I received an interesting question on one of the forums I moderate. A person was having foot pain and mentioned that he sits on a stool that doesn’t let his feet reach the floor, he wondered if the sitting position could relate to the foot pain. The answer is “yes.” In fact you may even be told you have plantar fasciitis when the only thing that is happening is your muscles are tight.
Your calf muscle inserts into your heel bone and when it contracts you point your toes. When you are sitting in a position that causes you to have no support under your feet, you’re pointing your toes even though you don’t think about it. It’s not an active contraction, however the muscles (gastrocneimus and soleus) are both being held in the shortened position.
As a result, muscle memory will ultimately cause the muscles to stay shortened, and then when you go to put your foot flat on the floor again the shorter muscle will pull back on your heel. This will put a strain on the muscles of your arch, and you may begin to feel pain in your arch, for what seems like “no reason at all.”
If you can’t change your chair to give you some support, then every now and then, push your heel down and bring the front of your foot up, stretching your calf muscles.
Wishing you well,
Julie