I was born with feet in the 1st percentile of the population and they stayed that way even despite getting taller. Now every shoe shopping experience is awkward af.
As a woman, I think it’s stupid that shoes are gendered in the first place. My shoe size is in the realm that exists for both men’s and women’s shoes. So in shoe stores I can grab the same sneakers from the women’s and the men’s section. Just sort the damn shoes by size and let people pick the ones they like ffs.
The first few decades of my life I assumed that there’d been all sorts of important orthopaedic/podiatry research done into the difference between men and women’s feet, gaits etc that meant wearing sports shoes sold as “women’s” would in some way cause my feet long term harm. Nope, it was bullshit marketing all along.
I wouldn’t be surprised if on average women’s feet were narrower than men’s, but even if that’s the case, just make narrow and wide versions of shoes and let people pick the ones that fit their feet. Surely there are men with narrow feet and women with wide feet. It just makes no sense.
Not just shoes, all clothes. We can come up with better terms, like tapered or straight line. Whatever would be most descriptive. It’s ridiculous.
Is the size of your forearm same as your feet? https://drschoene.com/press/doc-blog/is-your-foot-the-same-size-as-your-forearm/
No my forearm is bigger
While I’m 5’9 (176cm) with size 12 ( man 45 europe ) shoes since I was 15/16 ( same height and foot size since that age )
Haha same here. I’m around 5’6 or 5’7 and I find depending on make, I’m either size 11 or 12 shoes. Also have pretty big hands (or long fingers at least). I’ve always thought of my hands and feet as big puppy paws that I never grew into lmao.
You know it’s become a personal beef when you know the trade name of the device that insults you.
Haha yes indeed. You don’t know me Brannock device! Some men have footlets and that’s okay.
Some men have footlets and that’s okay.
What an odd childrens book this would be.
Insta-ban from Moms Against Liberty.
I think the word is “footsies”. /s
Wow dude, that’s crazy. Like, in a cool way.
My great-uncle was very small when he was born - the family story is that he used to sleep in a shoe box instead of a crib until he was almost a year old.
Probably not your shoe box, though.
Probably not your shoe box, though.>
Oh no, you didn’t
Haha bro thanks. And you’re right my shoe box would be too small for any baby!
Maybe the one from Slingblade
Some folks call it a Sling Blade, I call it a Kaiser Blade.
Mmmmmhm
I had a girlfriend who had the inverse of your problem — her feet were far too large for shoes aimed at women. She ended up becoming friends with a bunch of drag queens, and finding that the specialist store they got their shoes from was the best place for her
Okay Hank Hill.
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Peggy Hill!
I have this problem, but width only, not overall size.
I just wear men’s shoes, and even those are wicked hard to find. There isn’t really a category of shoes for my size (not big enough overall for drag shoes to be right, but far too wide for normally sized women’s shoes - I wear 6-8 [brand dependent] 4EW in men’s) and I’m not willing to spend a fortune on shoes to have cute custom ones made, so men’s shoes and sandals are my options. Boring.
Did you call her L?
Same here, and now our seven year old is already a size 3, like OP.
I’m 6’3 with what I thought were fairly small feet at 10.5/11. OP’s on a whole ‘nother level, but hopefully saves a lot of money on sneakers at least!
AFASS - Assigned Female At Shoe Store
…i shop women’s shoes when i can; they generally offer a much wider selection…
And they’re so much more comfortable, it’s ridiculous. It’s like the shoe industry decided, several decades ago, that men don’t want comfortable shoes.
Comfort or pockets
Fair. Men get pockets, but shite shoes. Women get comfort, but no pockets.
Women get comfort
I know there are no women on Lemmy but CMON are we really going to say the people wearing high heels have the comfortable shoes? 🤣
Hol up, y’all have pockets on your shoes? I’m getting neither comfort nor pockets.
Ah yes the two genders
Lmaoooooo 🤣🤣🤣💀
Do your feet hurt a lot? It sounds like a lot of pressure on a small area
Good question. You would think but my calf and foot muscles are quite strong to compensate for what I lack in foot surface area. They do get sore after a long day but nothing too crazy.
The foot is a lever. A shorter lever has to bear less load.
Uh, no, that’s actually the opposite of how that works. Pressure is force per area, and torque is the cross product of force and length (at right angles). The smaller the area, the higher the pressure. The smaller the foot, in this case, the harder the muscles have to work to create the same torque (or moment). #ThanksForAttendingMyPhysics101TEDTalk
The smaller the foot, in this case, the harder the muscles have to work to create the same torque (or moment).
