Take exercise, but with caution

Photograph: Maureen McLean/Alamy

After a nasty bout of Covid in 2020, I took up walking to get fit again at the age of 63. As Stephen Emms found (A moment that changed me: my husband and I split up – and I started walking 15,000 steps a day, 17 January), it proved exhilarating and addictive, driven by my Fitbit counter to achieve longer walks until I was averaging 20,000 steps every day. A year later, I had developed an excruciating pain in one heel (plantar fasciitis) and nauseating pains in the soles of my feet (Morton’s neuroma), which have led to eye-watering steroid injections in my toes and orthopaedic inserts in my footwear.

While walking is great therapy, it’s really important to prepare well: a really good pair of walking boots (wide enough for toes to spread out), warm-up stretching of calves, and the wit to override the Fitbit demands by listening to our bodies and reducing exercise levels accordingly.

Nick Beddow

Hadfield, Derbyshire

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