Hey everybody it's Doctor Jo, and today I'm going to show you how to relieve
plantain french fry dis, I mean plantar fasciitis. Let's get started.
To start off we're going to do a calf
stretch and this will also help stretch that plantar fascia underneath. I like
always putting a roll up underneath my foot because that leaves the heel free
to move around easily. Take a strap if you have a stretch strap, if you don't
have that you can use a dog leash, you can use a towel, or a belt but just make
sure you put it right around the ball of your foot. And you want to relax your
foot. So you're not actively moving the foot, you're pulling it towards you so as
you pull towards yo,u you don't want it to be super painful, but you want to feel
that stretching. You might feel it underneath the foot, you might feel it in
your calf back here, you might feel it in both places, but hold that stretch for 30
seconds, relax it for about 10 to 15 seconds, and do that 3 times. So just
stretching 30 seconds and then relaxing. The next thing to do is massage out the
fascia underneath the foot. So you can have someone else do this for you, if you
have someone to do it, or you can just massage it yourself. The big thing about
this is the plantar fascia that becomes a fasciitis can be in your heel, it can
be on the bottom of your heel, and a lot of times it's in this arch area, but it
can be even up here as well, so sometimes that heel pain that might be thought of
to be achilles tendonitis or something is actually plantar fasciitis, so
massaging this whole area, getting all of that fascia nice and loosened up
really helps out a lot. So what I like to do, you can get lotion or something if
you want to to help relax it a little bit, and make it a little easier to
massage, but just start off by going in the middle and just really push. You want
to push them pretty firmly, but you don't want it to be super duper painful. It's
going to be comfortable if that fascia is irritated, but you really want to just
kind of start pushing it to stretch that fascia back
out. You might feel some scar tissue or adhesions in there if it's really
flared up, and really work on those spots to get it worked out. Then after you just
kind of do some straight pushes up and down the foot, start fanning it out. Now
so start in the middle and pull out this way and that feels really really good.
Even if you don't have plantar fasciitis, that usually feels pretty good on the
foot, so starting in the middle, pulling out, go all the way into the heel
even to the back of the heel a little bit as well because that's that's up
there where that planar fascia is as well, so pulling out and pulling out. So
you can do this for anywhere from two to three minutes, really just to work it out
and get get that fascia nice and loosened up and feeling warm, and then
you can start doing some circles in there as well. And so again pushing
pretty firmly but you don't want to be so uncomfortable where you can't
tolerate it very well. So then the next thing you can do is roll it on a ball, so
what's nice with that is if you have something that has some spikes on it
because that really helps get in that fascia as well, and so just sitting and
putting some pressure through it rolling all the way again to the end of the heel
and then coming all the way back up to the toes. You can go sideways a little
bit and you want to put as much pressure on it as you can comfortably tolerate, so
you might have start off with just rubbing just a little bit, not a whole
lot, but just getting it working out a little bit, but eventually you want to be
able to start pushing a little bit more really to stretch out that fascia a lot,
and then the same thing here you can just start off with thirty seconds, work
your way up to a minute or two minutes, whatever is most comfortable for you.
Another one that I really really like a lot is to take a frozen water bottle and
use that to roll it as well. And some of you might ask well how do I get a frozen
water bottles, I'm doing this first thing in the morning because most the time
that pain is first thing in the morning, well what you can do is put it in a
little cooler by your bed. So these little sandwich
coolers only cost a couple bucks, and if you put a water bottle in there it
should stay pretty frozen overnight or you can set up a little mini fridge by
your bed, that would be pretty cool, or you can even train your dogs to go and
get it in your refrigerator, but if you don't have any of that or if you don't
have somewhere in the house that can go grab it for you before you first get up,
get a little cooler and then just put it in. Most people have coolers at home and
then just set it by your bed so you don't have to walk before you do it. But
this is nice because not only do you get the massaging part but you get that
pressure stretching out part as well. So usually this is a very very good feeling
if you have that plantar fasciitis because that helps calm down that
inflammation it makes it nice and cold, calms it down, stretches it out before
you even get up out of bed and start walking in the morning. So this is a very
nice way to start out as well and again you can just go 30 seconds and then work
your way up to about a minute and a half. So while you're in sitting, a good way to
work those muscles underneath the foot where that plantar fascia is, is
take a resistive band and it doesn't have to be anything strong it can be the
yellow lightest one, and put it right about where your toes are. Give yourself
a little bit of resistance, and just bring your toes up, not the whole foot,
just the toes, and then pull them down so you're working those muscles and tendons
that go underneath the foot because the ones that curl those toes under go
underneath that so this just helps some of that strengthening working those
muscles, helps get that irritation out of that area, that area, that area because
it's increasing the circulation in the area so this is a really good one to do
as well and it doesn't take a lot of stress on that foot so it shouldn't
really hurt ,and if it hurts, then either take off the resistance, or just
do it without the band at all.