That’s backwards, a shorter lever arm requires less force. If you had a 10 foot long foot, you’d have to have insanely strong calf muscles to stand on your tip toes, because how far the load is from the fulcrum.
torque is the cross product of force and length
Correct. The force at the end of the lever is your body weight. A longer foot thus exerts more torque on your ankle and requires more calf muscle to move. Longer arms don’t make chest flyes easier, they make them harder.
This isn’t totally true (about longer limbs=harder to exercise), because it doesnt take into account how myosin works on a longer muscle/surface area, along with how electrical differences between limbs and the torso help with electrical flow due to potential energy.
Look at a thoroughbred (fastest over medium distance), an Arabian (best for endurance), a quarter horse (fastest in burst over short distance) versus a donkey (stronger pound for pound than a horse but not faster), vs a mule (stronger than horse, faster than donkey). Keep in mind there’s different types of muscle development, eg burst vs long distance. Look at their legs. They are walking on (1) finger, look at where their ankle is. Their feet, like many animals, are angled completely differently than humans. Elephants have a similar foot to humans in that their sole contacts the ground, but obviously their feet don’t extend like ours (and they have bigger muscles). So it is interesting but I think theres more to it
It’s totally true from a physics standpoint. A longer lever arm between the load and fulcrum requires more force to move the same weight, all else being equal. Edit: thinking on this more, I think a type 3 lever is more applicable to my chest flye example, but the same concept applies; as you lengthen the load arm relative to the effort arm, more input force is required to move a given load.
“Harder to exercise” is poorly defined, especially when you go on to discuss endurance, speed, and force, all of which are very different terms.
I totally get what you’re saying, but I specifically narrowed it down to force for a reason. My shorter friends kick my ass in lifting due to the mechanical advantage their shorter limbs have, but I smoke them in a distance run because my longer limbs allow me to traverse a greater distance in a single step. This is complicated though because larger lungs are a factor here too.
True, i didn’t consider the point of contact.
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The foot bears more than 100% of your weight because it is cantilevered. The greater the cantilever, the greater the multiplier to the weight.
You’re arguing that a small foot has a small contact patch. But we need to be able to shift all our weight to our toes, and that contact patch is more a function of the width of your foot, not the length.
That would be relevant to the calf muscles, but the lower surface area of the feet means higher pressure in terms of psi or pascals.
Yes I can confirm that there’s more pressure on my feet if my wearing out kids shoes every 6 months is anything to go by. They are not designed for a man of my height and weight!
Have you ever had custom shoes made? Or checked what adult little people wear? They may have some suggestions
I’m just confused by why you keep getting your feet measured. I haven’t done that since my feet stopped growing, I know my size by this point
How I imagine it:
“I’m size 3”
“No you’re not”
“Yes I am”
“You can’t be”
“BRING THE DEVICE”
Or like look at the size 3 they currently are wearing.
Yeah but maybe their toes are just jammed up all the way to the front and they don’t know how shoes work! You never know!
I only got my feet measured for a new pair of running shoes at a new running store that just opened up. You’re right - I don’t have to combat the Brannock device on a regular basis.
TL:DR He says his dong is normal sized.
edit: Nevermind. Linked post was the same person.
If your feet stay the same size why don’t you just order online? I know testing them out can be nice, but you can return online orders.
I can’t remember the last time I went shoe shopping in person, because I know my size and which companies I need a larger or smaller size shoe for. Also why would they keep measuring you if you know?
You’re right I usually do buy online. I only went in to a fancy running store that just opened up because I do run and was wondering if they had anything other than youth sizes so they had to measure me (and I took this photo because I thought it was hilarious). They did in fact have a better running shoe for me!
Glad you got it worked out, what kind of shoes did you end up buying if you don’t mind me asking?
My brothers feet are massive and he can never find shoes that fit properly. Mine are a bit wide, so I always have to get a size up to be comfortable, but I manage.
The feet might not change, but shoe sizes are not consistent. Even two shoes of the same make, model, and size can differ. When your feet are very small, the tolerances are also very small.
This. My feet are very wide. Every once in a while I’ll find a good fit (usually have to go overly long), and hope that the style is manufactured for more than a year. Otherwise it’s a nightmare finding an actual fit.
