Reddit reviews KT Tape Original Cotton Elastic Kinesiology Therapeutic Athletic Tape , Blue

tl;dr - be smart, gets lots of opinions, read up, listen to your body, don't let the problems compound, don't let silly small issues distract you.

Honestly, I find that plantar fasciitis is a rather mysterious injury. So many people have all this authoritive sounding advice, but from what I've gathered, causes and solutions vary quite a bit.

What seems universally applicable, though, is that you need to stretch. All the time. I use a Foot Rocker that I stand on at work all day long. I have a standing desk (well, I and three other coworkers each have this thing on top of a regular desk and use it for my monitors, keyboard and mouse), and I stand on the foot rocker as much as possible, one foot on top of it, the other underneath pulling up to stretch until I can really feel it.

I keep a Lacrosse ball in the freezer, then stand on it to break up any knotted tissue or whatever the heck it does.

I've used KT tape, but I'm not entirely convinced that it's effective (the tape isn't all too cheap, if you get into it, you'd want to buy in bulk somewhere). However, I do feel that when I run without it, the pain flares up quite a bit. Not while running, afterwards (or next day).

The foot specialist I saw got me a night splint, but I found it to be utter crap. It's cumbersome, it's not effective, and half the time I wake up in the morning without wearing, because I likely tore it off in my sleep (because it's really uncomfortable).

I'd imagine (I haven't used it) that this thing works better, because it actually pulls your toes up in the front and really stretches your plantar fascia.

One of the girls I run with said they make a sock to wear at night, so I bought it. It's called the Strassburg Sock, and I actually really like it. I've used it on and off for the last 2 or so months, and it does help.

The last month I've run in custom orthotics (they scan in your feet and create custom moulds), and they seem to help as well. I tried reading up on how and why, and although I can't find the link right now, interestingly enough, an article mentioned that in a high percentage of cases it works, but we don't exactly know why. I'm a software engineer. I want to know and address root causes, not applying band-aid after band-aid down the pipeline that incorrectly and often less effectively patches or just masks the problem. But I guess "we just don't really know", which explains all those elusively vague answers that I'm getting in my own research.

Do plenty of research, read up on stuff. You'll see all kinds of advice. Some is good, some is irrelevant. You'll hear everything from "just dont run for a while" to "you might need surgery for bone spurs and/or months of recovery."

I've had plantar fasciitis twice:

1. I only started running last year. Religiously. Kicked it off with a 5K race at 28:00 min and was quite unhappy with that. Ran my ass off, battled finding the right shoe so I could run more than 4 miles without blistering up, but eventually my wide, high arch, pronounced heel found something that worked. Discovered forefoot running (it's amazing, like running on springs!), overdid it on the first go, and bam, plantar fasciitis, right foot. It was insanely bad. Super swollen, I thought I shattered my heel. I took two weeks off, and continued to take small breaks, but essentially ran through it after that. It was gone after 2-1/2 months. Mostly because it was just a simple inflammation; I overdid it, the plantar fascia was damaged from overstressing it, I let it heal, done. case closed. I ran the same 5K event a year later and had a time of 20:43 min.
   
2. I added P90X and weights this year (January). In mid-March or so, I got plantar fasciitis in my left foot. But it didn't just hit me. It slowly faded in over a week or three. I've been battling it ever since and actually run very little compared to what I normally put in. The doctor mentioned it's (in part) because I have a high arch, and my foot doesn't 'roll off' as easily. Kind of makes sense I guess, I'm not very flexible anyway, my muscles and ligaments are like piano strings. Anyway, so after that consultation with the recommendation that I don't run I did the only logical thing: I ran a half marathon and made a conscious effort to roll off more on the outside of my feet. It worked kind of, because it didn't flare up nearly as much as I thought it would/should (I ran 13.8 miles, normally I can feel it after a 5K), on the other hand, the next day my patella tendon hurt. Runner's knee, maybe? FML. The pain slowly faded away. Stretching and putting weight on my foot no longer hurts, but pushing right into the hot spot with my thumb is still noticable. I do, however, have a Spartan Beast coming up in October, and I needed to step it up. So, last ditch effort (ha) and i'm just running through all these silly ailments.
   
   The main thing is to listen to your body. Don't just blindly ignore problems, but don't feel like you can't do anything either. Plantar fasciitis is an inflammation. Generally that also means that you've probably torn some kind of tissue, there, so that needs to heal, but the question is still why you did that? There are all kinds of schools of thought on that out there. From tight calf muscles to neck problems (yes, really, similar to how a tail bone injury could affect shoulder pain, seems weird, but the body does seem to want to balance things out one way or another).

>KT tape

Is this what you mean?

https://www.amazon.ca/KT-Tape-Original-Elastic-Therapeutic/dp/B001RQYF1Q

I'm guessing each strip is one-time use, so this pack would be good for 20 days?

