Does Poor Posture Cause Pain? How Do Arch Supports Help?
Apr 8th, 2009 by Kathryn Merrow
Can your posture cause pain?
Oh Boy! It surely can! In fact, it does.
Poor, or collapsed, posture can cause pain in your head, neck, feet, legs, hips, upper and lower back. Why? Because being out of muscular “balance” means that you are using muscles to do the job of bones.
With poor posture, your muscles are trying to hold you upright, but that’s the job of your bones. Muscles are for moving. Bones are for supporting.
All of your muscles attach to bones. When a muscle is overworked or overstretched because of poor posture, it causes pain.
Poor posture can even cause your organs–heart, lungs, intestines, stomach–to have difficulty functioning. Why? Because you are collapsing forward. As you bend forward, all of your organs are compressed, or squashed. It is much harder for your organs to do their best job when they are squashed.
What can you to to correct your posture?
One important thing is to get arch supports (orthotics) for your shoes if your feet are “flat.”
How can you tell if your arches are flat?
Stand up with your weight the same on both feet for 5 minutes. Then assess: Do you feel that most of the pressure on your feet is in your toes? You need arch supports. Get a pair with a “real” arch, something that will truly support you.
Feet are supposed to have arches. They are the foundation of your skeleton.
Just like a building, we need a solid foundation. If our foundation flattens, or collapses, the integrity of our building–our body–is compromised. We get into trouble, and the trouble starts with poor, or collapsed posture.
A good pair of arch supports may feel as though you have a boulder under your foot.
Try to get a pair that actually fits to the shape or your foot. You want them to put your feet into the arched position they used to have. Take time to adjust to them. Start with just an hour a day, then 2 hours. Work your way up to wearing them all day.
Massage your feet by pressing the sole of your feet against a tennis ball, or golf ball, and rolling it back and forth, width-wise and length-wise. Do this for 5 minutes for each foot. After you do the first foot, you will have one happy foot. You’ll have to do your other foot so it will be happy, too. This helps relax your muscles and tendons and make it easier to adjust to your new arch supports.
There is more to do to correct your posture and get you back to feeling and functioning well, but arch supports are a good place to start.
