CLAIRE CISOTTI: Julia Roberts showed me bunions can be sexy!

The moment I saw pictures of Julia Roberts walking the red carpet at the premiere of her latest movie, it was love at first sight.

Super tall silver snakeskin with strappy platform heels: the shoes she wore under her pink silk dress were everything she wanted in a Christmas party shoe.

But I also learned with a deep sadness that those shoes belong to my past.

Why? In a word: bunions.

Specifically, one on the right foot that has protruded with an increasingly painful impudence for a decade, since the 40s.

Looking longingly at Julia’s feet, I told myself that my days in heels were over. I’d finally come to terms with this just a few days earlier, when a disastrous encounter between a pair of new platforms and my excruciating bunion ended any lingering notions I’d had of ever wearing heels again.

It was a tough decision, as I’d spent most of my 20s and 30s in sky-high heels and stiletto boots, which I wore as easily as a pair of sneakers. I could walk, run and dance with them all day and night with no problem.

I loved the way they made me look and feel, and at 5-foot-8 I didn’t give a damn that with heels on, I outshone all my friends—my shoes made a statement, and so did I.

Sadly, as I entered my mid-40s, everything began to change, and for the last ten years, wearing heels has been only the most occasional (and intensely painful) pleasure for me, since my bunion came out.

So I was stunned when I found out that Julia’s high-heeled, couture shoes were, in fact, orthopedic footwear, designed specifically for women with bunions.

I never knew I’d have something so embarrassing in common with Julia Roberts, but on closer inspection it turns out that just about every star wears these special bunion-relieving shoes, from Helen Mirren and Kelly Brook to Camilla, the Queen Consort.

Move over Jimmy Choo—the A-list is stealing Sole Bliss pairs.

I had heard of the brand before, but I thought they made very good, for my taste, boring heels and court shoes for people with podiatry problems, ie women with bunions.

However, the latest style in her collection, the Remy platform 5, is anything but matronly. They are made with three layers of memory foam to help the wearer’s foot withstand the pressure of the extreme height of this particular design and prevent soreness underfoot.

Most important is the bunion “bed” – an elasticated panel that gently encloses and supports the bunion comfortably, rather than cutting into it like an instrument of torture.

The front of the shoe is also wider than average, reducing pressure in every way.

The moment I saw pictures of Julia Roberts walking the red carpet at the premiere of her latest movie, it was love at first sight. Silver snakeskin, super tall, with strappy platform heels: the shoes she wore under her pink silk dress were everything she wanted in a Christmas party shoe.

To anyone who doesn’t have them, bunions may seem like just a cosmetic concern, but for the estimated 30 per cent of the British population who suffer from them, the pain can be like walking on razor blades.

And if you don’t treat them carefully, they can lead to all sorts of problems, from arthritis in the big toe and foot to hammertoes (where the joints in your fingers bend abnormally).

They can even cause damage further up the body, as changes in gait can affect the function of the knees and hips.

A bunion is made up of two parts. First, the head of the longest bone in the foot, the metatarsal, moves out of alignment and then rubs against the shoe, explains Kumar Kunasingam, a consultant orthopedic surgeon at Croydon University Hospital and the private Schoen Clinic in London.

The other part of the bunion is the big toe itself, “which is ‘pushed’ to lean at an angle toward the second toe, like an ice cream falling out of a cone,” he adds.

“So you have friction and pressure and pain on both sides of this misaligned big toe.”

All this makes it difficult to find a suitable shoe.

So were my early years of running around town in the wrong shoes to blame for my current situation?

Well, no. True, women tend to get bunions more often than men, but while it’s widely believed that the narrow, “fashionable” shoes we tend to wear are to blame, a bunion isn’t caused by footwear, she says Mr. Kunasingam, taking away in one plummeted a great deal of guilt and self-blame.

In fact, it is genetic.

“Shoes don’t cause bunions, it’s important to remember that,” he says. “Unfortunately, we can blame someone in the family, since it seems that bunions are inherited. If a parent or grandparent has suffered with them, it is much more likely that you will too.’

Both my mom and older sister have bunions, so I guess it was inevitable when I started developing one of my own.

That doesn’t make it easy to admit, though: There’s really nothing sexy about bunions, and like snoring, it’s something few women want to yell about, even though they generally affect us more than men. (Thank genetics again, Mr. Kunasingam tells me, because women’s and men’s joints develop differently. Women’s ligaments are also more ‘elastic’, probably to allow them to give birth, so They are more susceptible to the misalignment that creates bunions.)

As soon as I started feeling pain from the slowly growing lump on my foot, I went to see a podiatrist, who said the only real “cure” is surgery. And that, I know, can be very painful – my mum had it and was inactive for weeks (although Mr. Kunasingam assures me that keyhole options that get you back in the gym in a matter of days are now an option). . Knowing this, he was willing to give up sexy shoes for the sake of my foot health.

I traded in my summer flip flops for a pair of Crocs, with specially ‘crimped’ edges that support the bunion to prevent it from hurting. Along with the insole holders the doctor gave me, and a bath at night if I’ve had a long day on my feet, I thought I was adjusting pretty well.

That was until a couple of months ago when I thought I’d take a chance and go out for the night in a pair of high street heels.

Strikingly similar in appearance to the Sole Bliss style, I thought they had the makings of a shoe I could get away with: a chunky platform sole (for stability, I reasoned) and velor fabric straps (soft and forgiving on the heels). foot, it was right!).

But what was supposed to be a brilliant evening turned into a disaster from the moment I put my shoes on.

I pulled the left, good, although a little tight. So the correct one. Agony! Her toe strap was in the wrong place, and I had to wrestle with it over my bunion. But I didn’t have time to change them because the taxi was waiting, and within minutes my right foot felt like it was on fire.

I ended up sitting up most of the night instead of dancing the night away, vowing never to wear heels again.

Of course, that was before seeing the orthopedic beauties of Julia Roberts. Just to make sure they were the shoes for me, I borrowed a red suede pair from a colleague.

When I put one on my right foot, I held my breath; I suddenly knew how Cinderella felt. Her shoe slid on my bunion like a dream, cushioning it perfectly. When I got up to walk, it was as comfortable as wearing the trusty white sneakers I thought I would have to rely on for the rest of my life.

But not everyone who suffers from bunions has a problem with high heels, as Mr Kunasingam explains: “Everyone has unique feet, and choosing what I call ‘smarter’ shoes that have the right cut for your foot can be really helpful.”

It’s a case of trial and error, he says. “Although some bunion patients do not like high heels because of the added pressure on the ball of the foot, patients with milder cases may not find this a problem if their shoe is well designed.

“For example, you might have high-top shoes but they cover only the tips of your toes, with a cutout around the bunion and the strap attached much higher, so there’s no pressure on the bunion.”

For six hours I wore those red Remy shoes, anticipating the pain with each step as time passed. But I didn’t feel anything. And when I took them off, I had no pain, no bothersome, red, swollen bunions.

So, reader, I bought my own pair, in gold and silver. At £199 each I see them as an investment. And it’ll also mean some pretty nice gifts for my closest loved ones (and the local charity shops), because the time has finally come to give away all the beautiful, but now impossible-to-wear shoes I’ve collected over the past four decades.

As they say, onwards and . . . now up!

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