Achilles heels anyone?

[NDA]

Anyone knowledgeable about the Achilles tendons?

I pulled/tore my right one a couple of years ago and must have done the same a bit later with my left too. Some days I can hardly walk, some days it's fine.

The tendons (when sore) are too painful to even touch, incredibly sensitive.

Could it be something that is fixable without an operation?

Ta!

[ewenm]

Heel raises have worked well for me after an achilles injury, so standing with toes on a step edge and dropping the heels down below the toes, then raising them up as high as possible, many times. Also one-legged squats on an unstable surface (cushion, wobble board, BOSU ball) helped with my ankle weakness.

[NDA]

ewenm said:

Heel raises have worked well for me after an achilles injury, so standing with toes on a step edge and dropping the heels down below the toes, then raising them up as high as possible, many times. Also one-legged squats on an unstable surface (cushion, wobble board, BOSU ball) helped with my ankle weakness.

OK, will try.... Perhaps not today as I'm hobbling about. I assume if they're painful then it would be bad to aggravate the injury through exercise?

[ewenm]

Ibuprofen works well for the inflammation.

Edit: I'd look for a sports physio to get an idea of what's causing the problems though. They should be able to give you exercises to work on the problems.

Edited by ewenm on Friday 1st October 14:39

[GMJ]

Do you have tight calf muscles?

[Scotfox]

Recently tore my calf muscle and pulled my Achillies. As mentioned earlier gentle stretches will help as will just getting up and walking about and not sitting to long. Don't do to many at once and just build up gradually. Get thee to a Physio. I noticed a huge difference within 2 weeks of being given the correct excercise.

[Scotfox]

Oh and Gel heel cushions in my shoes and trainers.

[Rinko]

Definately worth going to see a sports physio.

I strained mine last year whilst training for a triathlon and the physio spotted two things - firstly due a leg break I had suffered a few years before, my legs were unequal lenghts.

Secondly he spotted that the shoes I was running in weren't supporting my foot properly - I supinate and the shoes were to support pronation.

With some physio and lots of ibuprofen etc it took 2-3 weeks to heal properly. Since getting some proper trainers and a small heel insert, I've not had a re-occurance.

[NDA]

I did go to a sports physio, but it hasn't seemed to help.

I am gloriously, majestically unfit - maybe that has something to do with it.

[GMJ]

NDA said:

I did go to a sports physio, but it hasn't seemed to help.

I am gloriously, majestically unfit - maybe that has something to do with it.

Do you mind telling me what the sports physio did?

I know some physios these days are very hands off that's why I always suggest going to see a sports massage therapist when people have muscular problems. Very hands on.

[NDA]

GMJ said:

NDA said:

I did go to a sports physio, but it hasn't seemed to help.

I am gloriously, majestically unfit - maybe that has something to do with it.

Do you mind telling me what the sports physio did?

I know some physios these days are very hands off that's why I always suggest going to see a sports massage therapist when people have muscular problems. Very hands on.

I had - over several visits - massage, deep heat thing (red lamps), ultrasound device and finally acupuncture. The acupuncture was quite painful, normally I'd feel nothing, but it was very sore.

[ewenm]

NDA said:

GMJ said:

NDA said:

I did go to a sports physio, but it hasn't seemed to help.

I am gloriously, majestically unfit - maybe that has something to do with it.

Do you mind telling me what the sports physio did?

I know some physios these days are very hands off that's why I always suggest going to see a sports massage therapist when people have muscular problems. Very hands on.

I had - over several visits - massage, deep heat thing (red lamps), ultrasound device and finally acupuncture. The acupuncture was quite painful, normally I'd feel nothing, but it was very sore.

Did they give you stretches and exercises to do?

[NDA]

ewenm said:

NDA said:

GMJ said:

NDA said:

I did go to a sports physio, but it hasn't seemed to help.

I am gloriously, majestically unfit - maybe that has something to do with it.

Do you mind telling me what the sports physio did?

I know some physios these days are very hands off that's why I always suggest going to see a sports massage therapist when people have muscular problems. Very hands on.

I had - over several visits - massage, deep heat thing (red lamps), ultrasound device and finally acupuncture. The acupuncture was quite painful, normally I'd feel nothing, but it was very sore.

Did they give you stretches and exercises to do?

