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Our feet are one of the most important parts of our active bodies, but they are often overlooked, especially when busy family life takes over. If you are worried about the state of your feet or the long-term effects of not paying enough attention to them, read below to find out the ways in which you can spot when and where your feet may need some love. Once you start to observe your daily life and how it is affecting your feet, you can become better at self-care and taking a moment to focus on your foot health.
Running Around With Children
Hectic family life always includes chasing after one child or another while also trying to do several other tasks throughout the day. Because children have so much more energy than adults, they are very rarely just sitting down. This means that you, too, are up and about trying to wrangle them and get them from place to place.
This kind of strenuous activity can lead to foot pain and even injury, so it is important to pay attention to your feet and make sure that you are not putting too much pressure on them. One way to take care of your foot health is to elevate your feet after a long day. This will help alleviate any pain you are feeling and will help with blood flow after hours of being on your feet.
Wearing The Wrong Footwear
Daily life is so dependent on walking around and completing tasks outside of the home. When you have a busy family, you are likely just to throw on any pair of shoes you can find before running out of the door. This lack of consideration for footwear can cause your feet to feel worn out and sore. Many people experience common foot problems because they are not wearing footwear with the right support. When you are running around with children and picking them up and carrying them, your feet go through a lot. If you are not wearing comfortable shoes during these activities, then you are likely suffering from foot pain by the end of the day.
Certain types of footwear will suit different kinds of feet, so it is important to try a few types out to see which ones are best for you. If you have high arches, make sure to find shoes with good arch support or you may experience severe foot pain and even back pain in the long run. The best rule of thumb is to find shoes that feel as comfortable as possible on your feet so that they are the last thing you are worrying about at the end of the day.
Stress
Running a busy family can cause a lot of stress and that can contribute to many health problems including problems with foot health. Stress causes muscle tension and inflammation which can lead to problems like swollen ankles, strained muscles, and even muscle tear injuries in the feet. Because stress causes muscle tension and posture issues, the structure of the feet can change after years of chronic stress, so it is important to keep an eye on the state of your feet.
If you feel like your daily life is quite stressful, the best thing you can do is integrate relaxing practices into your day-to-day activities. This can be done alone or with your children as it can help them to decompress after long, stressful days as well. When you get home from after-school activities or weekend trips, try sitting down with your kids and doing a stretching circle. This will help your muscles relax and will additionally help everyone practice their breathing techniques to reduce stress in the whole body.
Insufficient Rest
Living in a home with multiple busy schedules can lead to interrupted sleep schedules and not getting enough sleep at night. On top of that, sometimes you may find yourself going all day long without a break. This kind of restless lifestyle is not conducive to good overall health, not to mention foot health. Everyone needs sufficient rest in order to live a healthy lifestyle and maintain good health for the future.
The best way to remedy this is to rest your feet as often as possible. If you are waiting to pick up the kids from soccer practice, spend a few minutes reclining your car seat and extend your legs. This will give you some time off your feet and allow your circulatory system to flow more easily. Blood flow to the feet is always an important part of maintaining foot health.
Lack of Self-Care
It is hard to find time for yourself when you have a household full of little people to take care of, but a lack of self-care can result in neglect. General aches and pains can only be thrown aside for so long, especially foot pain. Because we are on our feet so much during the day, we are conditioned to believe that foot pain at the end of the day is normal, but if it is severe, then it should be addressed.
Dedicating time for some self-care every once in a while can result in fewer aches and pains and will help you avoid long-term ailments like Plantar Fasciitis. Although it feels like there is little time to think about yourself between the needs of your kids and your partner, it may be time to literally put your foot down and carve out some time for yourself.
No Time For Regular Exercise
A lack of exercise due to busy schedules is normal in a hectic family, but it can become detrimental if it starts to affect your health. Not getting regular exercise can lead to muscle atrophy, swollen legs and ankles, and general fatigue. If you find yourself only walking from your car to your house or your car to the grocery store, then you may notice that it is affecting your health. Little to no exercise can also reduce blood flow and may cause numbness or tingling in your feet. This could be a sign of something more serious and should be checked out by a doctor.
One solution for this problem is to start doing mini-exercises wherever you are throughout the day. If you are sitting and waiting to pick up your kids, try lifting your legs up and down and rotating them from side to side. This will help with blood flow and keep your feet from swelling up.
Water Activities
This is an activity that becomes very common in the summertime and could affect not only you but your family members as well. Because summertime brings weeks off of school, lots of days are spent at the pool, or at lakes, or at the beach and that means lots of exposure to the elements that your feet do not normally have. To prevent foot health issues like athlete’s foot or abscesses, it is important to make sure that everyone’s feet are fully dried before putting on socks or shoes and then walking around in them.
Other issues that can occur because of water activities are blisters and cuts. It is important that if you or one of your family gets a cut on the bottom of their foot in a public place like a pool or a lake they clean and dry it as soon as possible. Because we are constantly weaning shoes, wounds do not heal as quickly because they are not able to breathe. Make sure to air out any wounds that happen on anyone’s feet in order to avoid infection.
Poor Posture
One of the many aspects of daily life that is often overlooked is posture. When we live busy and hectic lives, we seldom get a second to correct the way we are standing or take the time to stretch out our spines. The thing about human bodies is that everything is interconnected. So, when you have poor posture and you do nothing to correct it, it can eventually mess with the alignment of your feet. Down the line, this can lead to limited mobility in old age, joint damage that could lead to things like hip replacements, and just overall chronic pain.
Correcting your posture or just checking in a few times per day to make sure you are sitting up straight and not hunched over can save you big time in the long run. This kind of check-in can be grouped together with other activities listed above like stretching with your kids or dedicating some time for self-care.
All of the stress and activities that happen in a day trickle down to the feet, so it is so important to always remember that whatever you do in a day, you have to take a few minutes to relax and think about the health of your feet and the rest of your bodies.
Image Credit: depositphotos.com