So this one again really helped stretch out that fascia underneath the foot, so
kind of get on all fours, put your toes out in a fanning position so your toes
want to go this way so they're not here but they're putting a stretch underneath,
and then come up into a tall kneeling position and that stretches out that
area so the more you lean back on your feet, the more of a stretch you get. So
you might only want to come here to start off with, and you might feel that
stretch a lot just right there, but if you want more of a stretch, kind of bring
your bottom back to your heels and that will stretch that a lot. So try and get
to 30 seconds if you can. If you just want to start off with 10 to 15, that's
fine, and do that 3 times. So now we're going to stand up. So the next stretch
you're going to use a step it doesn't have to be a big one like this, it can
just be a curb or a small step or steps if you've got a second floor, but make
sure you're holding on to something for balance if your balance is a little bit
off just so you don't fall over or hurt yourself a little bit. So you're going to
step up onto the step, and then put the ball of your foot right on the edge.
That's why you really want to hold on to something so you don't slip off. It's
better to do it with shoes on even though you might not get as much of a
stretch because it will grip the top a little bit more, but if you if you feel
comfortable enough you can do it with bare foot so then you'll get more of a
stretch in that plantar fascia, but just put the ball of your foot on the
edge, and then drop your heel down until you feel that stretch. So again, you'll
make sure you're holding on to something for safety just in case, and then holding
that for 30 seconds, coming back up give it about 10 second break, and then
dropping it down again, hold it up for 30 seconds. So that's a really good stretch
I like that one a lot. if you don't have
a step you can use a
wall or something with an edge that you can just prop your foot up on, so the
higher you can prop up your foot, the more of a stretch you'll get, and so if
there's a wall here, just kind of prop your hands up on the wall for some
support, and then just lean forward to get that,
I try and keep that leg straight and lean forward, so again holding it for
about 30 seconds, come down give it about a 10 second break, and then propping it
back up and leaning forward. So that will give you a good stretch too, especially
if you don't have a step to to do that stretch on. So now we're going to do some
strengthening stuff. So just standing in place again, hold on to something if you
need some balance like a sturdy chair or countertop, and you're just going to do
some heel raises. So going up on your toes, do a nice controlled motion. So
coming up, and then slowly coming back down. If you go up and you feel like you
come right back down, make sure you're holding on to something because you want
not to fall over, but you want to have that controlled motion going up and down,
really stretching out that area and really controlling it to do
strengthening as well as stretching. So just start off with about ten of these,
and then if that's easy to do, you can work your way up to 20 to 25. And then
the last set of exercises is just a balance series. So with the balance that
helps those stabilizer muscles in the foot that helps strengthen those muscles
down there and helps work out that fascia as well. So as simple as just
standing on one foot for balance. Now again if you haven't done this before, or
if you haven't done in a long time, hold on to something while you're doing it. So
hold on to a sturdy chair or a counter top, and then if that becomes easy when
you're holding on, then you can just hold on with one hand, and still doing that
balance, and then that becomes easy, then you can just hold on with one finger, and
then eventually try balancing without holding on to anything. So just start off
with ten to fifteen seconds, take a little break, but eventually you want to
work up to trying to hold your balance without holding on anything for about a
minute. So those are your stretches and exercises to relieve plantar fasciitis. If
you'd like to stretch both sides if you have time, you probably should because
sometimes when you have that plantar fasciitis on one side, it might start to
try and come on the other side, so make sure to try and stretch both sides.
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remember, be safe, have fun, and I hope you feel better soon.