Reply To: How to ease bad foot pain?

[milly89]

what causes it I think depends on the person, I have some hypermobile bits and some stiff bits, my ankles don’t have a lot of flexibility compared to my knees and hips, particularly on my left hand side which is generally a bit screwy. My left arch is quite flat and the ankle rotates slight inwards (flattening the arch) when standing, though if analysed when running I’m ‘neutral’.

That is why barefooting works for me (and why I get a bit angsty when people say absolutely not to do it because it does help quite a lot of people who come to it after having tried everything else), because it means that the structures in my foot have to work properly and strengthen so that the arch doesn’t push itself down any further. Now, if I spend all day walking in ‘barefoot’ footwear my feet will ache because they have had a work out but I don’t get any heel pain. The only time I have found that I need to use other footwear is when I play netball etc when there is a lot of jumping or running (though the rest of my body struggles with the latter anyway). I do all of my training sessions in five fingers or socks so that my trainer can see what my feet are doing and correct them if necessary, otherwise they do try and get away with all sorts!