Tired legs: How to treat and relieve them

Do you feel like you’ve been on your feet all day? Even if you haven’t, tired or tingling legs are a fairly common condition, especially in women. Some also experience extreme pain and heaviness, so it is important to take care and discover some remedies to treat them correctly and reduce the onset of symptoms.

From excessive exercise, to sitting all day, heaviness and pain in the legs all involve poor blood circulation. Among the most common symptoms are cramps, a feeling of heaviness in the lower limbs and mild pain in the legs, as well as itching and tingling. 

However, one of the main causes of extremely tired legs is, in more severe cases, so-called venous insufficiency, a condition in which there is a complication in the veins to send blood from the legs to the heart, causing the legs to swell around the ankles and small blood clots may appear in the form of varicose veins.

This causes fluid and blood to pool in the lower legs, making us feel tired and heavy. The National Library of Medicine (NIH) reports that it is women who experience a higher risk of venous insufficiency due to the direct involvement of oestrogenic hormones and progestogens in its origin, although men are not exempt from suffering from it either.

The symptoms of this condition increase with age, as the veins lose elasticity over time and do not contract as easily as we get older. In addition, there are other important factors in the onset of tired leg symptoms such as hormonal changes and genetic factors.

How to prevent and alleviate leg heaviness

Although the passage of time is inevitable, there are some habits that can be changed to avoid the appearance of the annoying symptoms of tired legs. Firstly, bad habits lead to poor blood circulation and therefore swelling and tiredness, so the first thing to do is to go for a walk or run every day to work your leg muscles. In addition to this, there are four basic guidelines of good habits to prevent symptoms:

• High temperatures

With the arrival of heat or exposure of the legs to extreme heat causes the walls of the veins to dilate more than normal, and this leads to increased fluid retention and increased blood in the lower limbs of the legs and a greater predisposition to venous disease. 

• Poor nutrition

Diet is the basis of almost everything, and in this case it also plays a fundamental role. Being overweight or obese is the most common cause of tired legs just because you are carrying more weight than normal. Thus, it is advisable to reduce salt consumption, as it is associated with a greater increase in blood pressure, among other things. 

• Tobacco use

When you inhale tobacco smoke, there are various substances that also have a harmful effect on the walls of the veins, damaging them and predisposing them to medium- to long-term damage to the venous valves. If smoking is very harmful to health in general, it is also harmful to the legs and their blood supply.

• Moderate exercise

Exercise is one of the best ways to relieve and treat tired legs, but in moderation. Rest between workouts is essential, not only to recover,           but also to avoid overloading and contributing to more leg pain in general.          In addition to all this, you can alleviate heaviness and improve blood circulation in the legs with the help of alternatives such as compression garments, leg lifts, and other alternatives that we discuss below.

How to treat tired legs at home

If you’ve been noticing some of the above symptoms lately, there are some home remedies that can help treat tired legs. A study published in the National Library of Medicine (NIH) on treatments for patients with circulation problems and varicose veins recommends leg lifts and compression stockings to help with this condition, as well as some exercises, of which we highlight:

1. Leg stretches

Any exercise that involves stretching the legs reduces pain and discomfort. Whether it is postures, e.g. yoga or pilates, the intention is to activate the circulation in the legs and tone the muscles. Yoga asanas such as downward dog pose (Adho Mukha Svanasana) are a very simple way to improve blood flow.

How to do it? Get down on all fours on a mat and raise your buttocks so that your body is in an inverted V-shape. Stretch your legs as far as you can and bend your knees a little from time to time. Hold each leg for at least 20 seconds and repeat the exercise daily.

 2. Yoga posture (Virasana or hero asana)

This posture is a very easy and simple solution when you tend to accumulate heaviness and tired legs, as the compression effect is quite strong for the legs, knee joints and ankles. In addition, the legs are stretched and the sensation of lightness is felt.

How can we do it? Kneel with your knees next to each other and your feet apart with the help of a large cushion or a block and put it in between your feet. Sit on the support, and if your knees hurt, add a little extra height. Sit upright, with your hands resting gently on your thighs, and stay like this for 2-4 minutes. When you come out of the pose, stretch your legs forward for a few seconds to straighten the knee ligaments.

3. Lift your feet

This is another super simple and easy yoga pose to activate circulation and relax the leg muscles. It is called the inverted lake pose (or also known as viparita karani in yoga) and is very effective if we have been standing or sitting for a long time.) The way to do it is very simple. Lie down facing a wall and bring your legs up while resting them on the wall. Make sure your back is flat on the floor.

Try to move more and more towards the wall and stay in the position for about ten minutes before standing up again. All in all, good rest and home remedies are usually enough to treat and relieve tired legs. However, the use of creams such as the new G7 Light Legs+200ml can help prevent extreme tiredness and leg pain, improve circulation and prevent fluid accumulation and varicose veins.