Mortons? Avoid the gaps = no pain...?

[Piggyback RidePlease]

This will not help many folks but if it has helped me so...


I thought I'd share this in case anyone is grasping at straws for what else (obviously beyond the MT sticky that's not in the health section) may contribute to pain around the area of your foot that you'd suffer from Morton's neuroma in. It may be of most use to BF beginners like me.

If you go BF on a surface with "gaps" such as a wooden floor with no calking between the planks then this might just be contributing to any pain in that prone to problems area for those of us with Mortons toe. We have stripped & sanded floorboards with not much calking left beween them in our house and I pad about on these a lot everyday.


I think that the soreness I was getting is what lead me to try this as I was concerned that it would just continue to build up & leave me with a whole host of new problems to deal with (after suffering repeat plantar issues when shod). I now avoid all the gaps in the floor boards with the pads of my feet, (not due to superstition :ghost: !) and the pain that I became concerned was Morton's neuroma has gone (not that I've done much BF - mostly just walking about the house & up to 0.2 mile runs on concrete now).


Obviously as I build up the running BF more I may still succumbe but I hope this will give my feet time to adapt so that there are no issues as I certainly never had a problem BF as a little child (many decades ago :shock with Morton's.

I'm not sure what other surfaces may qualify. I think you will instictively avoid the gaps between concrete paving slabs as I do when running (due to slabs sticking up a bit here & there offering a huge injury risk if you clip a toe etc.).

:santa:

 

[Barefoot Dama]

Piggyback, you re right about

Piggyback, you re right about the gaps...big no-no for us MN sufferers.

The other two surfaces that I found irritate my MN are cushy areas like grass,carpet/cushy shoes...etc,etc.

 

[Barefoot TJ]

Pig, are you an MT or

Pig, are you an MT or MN sufferer? If Morton's Neuroma, have you been diagnosed with MN? I feel my neuromas most when walking on soft surfaces like the carpet in my home, grass, and deep sand. I also feel them in any footwear that doesn't allow my metatarsals to spread apart.

 

[Piggyback RidePlease]

Hi Barefoot TJ,I have the

Hi Barefoot TJ,

I have the toe, (well more the 2nd metatarsal joint ahead of the 1st - the 1st/2nd toe ends are about level) but the jury is out on the neuroma. If I avoid the floor board gaps I'm hoping that I will be lucky enough that that is all I need to worry about to prevent the neuroma developing. Doing this certainly took away the soreness that was building up in the area that would be prone to neuroma (assume that's what it was).

I have not found a problem with carpet yet. When I've done my small runs I've not noticed more pain in the area likely to suffer neuroma (so far), only with the floor board gaps. I've yet to try many surfaces such as grass so I anticipate needing further caution (but of course hope that I will be lucky & get away with just this one bad surface for me).

 

[Barefoot TJ]

Hi Pig, having MT and MN are

Hi Pig, having MT and MN are not necessarily interchangeable, meaning they don't necessarily go hand-in-hand. You can have one without the other. If you are on the road to developing one, the best way to avoid that is to avoid shoes that have an enclosed toebox and avoid shoes that have a raised heel.

Is the pain only on one foot? Do you see any hard caluses developing in the area of pain? If so, you may just have a MT problem and not an MN problem. If you really suspect a neuroma, you should get a definite diagnosis. X-rays do not pick up neuromas; ultrasounds and MRIs do.

 

[Danjo]

Yep, sidewalk cracks are

Yep, sidewalk cracks are killer. Which is weird, because more surface varability is supposed to help with MT problems, not make them worse. And it doesn't seem like you have to land right in the crack either, if my forefoot goes over the crack at all it makes my 2nd metetarsal hurt pretty bad, and then after stepping on a couple of cracks it gets sore enough that the flat stuff hurts a little too. I need to make one of those MT orthotics, because my mortons toe seems to be about the only thing keeping me from upping my mileage (aside from lack of time and motivation.)

 

[Barefoot TJ]

Danjo, do you feel numbness

Danjo, do you feel numbness or tingling when you step "just right" over a crack? Or if you do this over a few cracks (or varying surface levels)?

 

[Piggyback RidePlease]

I get the pain in both feet

I get the pain in both feet and there do seem to be some smaller areas on the pads that looked different when I was suffering a bit but have now gone down. As I've been avoiding gaps in floorboards / paving this problem seems to have gone.


The only noticeable pains I get now are an intermittent rare but very intense burning pain which happened a few time after my run yesterday (just back from lower/outer on 1st toe/met' joint). The pain only lasted about 2-3 seconds each time and was gone. This happened once on my right foot a few days ago and repeated 3 times in my left foot not long after a tiny 1/3 mile BF run yesterday. I don't think this is at all related to MT (but any comment welcome - I wondered if it was a stress type thing but assumed that would be nearer the middle of a met' bone and would be more persistent).


The other pain I'm now getting is mostly in my left foot. It seems to be behind the 2nd toe, under it, before the met joint. I had this a little in the right foot and the last 2 days a lot in the left foot from when I get up until I put something on my feet. Thick socks seems to have fixed it this morning. One thing - I could sware that my 2nd toe has moved a mm apart from my 3rd toe on the left foot over night! I am assuming that this is just a transition pain but plan to give it a few days to go/settle.

 

[Barefoot TJ]

About the pain in your big

About the pain in your big toe, that doesn't sound like Morton's Neuroma at all, especially since you didn't mention numbness or tingling in this last post. Whether it is caused by your having Morton's Toe (like that's some kind of medical condition of something...pttttth!), I have no idea. It sounds like you are experiencing some sort of stress there that could lead to something more serious, like a fracture.

With the second toe, do you feel numbness and tingling at all, or just sharp pain. With MN, you normally experience numbness, tingling, followed by sharp pain.

 

[Piggyback RidePlease]

Hi B' TJ, I do get a bit of

Hi B' TJ,



I do get a bit of numbness but I'd say it's closer to the met' head of the 2nd toe than the toe its self.



No repeats of the big toe sharp pain so far today... and I picked up a new set of shoes (for when necessary) with a flat sole & a large toe box so that should help cut down Morton's problems.

 

[Barefoot TJ]

Wise choice to get some wide

Wise choice to get some wide shoes. Let me know if they cause you problems. As you know, I have Morton's Toe and Morton's Neuroma, and any shoe with an enclosed toebox causes my neuromas to go numb.

With MN, you can have numbness and/or tingling anywhere in the middle of the ball of your foot, to the base of your toes, to the toes themselves. It can be different for each person.

The big toe pain sounds like an MT problem.

The numbness at the base of your second toe sounds like MN, but you will only truly know by getting an ultrasound or an MRI.