Effects of Wearing Tight Shoes: Your Foot Pain Diagnosis
Effects of Wearing Tight Shoes: Your Foot Pain Diagnosis
No one knows better where the shoe pinches than he who wears it. As much as this saying is proverbial, wearing shoes that pinch or tight shoes can cause significant discomfort while walking as well as do much damage to your feet.
Here’s what you should know about the effects of wearing tight shoes.
Foot Pain
Foot pain is one of the instant effects you experience when wearing tight shoes, especially on the front area of the foot. Tight shoes squeeze the toes and do not allow enough room for unrestricted movement, causing uncomfortable pain, especially on the forefoot.
Toe Deformities
Prolonged wearing of tight shoes can cause toe deformities, the feet start taking up the shape of the limited environment.
Common deformities include:
• Calluses – Due to the constant friction and pressure between your feet and tight shoes, sections of the skin around your toes, ankles, or any other part of your foot may thicken. These lumpy things are sometimes painful and can cause discomfort, especially if you put pressure on them while walking in tight shoes.
• Bunions – A bunion is a painful bony bump that forms on the joint at the base of your big toe. Prolonged wearing of tight shoes causes some of the bones on your big toe to shift, resulting in the big toe to being pulled inwards, leading to swelling and uncomfortable pain.
• Toenail clubbing – Increased pressure to the toes as a prolonged effect of wearing tight shoes may cause toenail clubbing, which is commonly described as resembling the head of an upside-down spoon. This constant pressure on the toes causes the tip of the toe to bulge and the nails curve, forming a sharper angle with the toe. As much as clubbed toes are not good-looking, they also cause a great deal of discomfort while you walk.
• Hammer toes – You develop hammer toes when your toe starts to coil up or bend instead of lying flat, making your toes look like claws instead of their original flat shape. Hammer toes occur when the joints in your toes do not get enough space in tight shoes. Instead, they push and shape them to adapt to the new limited environment. Hammer toes cause immense pain to your feet, and over time, form corns and calluses on the top of the bend, resulting in even more discomfort.
With our services and custom orthotics at The Active Foot Store, we strive to correct all these conditions.
Ingrown Toenails
Have you ever wondered what causes ingrown toenails? Ingrown toenails occur when the edge of your toenails grow into the skin of the toe due to the extra pressure placed on your toe from wearing tight shoes. Ingrown toenails usually occur on the big toe and can cause inflammation of the skin around your toe. Unfortunately, it also causes pain and can even lead to an infection.
Subungual Hematoma
Subungual hematoma occurs when a person wearing tight or ill-fitting shoes engages in sports that require much use of the feet, e.g., running, football, tennis, among others. This pressure on the toes causes an injury that breaks open blood vessels under the nail, leading to blood collecting on one spot. Subungual hematoma causes intense pain and pressure under the toenail as well as leaving you with discolored nails.
Metatarsalgia
Metatarsalgia is a condition that causes the ball of your foot to become inflamed and painful. If you engage in walking, running, or jumping, you should avoid wearing tight shoes. As the ball of your foot—the metatarsal—keeps on getting compressed by the tight shoes, the area becomes inflamed, resulting in great pain and discomfort.
Soreness in Other Areas of Your Body
Not only does wearing tight shoes cause damage to your feet, but it can also cause damage to other parts of your body. As your body adjusts your gait and posture due to the pressure from your tight shoes, your legs, hips, lower back, and other muscles can become strained. This uncomfortable posture often means soreness and pain spread to other parts of your body.
To sum it all up, it is always important to wear shoes that fit your feet to spare you aches, pains, and the embarrassment of having toe deformities caused by tight shoes. Here at The Active Foot Store, we take pride in our extensive training and specialized shoe fitting. Visit us today so we can help make you feel good to be on your feet again!