With spring fast approaching and the hint of warmer days to come, what better time to think about your feet!
As we come to the end of winter, our feet have spent most of the last six months wrapped in heavy socks and boots. Our feet are often over looked and neglected at the best of times and that is especially true at the end of a long cold winter.
Yet our feet are one of the most important and amazing structures in our body.
Here are some fun and interesting facts about our feet!
Each foot contains 26 bones, that’s one quarter of all the bones in our body. Additionally, each foot has 33 joints, over 100 ligaments and 19 tendons and muscles.
Our feet contain a quarter of a million sweat glands, which produce half a pint of perspiration daily. This helps to regulate our body temperature and prevent dryness.
Running puts five times the pressure of our whole-body weight onto our feet.
In our lifetime we will walk around 115,000 miles – that’s the equivalent of circling the globe 4 times.
For me though the most interesting fact is that, the soles of our feet have more sensory nerve endings per square centimetre than any other part of our body!
This means that our feet and the reflexes found there, are a hot line into our nervous systems. Our nervous system controls how and when our body responds to internal and external changes and pressures. It is responsible for maintaining our health and wellbeing, also known as homeostasis.
The nervous system therefore is a key area worked by reflexologists, to help re-balance the body.
As a reflexologist, it is easy to see why I love working with feet, they are truly amazing. They do so much for us and we often don’t give them a second thought.
Now you know how much work they do for us, how about giving them a little love?