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High Heels And Pain

By Reine Gammo

[Ladies Fashion]

How much pressure is on your toes when you wear high heels? Reine Gammo let you know so that you can take care.

I am a huge fan of high heels. Not a surprising statement from a woman, but I also sometimes refuse to believe that they can do some damage to my feet and my back. To me, the silhouette of a pair 5 or 6-inch heels is a work of art. The way stilettos can enhance an outfit or even make a woman feel confident are just some of their great attributes. I would love nothing more than to wear my 6-inch heels every day, but the time has come for me to admit the pain inflicted by heels and the damage they can exact on the bones and spine. This is by no means supposed to stop women from wearing heels and it certainly didn’t stop me. However, it is important information to know so that you can protect yourself when in heels.

Posture And Pressure

High heels push the centre of mass in the body forward, which takes the hips and spine out of alignment. When in flats, your body is fully aligned, while when you are on your toes, the alignment is altered. This causes your back to ache and increases pressure on your toes. High heels may make your legs look longer, but as the heel height goes up, so does the pressure on the forefoot. One study shows that pressure increases by 22 per cent when wearing 1-inch heels, 57 per cent with 2-inch heels and 76 per cent with 3-inch heels. You can imagine how much pressure toes will suffer in 5 or 6-inch heels.

The altered posture caused by walking in high heels also places excess force on the inside of the knee. This is especially bad as that is a common site of osteoarthritis among women, so the chances of developing problems are increased with the prolonged wearing of heels. One study found that knee joint pressure increased by as much as 26 per cent when a woman wears heels.

Common Effects

Muscles adjust according to how your feet are placed on the ground. Calf muscles, for instance, will contract and adjust to the angle of high heels, shortening and tightening as you go up. Most of the damage caused by high heels, however, is inflicted on the foot itself. Morton’s neuroma is what happens when a thickening of tissue around a nerve between the third and fourth toes occurs due to the height of the heel and a narrow toebox. This can lead to pain and numbness in the toes. Also, when the front of the foot moves down in relation to the heel, the Achilles tendon tightens up, so the higher the heel, the shorter the tendon becomes, which creates heel pain. Metatarsalgia is a term used to refer to foot pain caused by the redistribution of the body’s weight when in heels. Prolonged wear can lead to joint pain in the ball of the foot.

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