Self Massage: Treatment for Plantar Fasciitis

I am a nurse and after many years of abuse, my feet are often unhappy. Having suffered through several bouts of this painful condition and having followed all of the advice about tennis ball foot massages and foot stretches, I had found rare and limited relief.

With my most recent episode I spoke to a dear friend who is a professional massage therapist. She has been working for years at a major cancer hospital in New York City. She is very good at what she does.

Her advice made perfect sense. It seemed to be an extension of all the advice I had already been following. She told me to stretch my toes towards my knee by propping the ball of my foot on something with my knee bent so that I could reach my foot. I found the padded arm of an easy chair works very well for this with my foot up in my lap.

She than suggested that, starting at the ball of my foot I massage the sole of my foot. The massage is to be done with pointed fingers walking over the sole of the foot taking tiny finger walking steps to cover the whole surface of the sole of the foot. Although long strokes are lovely, in this instance you need to walk the finger tips over the sole of the foot and along the way probe for any sore spots. Those sore spots needed a bit more attention, gentle but longer and slightly deeper massage. Go only as deep as you tolerate. Shallow will work but the foot's skin is thick so a bit deeper is good. When the foot was finished she told me to work up the back of my calf in the same way. Starting at the ankle and working towards the knee walk the fingers up the back of the leg with the foot still in that, toe pointing up towards the knee, position. Again giving more time and gentle attention to any sore spots. I did this and found to my amazement that my symptoms left. They completely left!

The next day, just to make sure they did not come back, I did the whole massage treatment it again. This time I bent my toes up towards my knee, did the foot's sole and calf than I decided on my own to do the other side or top side of my foot and shin. I pointed my toe down for this treatment to elongate those muscles and went to work on the top of my foot and my shin. I was surprised at how many sore spots there were on the top of my foot. It took a long time to cover this area. When I got to my shin, I massaged the cord-like muscles on either side of my shin and found only slight tenderness in just a few spots. For good measure I worked on the other foot in both positions too. It took quite a while to complete this self treatment.

I have suffered for several years with plantar fasciitis, some times in my left foot, sometimes in the right and I must say that after following this advice I have never had happier feet.

I told my massage therapist friend what I had done and she smiled with approval. She liked the idea of doing both top and bottom sides of the leg and foot. Though she had not advised it, she did think it was a good idea.

The next week my son, a nineteen year old athlete, came to me with foot pain. He had strained his foot playing Ultimate Frisbee the night before and had pain both under and on top of his foot. This is a rare happening as he never comes to me for relief, that would be acknowledging that Mom has a brain. Nineteen year old boys usually do not do that, at least not this one. He wanted to go out and play another game of Frisbee that afternoon and his foot was really unhappy so he reluctantly came to me for help.

After determining that his range of motion was normal and that his pain was not excruciating enough to likely be a fracture, I began. Of course he had to disagree with me and tell me that that was not where it hurt when I was working on his foot. I stopped his protest with a raised eyebrow and he allowed me to continue to work on him. I did this massage for him just as I did for myself and he was surprised at how good his foot felt after. I am sure he was thinking that perhaps his old Mom might know something after all. Off he went, smiling, for another game of Ultimate Frisbee.

The next time you have the horrid foot pain of plantar fasciitis, sit down and, let your fingers do the walking, walk them up and down your foot and leg and experience the blessed relief that can come from this self massage.