My experience - jogging barefeet

Already as children my siblings and I had restless legs. One had it worse than myself.

Here is the very latest for me. I have come to understand that the symptom might be the same for us all, but the reasoning and treatment varies sometimes from opposite ends. This might mean that the causes are all varied or a stable result of dynamic differences between each of us.

Here is what I have found.

At some point I began jogging, barefoot. You can do this with barefoot shoes or indoors somewhere with your socks. It might work with shoes as well, but I have heard it does not work for all and this is the separation to normal running that I have done. You could try running with the tips of your feet instead of some other way in case you have tried to run but it did not help. I started from being able to run less than one minute a day, to increasing when I could, to being able to run for an hour on average, but stabilizing at 20 minutes per day because otherwise I noticed I would start skipping days. I ran every day when possible.

I spent half of this summer in bed. After about a month or so, I got restlss legs. For me it was a very aggressive urge to pull the front of my leg up and shake it, which does nothing to really help. That's a frustrating part of this issue I feel.

I spent another month in bed approximately. This means very little to no walking and so on, little to no fresh air, nothing.

After this, I got to walk again. I did this in bare feet and only for about 30 minutes or less than an huor, and it did not help, unless I should have done it either for longer or for more days.

After this I started jogging. A few minutes did not help, regardless of whether it was earlier in the day or later.

Then I did my first jog of 10 minutes, and there was a difference. I really appreciated this because the relief was immediate for me, which means that unless it has all been a fluke for years, I could tell the difference without spending days doubting, which I dislike strongly due to a lack of faith in things I don't understand. The symptoms were there very little in the morning, but immediately went away as I moved around just a little and was completely fine afterwards.

Also, I have noticed, how jumping very high on my trot gives this certain feeling that makes me at least think that something good is happening when it comes to this issue. Speed might be an issue, where you need to run at a natural pace, but the height seems to do something as well, so taking taller jumps when you are running and landing so that a lot of the leg works hard during these periods of landing feels like it does better than a more stable running.

Before I got to jog, I tried a massage gun that shakes the leg. I went all the way around my hip joints, really getting in there, bones, finding those spots where I think I hit either a nerve or some muscle attachment and got that sensation of relief, and that did possibly help somewhat, but did not remove the issue. I depleted my gun on both legs from hit to bottom of foot twice each side, and if it did help, it was not a complete relief, but it is something.

Another thing is fresh air when I sleep, and/or cool air.
Adversely, when it is warm and I try to sleep, it is possible that my symptoms get worse.
One more thing to try is to sleep on a hard surface. You can try going directly on the floor which is cool, and then try to add cushioning one night at a time. You will get used to harder surfaces after a while, but this isn't available for everyone, and during for example some flus I have had, my joints are in pain and that's when one ought to have a mattress at hand.

With the combination of cool, hard, and jogging with possibly high jumping mixed in there on occasion, it would seem that at least it has some effect on the issue, for me. When I used to run every day, I never had this issue, or never noticed it. It could have been immobile the entire day otherwise, with slight walking, but running for 20 minutes. Then of course, it seems like it can take a little while for it to begin appearing. Some weeks for it to be noticeable for me, but I would imagine it can be less depending on things I don't know. So one night here or there seems fine.

If someone has tried running, but has not run in a way that uses the bottom of the foot and calves in this way, and then perhaps the hard and possibly cool or cooler surface, it definitely is worth another try.

Next up I hope to find some way of alleviating this without the need for movement, unless it of course makes me stop jogging. Sometimes there is no option to move around and that's when I feel we probably need rest the most.