Everyone has her Achilles heel: mine is actually an Achilles vein. Or veins. Even as a small child, you could track these fine blue veins under this nearly translucent skin. By my early teens, I was getting spider veins around my knees, and the children I babysat made up games involving my legs: "Here's a road, and here's a road, and here's a town . . ." It drove me nuts. I ask my doctor father what I could do to make the spider veins stop. "Walk on your arms," he said unhelpfully. "Or you could go ahead and start wearing support hose." Support hose! So not-sexy. I absolutely would not do it.
Well, I was 25 years younger then. And being sexy was much more important than being comfortable. Oh, and I wasn't 11 weeks pregnant, which I am now. And let me tell you: by week 9, some of the superficial veins in my calves and around my knees were already bumpy and sore, not giving me happy visions of what they might be when I reached 39 weeks pregnant. I bought the damn support hose!
Well, not without some primary research, which can be a little confusing. The good news is, support hose--at least "medical grade" support hose, known as "compression stockings"--really work. The pain was entirely erased by wearing them during the day. The bad news is, they can be pricey, starting out at around $25 and going up to over $100. Also, medical support hose come in about four "tensions": light, medium, firm, and extra firm. All of these tensions have numbers associated with them, and the highest tensioned hose actually require a prescription! That blows my mind, since squirming into my medium tension hose requires about ten minutes and the help of a small construction crane. Finally, they also come in knee-high, thigh-thigh, and waist-high, not to mention foot-less versions of the last two. So you have to find a happy mix of affordability, sizing, etc., though I would definitely just avoid knee-highs (talk about cutting off circulation).
Some medical supply stores will measure you to determine size, though I threw the nice store lady off when I presented her with a large thigh, extra-large waist, and queen calves (no, I don't often get to wear the more stylish boots). But, the extra-large size ended up fitting me just fine. Actually, I have heard that you can get "custom" support hose which are fitted every inch or so all the way up the leg, though I shudder to think what those cost. My pair were about $43, and worth it, since I now have no pain and no (current) worry that my legs are going to cut short my massage work during my pregnancy.
So if you or any of your clients are suffering from leg pain--pregnant or not--due to venous issues, I HIGHLY recommend support hose. Sexy is good, but sometimes stodgy is so much sweeter.
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