do a stretching program for 30 days to see how much of an improvement I can get.
It's 2 stretches for my calves - each to be held for 40 seconds 5 xs / 3 xs a day.
That's a lot of calf stretching and I will have to find a place to do it at work but I will be a fool if I don't at least try.
30 days to flexible calves!
March 15 - April 13
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