Running Ankle Pain & Injuries
Almost all of us run or jog at some point in our lives. When you do so on a regular basis, though, it’s a bit different. Serious runners or joggers put a lot of stress on several of their body parts and one region that tends to suffer is the ankle region. There are lots of types of ankle injuries that you could incur from running.
The Ankle Sprain
An ankle sprain is probably the most common ankle injury associated with jogging. In order to understand what causes it, you first need to understand the ligaments involved. They are the calcaneofibular, the anterior talofibular and the posterior talofibular ligaments.
Now, when it comes to an ankle sprain, it happens when you twist your ankle is such a way that one or more of those ligaments is stressed. For example, you might be jogging and accidentally step on a rock, causing your ankle to twist or roll to the side.
The rolling action when you have such an accident can moderately or severely injure your ligaments and tendons. Depending on the level of injury, you’ll have one of the three sprain types. You could have a first, second or third degree sprain.
As with burns, a higher degree means a more severe sprain. So, if you have a first degree sprain, you might just have a little bit of swelling. Second degree sprains cause more pain and can make your ankle a little bit unstable. It’s third degree sprains that cause the major problem, though.
Initially, a third degree sprain will be incredibly painful. It will certainly stop you from running immediately. Your ankle will also start to swell up. Shortly after that, though, the pain will go away. That doesn’t mean that your injury has healed, though. It just means that you’ve lost feeling in your ankle because nerves have been severed. The most severe pain from an ankle sprain occurs when you jump out of bed the morning after the injury….ouch!
Subluxating Peroneal Tendon:
Normally, your peroneal tendon fits into a groove in the back of your ankle. When you jog, though, that tendon can become dislocated and move out of that groove. The good news is that it probably won’t be that painful. The bad news is, though, that it will feel just plain wrong and make a strange noise, almost like a clicking sound. If not treated properly, it can lead to bigger problems.
Plantar Fasciitis & Heel Spurs
The Plantar Fascia is a ligament in the base of your foot. If it becomes irritated or inflamed for some reason, such as the repetitive stress of running, it can cause a lot of pain. That condition is known as Plantar Fasciitis, and you can find more details about this injury on our “Foot” page HERE. It can be treated and resolved completely using an all natural anti-inflammatory such as the previously mentioned Flexcin w/ CM8. However if Plantar Fascia is not properly treated, it can lead to another problem that you’ve probably heard of that is much more troublesome, a heel spur.
A bone spur is a protrusion of bone. It happens when an injury or a calcium deficiency causes your bone to leech calcium. Bone spurs can be very painful, depending on where they’re located, because most places in the body aren’t designed to accommodate extra protrusions of bone. A heel spur is just like any other bone spur, except it’s located in your heel, obviously. That can make it especially painful, since the foot is a very small area and there isn’t any room for expansion.