I train judo with a Dexcom G6 and Tandem t:slim X2. With a bit of preparation I'm able to keep the CGM and my infusion site from being ripped off. I've talked about how I suit up for judo before here. Since it's an evolutionary process, there are a few changes I've made since when I wrote that. Here is my current process:

I've always placed the Dexcom sensor in the abdomen, usually in the area above the belly button. I try to put it in a spot that won't be in the middle of a fold in my skin when I bend forward. I move it around every time I apply a new sensor of course, but I don't stray too far from that area and I've always had pretty good readings there.

First of all I use skin-tac on both the cgm and pump infusion site before I put them in place. That alone has always been sufficient for normal daily life, but is woefully insufficient when doing judo. When I get dressed for judo I do the following:

1. Apply skin-tac to the skin around both the cgm and pump infusion site, generally 3-4 inches around the CGM and 1 inch around the pump infusion site.
   
2. Get masking tape and tape over just the actual cgm and infusion site. For the infusion site I need to make a loop and have the sticky side facing out, with just a little bit of sticky wrapped under and taped to my skin just on each side of the infusion site.
   
3. For the CGM site I do the following: get a sheet of wax paper and cover it with strips of masking tape. Then cut out an oval-shaped section that is slightly larger than the cloth portion of the Dexcom sensor, cut a hole in the middle for the transmitter, and place this over the cloth. Then I make a loop of masking tape and put it on top of the transmitter.
   
4. When the skin-tac is dry I use a couple of sections of KT tape (cut to smaller lengths as needed) over the cgm and infusion sites. The skin-tac is so it can strongly adhere to my skin around the sites, holding them in place even when I sweat. The masking tape and wax paper that is between them is so I can remove the KT tape later without also removing the original adhesive for the cgm or infusion site. For the sensor I use one strip cut into halves, for the infusion site I use one strip cut into thirds.
   
5. Wear a compression shirt over everything. In jujutsu pretty much everyone wears a compression shirt, so that shouldn't be an issue. I've found that a tight compression shirt keeps everything tight against the skin makes it so that any friction between myself and my gi/my partner/the mat/etc., rubs across the compression shirt instead of directly against the tape and everything holding my CGM and infusion set in place. Also the compression shirt will stick directly to my skin in the area around the KT tape, again reducing friction against the CGM and infusion site.
   
   That preparation has always been sufficient for my cgm and infusion sites staying in place doing judo. Figuring all this out has taken a bit of trial and error, but once I started doing all of this I've never had either come off during practice, and that's full super-sweaty throwing (and being thrown) around and grappling on the ground that we do in judo.
   
   To take care of the pump, I have to do some additional things to protect it as well.
   
   
6. Wrap it up in a layer of thin foam (1/4" or so). This is to protect it from being broken, before I started doing this I've broken the screen on my pump twice, since I started using the foam it's never been a problem.
   
7. Put it inside a sandwich size ziplock bag (to protect it from sweat).
   
8. Put all of that inside a SPIbelt elastic running belt that I keep under my pants just under the waistline.
   
   Doing all that is a little time-consuming, since it can take me 10-15 minutes just to get dressed for judo where everyone else takes about 1 minute, but it's what I have to do to keep my sites and pump secure and undamaged.
   
   Sometimes after practice when I get home to shower and take all the tape and stuff off, the Dexcom sensor will have partly come off. I just apply some more skin-tac to the area that has detached, wait for it to dry, and then re-attach it. By doing that, I've never had a sensor that didn't last the 10 days, and I can almost always stretch it to 15-20 days with a session restart. Generally I have to change the sensor because it starts malfunctioning, not because it comes off. I've had more success with keeping everything on and not starting to fall off by waiting until all the sweat has dried away and then removing all the tape, as it gives the adhesive on the CGM a chance to get sticky again.
   
   Since you're on an Omnipod, you might try with the Omnipod the same kind of thing that I do with my CGM. However it is quite a bit bulkier than a CGM sensor+transmitter, so YMMV. If you can consider switching to a standard insulin pump I know from personal experience that it can work.

I hope it gets better. Have you tried KT tape on the arm? I've been using it and it really does ease a lot of the strain.

*insert obligatory "Hail Bezos" here*

https://www.amazon.com/KT-Tape-Original-Kinesiology-Therapeutic/dp/B001RQYF1Q/ref=sr_1_1?s=sports-and-fitness&ie=UTF8&qid=1526229457&sr=1-1&refinements=p_4%3AKT+Tape

I got turned on to this after a bad knee sprain.

Here's how to tape the elbow.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wa7FUlJCzyA

KT Tape also works well for hotspots (I like it better than moleskin):

• https://www.amazon.com/KT-Tape-Original-Kinesiology-Therapeutic/dp/B001RQYF1Q
  
  Badger Foot Balm is also a quality product for feet:
  
  
• https://www.amazon.com/Badger-634084025019-Foot-Balm-Tin/dp/B0015MTSRS

wtf is wrong with people. why are they downvoting you. you need love and support -.-

I used this to moisturize my belly and this to keep my belly from sagging downwards. Also exercised every day to stop unnecessary weight gain from alll the damn pizza I ate. 8months now, no stretch marks. I do have to add a disclaimer that they are partially genetic. Not preventable for everyone. ): My mother had no stretch marks and she may have just passed that gene down to me.

best of luck for the twins! Those are incredibly heroic, to carry.