From long work shifts to daily wear and tear, it’s common for most people to experience foot pain. However, those with flat feet tend to experience it more often than others. Since the arches of your feet play an important part in distributing ground impact, those with fallen arches experience the brute force of contact between their feet and the ground. They also feel the full force of their body weight, adding more strain on their feet. If you or a loved one has flat feet, here are three top pain-fighting tips and tricks for flat feet.
Roll Out Your Feet
Massaging your feet offers numerous benefits. It promotes circulation, releases tension, removes strain, and relaxes your muscles. One of the most popular and efficient ways to massage your feet, especially for those with flat feet, involves rolling a ball with the base of your foot. While seated in a chair, you simply roll a tennis-sized ball along the bottom of your feet, massaging your heel, arches, and the ball of your foot. The ball applies pressure on your muscles and rubs them as it moves across the sole of your feet. Other ways to roll your feet include using wooden massage rollers, small foam rollers, and other cylindrical massagers.
Strengthen Your Foot Muscles
Strengthening your foot muscles reduces the force of impact between your feet and the ground. It’s a preventative measure that minimizes future foot aches and pain. The stronger your foot muscles, the more control you possess and the stronger your defenses against any applied strain or impact force on your feet. They also ensure that other nearby muscles help take the weight off your feet, providing extra support. There are numerous ways to strengthen your feet through exercise. Popular strength drills include:
- Heel raises
- Seated ankle pumps
- Marble pickups
- Towel curls
- Toe lifts
Like with any exercise, you should moderate and avoid overworking your muscles to strengthen without causing extra pain. Many foot-strengthing drills also help build and maintain your arches.
Support Your Heel and Arches
Fallen arches put a lot of your body weight on the heels of your feet. Without an arch, you lack proper weight distribution, straining certain parts of your feet. Providing some form of heel and arch support equally distributes weight and strain, minimizing next-day foot aches and pain. Wearing orthopedic footwear gives you the most effective heel and arch support. Their orthotic design raises your heel, provides added cushion to diffuse applied pressure, and creates a springy structural support system that diffuses ground force interaction.
With these pain-fighting tips and tricks for flat feet and added support from Z-Coil Footwear, you can reduce pain from your fallen arches and walk without pain. Taking care of your feet helps them function optimally and keeps the pain away. These three pain-fighting tips to support and care for your feet make flat feet more bearable.