Bruh was a deer in his past life
current
Accurate
Dude this is insane. First I feel like you’d be more prone to falling over or something? Like top heavy?? But on the other hand you can probably go up most stairs without feeling like you’re about to fall to your death. I have average foot size for my height and all stairs I have to be on my tip toes. Honestly have wished I had smaller feet many times in my life. Thanks for sharing! Not something I ever thought was a thing.
I think that’s the normal way of walking upstairs. I bet even OP does it.
I thought the normal way was to crawl up on all fours like an animal
My balance is not too bad actually my body has had my whole life to adjust to its situation with my feet. I also go up stairs quickly on my tip toes but yeah I do always feel that stairs have ample room for my feet. Another positive is I pretty much never stub my toes.
You have different shoe sizes for men and women? WTF?
Where do you live that they don’t?
In Japan everyone knows their shoe size in centimeters. Those stay the same regardless of gender or whatever other crazy unrelated topic to how big something is.
It’s normal for men to have wider feet, with a wider and longer toebox compared to the length of the foot. Length is only one dimension of several. (Though a lot of people don’t think to re-lace* their shoes for arches.)
It’s unclear how much of that is upbringing. The toebox length is gendered, but toe and foot width go up wen spending a lot of time barefoot, and toe width goes down in pointed shoes that can eve n make toes ‘tuck’ and cause bunions.
A women’s 9 1/2 double-wide fits me about the same as a plain Men’s 7. Women’s dress shoes are rarely in wide, and NEVER double-wide. Though I’ve found success with Aussie brands because going barefoot is normal there and so the shoes are often wider for everyone. We’re also seeing the toebox become a more slanted natural foot shape, instead of the weird point symmetrical one.
Bodies can be complicated, and one size/shape isn’t for everyone. The way we live and dress absolutely changes the shoes we need, too.
My most recent shoe purchased was decided because the arc in the shoe perfectly marched my own. Also i do have rather wide feet and did go barefoot a lot as a kid. Funny thing im the only in group that still has arches.
I recommend re-lacing. Autocorrect changed it to ‘replace’, but changing how your shoes are laced really helps. I have a very high arch, and found that I didn’t actually need much arch support in the shoe itself, I just needed the tongue not to be pushing down on it. It means the shoes now feel tight and secure around my ankle and toe, I don’t have to go up a size to fit my arch. Much more comfortable!
Huh! That’s very interesting. I’ve never thought abou lacing having an impact on fit. I also have high arches and I’m definitely giving this a try. Thanks!
Yes but the number doesn’t have to change. Just like in the US, they use letters to denote relative foot wdith vs. the average. No need for multiple numbering schemes.
Just like in the US
The letters denoting widths exist, but they’re not used. Very few US shoe brands offer different widths on the same size shoe. Some offer two. A handful three, and now you’re talking about workwear, not trainers or anything else. Generally, US shoe widths are decided by whether it’s a mens or womens model.
My fellow lemming, I worked in a shoe store in the US for two years. I can tell you that yes, in fact, every shoe has an associated letter denoting width along with the number denoting length.
However, unless the width is special it may or may not be printed on the box.
size in centimeters
Measuring like that would be even easier in the US, where the answer would always be simply “one foot”.
That would make it a foot measurement, not a shoe size.
It would except for the fact that shoe sizes here, from babies to adults are only sized in centimetres. If there are international sizes printed on the shoes, they have no meaning to residents in Japan. Check the tag inside your shoes; If they have international sizes printed on them, you’ll see Japan’s is in centimetres, and may have EE (or more Es) next to it to denote width. If there is nothing, then they are standard width.
Children’s clothing is also sized in centimetres. Makes things really simple.
This is probably gonna blow your mind. But most shoes are worn on feet. Crazy, uh?
Shoe sizes are Unisex here in in Europe as well as in Asia. And in Asia they are even smarter - they simply use centimeters, while we use “Paris Points” of 2/3s of a centimeter.
Just so you know: Women shoes are different in both width and length*.
Probably because men often need wider shoes.
Well, that’s why you still have mens and womens sections in the shoe shop. But it definitively makes it easier e.g. to find a shoe for a woman with wide feet, just take a mens’ sneaker in the same size.
my sister’s foot size is 12. She has larger feet than me and I’m AMAB
AMAB
A Massive-Ass Bastard?
Assigned male at birth.
No, no I think the other guy is right.
That’s not very nice.
