Pain In Your Big Toe, Big Toe Joint Pain

When I was in ninth grade my big toe joint swelled and hurt.  The school nurse wasn’t very sympathetic.  She blamed it on my shoes.

Maybe so.

But they were cute.  Cheap but cute.

They probably caused me to curl my toes to hold them on my feet.

But according to Doctors Travell & Simons MD, bunions (enlarged big toe joints) show up more in certain ethnic groups than others.  They also said there may be a strong hereditary component.  (If your parent had them, you have a good chance to have them, too.)

There are several possible causes for pain in your big toe joint.

Bunions cause a muscle imbalance which just makes matters worse.   It causes an “out of balance” walk that aggravates the muscles in your leg.

A variation in the first metatarsal and great (big) toe joint is called a bunion when it sticks out toward the other foot.  It can make it hard to get shoes that fit.  You’ll know if you have bunions.

Bunions can appear on both feet or only one.

Bunions can be surgically fixed.  I’m not a surgeon (and don’t even play one on television) so if you decide to go this route, ask lots and lots of questions.

“How long will it take to recover?”  “How much pain will I have?”  “What exactly is the procedure?”

It’s your body so you get to ask.

Also sometimes wearing a cast can cause pain to appear in the big toe joint.

So can having an anatomical (actual) short leg.  That’s what I had.

If you have a short leg, that foot will receive more pressure.  More pressure can equal more pain.  In this case, raise your shorter leg by placing a lift under your whole shoe on the short leg side.

Sleeping with your feet strongly flexed (turned downward; curled toes to heel) can also cause pain in the big toe.  Sleep with your feet flat.  You can buy special boots to help with this or sleep closer to the headboard, footboard or wall so you cannot flex your soles.

Flat feet and tight socks can also aggravate those lower leg muscles.  Wearing high heels and crossing your legs are two more baddies.

You see, sometimes pain in the large toe joint is caused by tight muscles in the lower leg.  They can be aggravated by doing any of those things in the last couple of paragraphs.

If you receive or do massage for pain in your big toe, make sure to work deeply into the muscles of your calf.  The muscles that tend to be involved are on the outside of your calf (the baby toe side.)

Trigger points (see the “Trigger Point Category” here) in your calf can cause pain in your big toe.  Working deeply into those calf muscles can help get rid of the trigger points and your toe pain.

Ice or cold packs are another treatment that may be helpful.

Just to be on the safe side, I would also “treat” (press into) the arch muscles on the same side as the big toe.  If they are “too tight” (contracted) they can pull on the big toe joint.

Also, wearing a metatarsal pad (a pad under the toe joint in the ball of your foot) may help if you have a certain foot condition called “Morton’s Foot.”  In this case, your second toe is longer than your big toe.

Hopefully this will get you on the road to getting rid of the pain in your big toe.