How long have you spent looking for the perfect pair of heels only to spend the evening tip-toeing or shuffling around the party floor and going home with fresh battle scars on your feet? All you want to do is to dump those heels in the nearest bin but you don’t have to. Here are some things you can try.
Our Fantastic Feet
Our feet are amazing! With only 26 bones, 33 joints and more than 120 muscles, ligaments, tendons and nerves, our feet can support our entire body weight. Not only this, they act as our inbuilt shock absorbers, keep us balanced and take us to wherever we need to go. If you think about it, our feet are very small compared to the rest of our body to be receiving such an enormous responsibility and load. On top of that, we squeeze them into narrow, high heeled shoes or shoes with slippery soles, exposing them to risks like sprains, bunions, calluses, corns and lots and lots of pain.
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Fun Feet Facts[/caption]
Common Feet Problems
Whilst we may not intentionally subject our feet to poor shoe conditions, unfortunately there are some conditions of the feet that are a result of poor shoe fitting. Here are some common conditions.
Bunions are ten times more likely in women than in men and are directly related to the wearing of tight shoes. A bony growth or misaligned bone at the base of the big toe or sometimes on the small toe forms due to continual irritation from ill-fitting shoes.
Calluses appear as flattened, yellow-white, thickened skin and are caused by constant friction and pressure. In women, the most common area for calluses to form is the balls of the feet. Calluses can also form on the heel and on the side of the big toe. Sometimes, calluses can be a good thing as they form a natural barrier and protect the skin beneath, but when the callus forms in abnormal places and becomes very thick they can cause pain and discomfort.
Corns have a central core of hard grey skin surrounded by a painful, raised yellow ring of inflamed skin. Any of the toes can be affected but is most common in the second toe. Corns form due to friction and pressure against one of the bony areas of our feet, with inappropriate footwear being the primary cause.
Heel pain often results from poor shoe support and uneven distribution of weight. This pain usually occurs at the back of the arch and may indicate an inflamed ligament at the bottom of the foot.
Some Soft Solutions
If your shoes don’t fit, it’s worth giving these gel cushions a try. The gel is soft and conforms to your feet, providing some relief from those hard soles. They can also act as a nice smooth barrier against those rough edges on your shoes.