Points for ankle sprain

Firstly, are you sure it was sprained? ie was it xrayed at the time?

Next, consider the drainage of waste from the foot - general posture can change, as can the way you walk, as a reaction. This is hard to assess or to fix without help, but can limit recovery...

Keep the ankle moving.

Soak in hot water. I know the conventional wisdom is ice, but it's not always right. After this amount of time, there is a lot of stagnation in the area, you need to get waste metabolites and inflammatory products on the move. You can add a couple of cupfuls of epsom salts to the footbath, and repeat daily.

Find the sore spots on the edge of the ankle joint and rub them frequently. After this amount of time this might not help so much, as much of the healing will have happened now, but the aim is to break down adhesions and help scar tissue reform properly. See if it helps and stop if it doesn't.

And restoring movement at the anke means daily calf muscle stretches. If you don't know how to do these then you need to be shown.

And see your osteopath. All of the above advice comes with caveats, you need the diagnosis confirming, progress monitoring, and help to make sure you are doing the stretch correctly. And there are postural aspects that can't be corrected by oneself very easily.

But you may be able to do a lot at home by yourself. However, be mindful that this is general advice, and your own specific circumstances need taking into consideration. If things get worse or do not improve, or new symptoms develop, then stop what you are doing and get advice.

Hi kvdp, thanks so much for your detailed reply.

Well I couldn't walk for a while when I first sprained it, in fact it affected the length of my whole body so my back couldn't even support me to sit up straight or walk. So, no, I didn't get it xrayed, I just had to be pushed around at home for a week, then eventually got myself a Lazyboy chair to ensure my sitting and resting posture was good, eventually my body repaired itself enough for me to walk around. But as I can walk I assume I haven't broken anything, and it's just a bad sprain. I got it while rushing to put on my boots and my foot twisted inwards. But since then, after I felt I was better, I accidentally had to hop on the same leg, and I got a terrible pain running from my inner ankle up through to my shin. So the outside ankle is swollen and the inside ankle has what feels like a painful nerve. I'm okay walking, it doesn't hurt, but not running.

Thanks for the info about soaking it in hot water, I'll try that. Yes, I do always keep it moving, I do yoga every morning to rotate the ankle and move the foot back and forth. And I always do a lot of calf muscle stretching as well as ankle strengthening exercises as my ankles anyway get painful when I don't.

You mentioned sore spots on the edge of the ankle joint - are they the reflex points? It's very hard to find out about reflexology points for foot problems.

No, the sore spots are the bits that hurt, find them with your finger and give them a good bit of friction. Likewise with the hot water, any advice needs tailoring, so if it doesn't help, or makes it worse, then stop.

Being able to walk doens't mean it hasn't broken; an avulsion injury is where a piece of bone is pulled away by a ligament or tendon from where it attaches. It won't affect load-bearing necessarily, but could create real problems with other functions. Something like that shouldn't be overlooked, so do get a proper assessment please.

Beyoind that it means bodywork to deal with the reactions, adaptations and compensations that your body has adopted. They prevent further initial damage, but can then limit recovery for a long time.

Ligamentous injuries heal very slowly as ligaments have very poor blood supply-they can take up to 18 months and sometimes never heal properly. Ankle mobilisation/rotation will help circulation, but if you are taking the foot to end of range you will be stretching already damaged ligaments further reducing stability within the ankle. At 7 months post-injury, you should really have started a rehabilitaiton/strengthening programme. A wobble board is very good for this-start slowly and build up time/difficulty. This will also help you re-gain some proprioception (position sense) which may have been lost with ligament injury. Wobble boards are available from all good physio equipment suppliers. If this does not help, see your GP for a referral to a physio.

Hi Lovinit,
To answer your question, I usually explain that by applying reflexology to the foot you are infact covering the foot reflexes at the same time!

I would recommend incorporating reflexes which will help with recovery so for elimination to reduce swelling treat lymphatics, liver, kidneys, spleen. Plus the adrenals/pituitary and the heart/lungs for circulation and stress reduction.
The leg reflexes need to be covered as well and if the foot is too painful then the hand is an option to use for treatment instead.

Various massage techniques are usually incorporated into a reflexology session so these will assist the damaged areas to heal assuming that you have had the injury checked out to rule out more serious problems. 😉

Thank you all so much for your responses, they were really helpful. In particular gaiaholistix, it was interesting reading your post and the concept you explained about the foot reflexes, I shall try out all of those points. And thanks Suzy for the idea of the wobble board, I'll see where I can find one. I'm in India right now and there's a well known naturopathy hospital near where I am staying, in fact the doctor that first introduced me to reflexology is still there, so I've managed to persuade him to see me...usually they only have an inpatient programme, not outpatient, so I'm lucky. Hopefully this time I'll observe and learn a lot more from him as he treats me, as I'm a bit wiser now;) Hopefully kvdp, he'll be able to clarify what the injury really is!

Just to say how it turned out...he found that it's my sciatic that I should be working on, and, as you noted might be the case, kvdp, I have a pelvic imbalance which I now have to correct.

Surely if the ankle is sprained you shouldn't be working on it at all ?? If this is the case then I work on the hands instead !