Recovery of the legs when they are tense and stiff after a long plane flight

Have you been on a long flight?

Many travelers have done it and when they arrived at their destination they were most likely sore, stiff, with swollen ankles and feet barely fitting into their shoes; This is a problem because if you are visiting somewhere and have limited hours, the last thing you need is to walk stiff in shoes that don’t fit properly due to swollen feet.

Poorly fitting shoes can rub on your feet and cause blisters which, if left untreated, can lead to infection and take a long time to heal as the fresh blood supply to the blister site is reduced.

Why do legs and ankles swell on long flights?

The basics of swollen ankles

Veins are blood vessels that carry used blood back to the heart; They have one-way valves so blood cannot go back the way it came.

Swollen ankles

When used, the impoverished blood reaches the ankles and stays there stagnant; lymphatic fluid begins to separate from the blood used in the spaces of the tissues; Because you can’t pump your legs toward your body, your ankles swell.

The gravity and weight of blood in the body.

Water is subject to pressure: the deeper it is, the more pressure there is at the bottom; for example, at the surface of the water, the swimmer feels nothing, but the deeper he dives, the more it affects his body as the pressure increases.

The blood in the body is similar; in someone standing, the pressure in the head is almost non-existent, but in the lower part of the body, the feet, the pressure is higher due to the weight of the blood in the veins, but also because fresh blood is pumped there. under the pressure of the heart.

calf muscle pump

For the used blood to return to the body, there is a system called a muscle pump made up of the leg muscles; the main movers of the pump are the calf muscles.

The calf muscle pump forces the depleted blood used against gravity by the legs back into the body, where it is replenished with oxygen for recycling and sent back to various parts of the body through the arteries.

The calf muscles provide energy for this pump, but they only work if used

To keep the circulation in balance in the legs, the same volume of blood must leave the legs as enters; if the calf muscles don’t work, the pump becomes inefficient and nothing moves.

Problems caused by calf muscle pump inefficiency include:

Bad circulation

Lymphatic system inactivity

Reduced venous return

First aid is needed for the leg muscles.

The quicker your legs get help, the quicker they will recover, but it’s important that you get it as soon as possible before pain and stiffness limit what you can do with them.

There are ways to provide legacy first aid – recovery takes different forms

Passive and active

Passive recovery for legacy

This means letting the legs do what they want and let them fix themselves; lying on your back with your legs higher than your body to help fluid drain back into your body can help relieve them by reversing the effects of gravity.

(Something interesting on TV, can you understand the language?)

Because it takes time to wait for this to happen, this can eat up valuable travel time; You might as well go back to your hotel/villa/hostel/tent and spend the next few days without sightseeing (you might as well have stayed home).

Or you can convert the lodge into a Mini Recovery Center and get your calf muscle pump working again.