Exercises for plantar fasciitis?

Get a can of vegetables. Roll your foot gently over the can for about 5 minutes or so. This stretches and relaxes the foot. Literally, you can feel the foot ease it's tension. Do this faithfully every night. (You can buy foot rollers but the veggie can is cheaper and works just as well)

Get a good pair of running shoes. Everybody is different, so there will be some trial and error with this. Also, get better work shoes. I wear Danskos and they work like a dream. No pain at all.

PF can also lead to back pain, so if you can, get a massage on a regular basis. I get one once a month. It's expensive but saves me a fortune in doctors bills, because I relax and the muscles ease their tightness.

Good luck.

When I had it, I was instructed by the podiatrist to use off the shelf arch supports and to perform calf stretches. Keeping calf muscles long reduces pressure on the plantar. The stretch recommend to me was to prop up a cutting board on the edge of a phonebook. Stand on the slanted board with your toes raised for several minutes a few times a day. I set this up in front of the washbasin (to stretch while brushing teeth) and a couple of other strategic spots around the house (to stretch doing food prep). My symptoms disappeared in about 6 weeks, I think.

PF sucks, and it sounds like you had a really bad case of it.

have you seen a podiatrist at all?

Stand up, hold something. Up on your toes, back down...slowly. 25 times each a.m., 25 times each p.m.

I wear Eccos, which my orthopedist recommended. They aren't Sex in the City shoes, but they prevent the PF from flaring up, and you can get them on Zappos.

I avoid high impact aerobic exercises and use the elliptical trainer.

You might want to consider seeing a physical therapist as well.

Where I live we don't have one, I have an app with one out of town but it's not for another month and a half!

get an earlier appointment. i know from experience this pain is hell. find a different doctor or something. ask for an emergency appointment.

Get a can of vegetables. Roll your foot gently over the can for about 5 minutes or so. This stretches and relaxes the foot. Literally, you can feel the foot ease it's tension. Do this faithfully every night. (You can buy foot rollers but the veggie can is cheaper and works just as well)

Hubby does this with a frozen water bottle and it does help. . I don't know for sure but I don't think average weight people get PF (correct me if I'm wrong) so eventually it does go away as you lose the lbs.

Get a can of vegetables. Roll your foot gently over the can for about 5 minutes or so. This stretches and relaxes the foot. Literally, you can feel the foot ease it's tension. Do this faithfully every night. (You can buy foot rollers but the veggie can is cheaper and works just as well)

Hubby does this with a frozen water bottle and it does help. . I don't know for sure but I don't think average weight people get PF (correct me if I'm wrong) so eventually it does go away as you lose the lbs.

You are incorrect. "Average" weight people can and do develop plantar fasciitis. I was 60lbs lighter when I went through a two year bout of this.

OP, here is some info about plantar fasciitis:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0004438/

The suggestions to roll cans/frozen bottles are helpful, as is stretching and physiotherapy. It is crazy painful. I hope you find a professional to work with, managing it through the ER is not going to be helpful in the long-term. Sorry you are going through this, it sucks.

See a podiatrist for sure, stay off it as much as you can, ice it, use the rolling exercises with the vegetable cans also.

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You are incorrect. "Average" weight people can and do develop plantar fasciitis. I was 60lbs lighter when I went through a two year bout of this.


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Thank you for correcting me. I just read that being overweight is just ONE cause.

I would NOT get steroids or even use an insole. That's covering the problem and not helping it its an aspirin. Just massage with one of the said items above or a small ball (I did it so it was painful but I had to because I was forced to run every day). If you use an insole it won't help you strengthen your feet muscles and tendons making them weaker and rely in insoles. Skip them massages out your feet. My pf hasn't been back and it's been a few years!

Since it's many times a plantar strain, exercise for it should really be backed off, it's a damaged tendon, and should be allowed to heal. That's why ice can help at first, or often if you get damaging it.

That being said, awfully hard to do when every step uses it.

I had to get orthopedic insoles for every shoe I wore, especially stiffer ones, so it wasn't being used nearly as much.
But, I only paid the Dr for one, paid attention to how he did the foam imprint, and then got a thin cycling pair by doing my own through mail-order.
There was also a business in town that had a simpler, cheaper, and quicker version, stand on form that has a grid of pins that comes up that is almost continuous. The end result looked exactly like the 4 x as expensive Dr office version. My mailorder one was same cheaper price, but very low profile and carbon fiber. Ohhh.

That finally allowed me to heal, as well as backing off weight bearing exercise like running. The ice and rolling were a little relief, but mostly after doing too much on it.
The night stretch boot was decent help too.
I've been noticing it a bit on squats and deadlifts though, so thinking of getting them in to my lifting shoes.

Progressed enough and healed enough I could do barefoot running, which really strengthened it up then. But had to heal first.
And it took lots of time.
I still wear the insoles in the stiffest dress shoes and cycling shoes since they don't bend like the foot would like to. But any other shoe is flat bottomed.

Steroids didn't help enough, mainly because Dr was trying to work with me to allow me to keep doing lots of exercise. His final comment of "we can cut a piece of the band and that should bring relief" was like no way - it's there for a reason. I backed off.

I will say, once I healed from initial injury, latter injury through my stupidity was much quicker, and it was plantar sprain, couldn't push off walking, couldn't engage calf muscle. Did a little bit too much barefoot running at too fast a pace because it was just feeling so good. Oops.

Freeze a water bottle and roll your foot gently over it for several minutes a couple of times a day.
Stretch several times a day --- sit on the floor, legs out in front of you. Grab a bath towel and pull your foot back toward your body using the towel. Do this in 20-30 second intervals for 2-3 minutes and do this several times a day and before you get out of bed in the AM.. You need to stretch the rubberband-like tendon that tightens up during the night.
I suffered from it for a while before I knew what it was. Weightloss has probably helped, too, I imagine. With the weightloss of 20-25 over time plus the icing and stretching for a couple of weeks, I don't have any PF pain any longer.
Hang in there -- it is awfully painful! But you can remedy it and feel better.

This^^^
I also wear dansko shoes, they take a bit to get used to, but do seem to help. I also swim as my exercise, there is no pain for me while swimming. If you can keep up with the stretching and ice bottle rolling, it should improve. I also have noticed as I take off weight, it hurts less.

Good luck OP!

stretch you feet BEFORE you get out of bed in the morning. sounds crazy but it was easier to get them to stretch then and it really reduced the pain when I stood up. I would try to point my toes as far up toward my head as possible which stretched out the tendon. Anything to make it stop feeling like someone is stabbing me in the bottom of my foot whenever I put weight on them!