Last week I went to the podiatrist for the first time for my plantar fasciitis. I went back today so he could show me the x-rays of my feet and help me figure out which type of orthotics to get. He continued to explain how my feet have gotten this way. He said a lot of it has to do with genetics, but also the fact that I'm very flexible, which is a good and bad thing. The good part is that I could have been a ballerina or contortionist. The bad part is that my ligaments in my feet aren't as rigid and strong as they should be in order to keep my feet from pronating.

Looking at my x-rays was really fascinating and weird at the same time. When you're looking at feet x-rays, you're looking at 1/4th of the bones in your entire body, which I thought was crazy. Apparently my right toe bone is pointing toward the other toes by 13° more than it should. It's pointing toward my other toes to the right and my bone is sticking out too far on the left side of my right foot, if that makes sense. If I don't get this fixed now, it could obviously get much worse and eventually my toe joints would deform and fuse together, eliminating the tissue between my bones and causing arthritis and other ailments. My left big toe is worse than normal also, but not nearly as bad as my right big toe. Interestingly, I read online that 9 females to only 1 male have bunions. Also, I'm showing signs of a heel bone spur in my left foot, which is developing because of my pronation and plantar fasciitis.

So, the doctor looked at my hiking shoes and walking shoes and actually said they were pretty good. The key is for them to be pretty rigid and offer enough support. Three things are important to look for: 1) they shouldn't bend in the middle 2) I shouldn't be able to twist it too much when I'm holding it by the heel and the toe and 3) the cushioning around the heel should be stiff to where my heel doesn't lean too much one way or the other.

He showed me tons of different types of shoe inserts and we finally decided to make custom ones for my athletic and hiking shoes. So, they did the casting of my feet for the custom ones and they'll be ready to pick up in about 3 weeks. In the meantime, I also bought a pair of generic inserts for my athletic/hiking shoes to wear instead of my crappy insert I got from Foot Solutions. He showed me the difference between the Foot Solutions insert and the ones he had that I could order through him. The Foot Solutions ones weren't nearly as strong and supportive as his orthotics, so I can see why mine didn't help much. Once I get my permanent orthotics for my athletic/hiking shoes, he'll modify the generic inserts I got and make them fit my dress shoes, I think. Everything happened so fast and I felt rushed because I was late getting back to work (I went during my lunch hour).

Hopefully the permanent orthotics fix everything. Stopping the pronation sounds like the key to fixing my plantar fasciitis and my developing bunions. I'll keep everyone posted and give an update in early September.