A few - unfortunately it seems to set off the problem again. I can feel quite a pronounced lump on one tendon. It's a major irritation to be hobbling around everywhere!

[StratosGirl]

I'm interested in an answer for this too. I do karate and although we do plenty of warm-up, I still have trouble with one Achilles tendon.
We don't wear shoes either so I can't compensate with that...

[Scotfox]

NDA...are you active during the day or sitting at a desk for most of the day ? How frequently did you do the Physio excercises ? I was doing gentle stretching excercises every hour to start with. Then after a couple of weeks down to about 4 times a day. Blood circulation to the Achilles is very poor so takes a long time to heal. Get two buckets/basins fill one with cold water and the other with hot, bath temperature. alternate your foot between the two about a minute a time to stimulate blood flow.

I injured mine back in June this year and even now it's still not 100% but getting there. If I pinch the tendon just above the heel on my right leg it still feels twice the width of the one on my left !

[NDA]

Scotfox said:

NDA...are you active during the day or sitting at a desk for most of the day ? How frequently did you do the Physio excercises ? I was doing gentle stretching excercises every hour to start with. Then after a couple of weeks down to about 4 times a day. Blood circulation to the Achilles is very poor so takes a long time to heal. Get two buckets/basins fill one with cold water and the other with hot, bath temperature. alternate your foot between the two about a minute a time to stimulate blood flow.

I injured mine back in June this year and even now it's still not 100% but getting there. If I pinch the tendon just above the heel on my right leg it still feels twice the width of the one on my left !

A bit inactive to be honest - I need to do more!

[Pickled Piper]

Tore my Achilles about 18 months ago.

Several people have said it - go see a sports physio!

They will guide you through rehabilitation and once you are mended will show you how to avoid it happening again.

pp

[sidicks]

StratosGirl said:

I'm interested in an answer for this too. I do karate and although we do plenty of warm-up, I still have trouble with one Achilles tendon.
We don't wear shoes either so I can't compensate with that...

I'm in the same position - my main fitness is Karate, 3 days a week. Recently, I've noticed my achilles feeling very tight in the mornings. I spoke to my sister (who is a physiotherapist) and she recommended gentle calf stretches and calf raises in the mornings.

So far this has improved things slightly, so I'm going to continue with this to see if this continues to get better. Otherwise I'll be booking an appointment with my physio.

sidicks

[StratosGirl]

Thanks, I will try that! I tried using one of those tube bandages but although it helped my tendon a bit, my ankle felt worse. Go figure!

[M-J-B]

two and half years ago I ran through an entire F1 'show' on my treadmill. The next day I was sore, very sore but thought nothing of it.

I then ran 10k 5 or 6 times a week and suffered after every run, but again, thought I'd just had a minor injury and it will heal. I knew however something was wrong when I wold find it almost impossible to walk and I couldn't sleep due to the pain - even having the duvet touching my heal would make me cringe.

Wind forward and lots of physio later I went to my local hospital (fortunately private through my healthcare) and I had torn my Achilles towards the bottom of my foot, and you guessed it - I had done more damage continuing to run. The back of my heal was so painful it would wake me at night, I could sit down for 5 minutes, stand up and be unable to walk and generally be very, very painful (I had at that stage stopped running). To cut a long story short, it appears my wound had healed badly and I now had bone growing (or something like that) on the back of my heal and that was causing the problem. After a consultation I was operated on on 17th May this year and the surgeon removed quite a lot of st from the rear of my heal and did his best to tidy up my achilles through a hole about 2 inches long. Recovery was painful, made worse by the fact I didn't rest and went back to work after 2 days off, despite being told to take 2 weeks off and rest my foot which swelled up.

However, I now have no pain to the touch, and the problems I had have now gone......but I do have a lump on the back of my heal, I haven't and can't wear shoes since the operation due to the back of the shoe rubbing the wound, which is more painful than the original symptoms. I wear boots now (that's not a problem, aside from the initial sliding of my foot into the boot and rubbing the wound which is a bit iffy) and don't know when or if I'll be 100% fit again. The chances of running in the near future are slim currently which pisses me off as I love to have some 'me' time.

Given the original problem I'd still do the same again and have the operation. I've been back to the surgeon after many hours of physio to establish if everything is ok and he's quite rightly reluctant to operate again as I will then have scar tissue on scar tissue and that's not good. I'm told it takes 18 months to determine if it's been a success - let's hope so.