Ladies,

what are your ways of dealing with dry and cracked heels?

I’m truly curious what your tricks are, whether you have some zero-failure products, or perhaps you prefer to go for home treatments that make your foot skin soft again. Let me know in the comments, but before doing so, please read on.

Common foot skin problems

Every other woman confesses that she is struggling with foot problems. The most common one is excessive foot sweating (nothing surprising after realizing that there are over a hundred oily glands scattered on the feet), which may lead to athlete’s foot.

But that’s not all! Skin on the heels has the tendency to lose water easily and crack. It becomes rough and really unpleasant to the touch, and the thick skin is easy to feel. More worryingly, this doesn’t only look bad but also may impede walking when the cracks and blisters appear. No wonder why we turn to various ways of bringing health back to our feet.

How to take good care of your feet

The very first pick of anyone who struggles with dry heel skin is obviously a foot cream. If it contains urea, this is a really good choice because this substance has a deeply moisturizing effect. However, in the case of calloused skin, replenishing skin with water may not be enough.

Other solutions are foot soaks and either homemade or ready-made feet masks. To prepare them at home, you can use plant oils, herbs, flaxseed (flaxseed gel is super easy to prepare and it takes just a few minutes), oat flakes and even fruit like this rich in good fats avocado oil. The recipes for homemade foot products can be found online.

Personally, I’d recommend you using shea butter to soften the skin on the heels. I use it as an alternative to foot creams, it’s 100% natural, efficacious and lasts long. When used on a regular basis, shea butter smooths skin out, moisturizes, reduces dryness and roughness.

How to smooth foot skin out and make it soft?

Foot care is one thing. The other equally important issue is making the dry heel skin restore its smoothness and softness, which is actually pretty difficult when the skin is callous, creating a thick “crust” on the heel.

The most common ways to treat cracked heels

• Foot scrub – the most often they come in the form of a lightweight gel with little exfoliating particles that we use to wash the feet with by massaging them for a short while, to remove the dead epidermal cells mechanically.
• Exfoliating socks – they are an alternative to foot enzymatic peels because in a foil sock there is a preparation rich in enzymes accelerating the foot’s natural processes of cell turnover.

Removing dead cells from callous heels

Many women reach for various forms of pumice stones and foot files that are supposed to speed up the process of smoothing the heels out. They are available in almost every drugstore, similarly to the electric callus removers with interchangeable heads. Once I heard that somebody couldn’t afford such accessories, so they used a razor blade to remove the dead skin… Don’t do that, please.

Actually, if you make use of any of the ideas I’ve just mentioned in this paragraph, PLEASE STOP.

The main issue connected with removing dead cells in these invasive ways is that the skin may start growing out even harder than before, which is a pretty natural thing for the skin to do. You disturb the skin by removing its outermost layer and reveal more delicate parts of the foot, so the organizm activates its defense mechanisms and accelerates keratinization to rebuild the protective epidermal layer it has been deprived of.

As a consequence, the more often and more aggressively you rub off the skin from the heels, the thicker it gets over time. This is the reason why it’s advised to go for moisturizing and nourishing through beauty products, not the pumices and electric tools.