Introduction: My Battle With Plantar Fasciitis

How It All Began

One morning in the summer of 2009, I woke up, and the first step I took with my right foot felt like I was stepping on glass. The pain was excruciating and caused me to severely limp into the bathroom. While showering, I could hardly put any weight on my right foot. I had never experienced such pain in the arch of my foot, but I knew exactly what it was: Plantar Fasciitis.

My Mechanism of Injury

There is always a cause for pain, which we call a mechanism of injury. Mine was increasing my running mileage, not stretching out, and not doing any strength training with my cardio workouts. Adding insult to injury, I did not purchase new running shoes when, a few weeks prior, my right foot was starting to be sore after a run.

What I should have done and failed to do was apply ice after the first sign of symptoms and then stop running until new shoes were purchased. You know what they say about hindsight?

Well, I paid the price for not doing what I would have recommended to a patient presenting with the same early warning signs of Plantar Fasciitis. Little did I know at the time this would be the first of many episodes of Plantar Fasciitis that I would suffer through for the next eleven years.

The worst would be in the spring of 2015 due to a grueling speaking calendar that found me lecturing all over the country for 8-hour seminars. I had developed plantar fasciitis in both feet and was asked to give the "Father to Daughter" speech at my youngest daughter's senior send-off. The speech included a very brief, funny dance routine that I would do in front of my daughters at home. Getting up to the stage was horrible, but I sucked it up, and nobody knew except my wife how much pain I was in. When I returned to my seat, the pain was intense, and I had to take 800 mg of Ibuprofen right then just to dampen the symptoms to get through the rest of the night.

The next day was even more brutal. I had another speaking engagement, a three-hour presentation. This one really took a toll on me. I could not bear any weight and could not drive down to Carbondale, Illinois, to pick up my oldest daughter from college and bring her home for the summer.

Instead, my wife had to make the 12-hour trip down and then back. Since I was laid up, we had to have a neighbor girl come over twice a day to walk our two dogs, since there was no way I could do it. She arrived just as my wife was pulling out of the driveway, and I hope she did not see the tears rolling down my face due to physical and emotional pain. At that moment, I knew I had to find a solution.

Mad Scientist

With every episode of foot pain, which eventually spread into both feet from time to time, I started to become a mad scientist trying to figure out the cure for this unbearable pain that was robbing me of freedom and quality of life.

In my chiropractic practice, I experimented with many modalities to alleviate the pain. Obviously, the main treatment was icing and ice baths. After all, anything with an itis at the end means inflammation, right? The problem with the ice baths was they felt good while my foot was soaking, but a few minutes later, with every step, I was back to the pain.

Then came ultrasound treatments to the bottom of the foot, and once again, there was no relief. This was followed by a combination of ultrasound and electrical muscle stimulation, which I have to admit felt wonderful, only to have the same frustration set in when walking and the pain returned. I even sent away the special socks you wear at night that place a stretch on your plantar fascia.

All I can say about those were Ouch! What a waste of money.

Five Year Quest

After five years of experimenting with various therapies, I finally hit the jackpot with ARP Neurological Therapy. This is a neuromuscular stimulation that not only eliminated the foot pain from Plantar Fasciitis but allowed me to find out why I kept having reoccurrences.

The best aspect of this treatment, is that you can do it from the comfort of your home. I wrote So You Have Plantar Fasciitis, which you can purchase from Amazon.

There is help, and you do not need to suffer any longer