7 Reasons Why Walking Causes Foot Problems
Posted on 15th August 2018 at 17:40
Why, oh, why do we have foot problems? I mean aren’t we just doing what nature intended? Your gait is as unique as your fingerprint.
We do not all walk about perfectly upright, arms swinging symmetrically at our sides, head forward like the synths in Humans. Just stop in your main street or my personal favourite, the airport and look around you. Limps, striding, sloping… just look at this guy
But what is the root of it all? Why the individuality? This is not an exhaustive list, but a taster, and some lucky people will never have a problem, but a recent survey found that 66% of people in the UK say that foot or lower leg pain has stopped them from exercising at some point.
1. As mentioned in my Feet are not always great at being feet blog, feet were once used more like hands that could grip and were dexterous and have ADAPTED to become feet
2. Until 9 weeks gestation our feet are tucked in like clubfeet and then rotate out occasionally leaving a tendency for feet to roll in when we are resting with our feet up meaning they have to go through a fairly large range of motion to meet the ground
3. The surfaces we walk on in the western world are FLAT and solid, human made and do not provide shock absorption
4. The sole of a foot is curved in the midline arch and the metatarsal arch and when this flexible curved sole meet’s human made unforgiving floors the forces from the floor pushes against the foot structure, attempting to flatten the arches and straining the internal structures
6. We should wear shoes to combat the surfaces we walk on see Getting your feet ready for winter blog
7. Often, we have one leg longer than the other. We are just not symmetrical. A fact that was not a problem before we walked upright. But now we do and stack feet, knees, hips, pelvis, spine and head in a liner fashion and a longer leg can kick the whole thing out of whack. By causing a single flat foot, one foot to rotate out or the other in, knee problems, hip problems, pelvic tilts, spinal deviations and shoulder drops amongst many, many other compensatory issues.
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