Hi,

I’m wondering if you tried any home remedies for the bunion pain before opting for surgery? I really don’t want surgery just yet, and I’m wondering what would help my poor feet!

Thanks!
Liz

Thanks for the question, Liz.

If you have bunions, you may wish to try some simple home remedies for relief instead of opting for painful surgery. Wearing the right kind of shoes to start with can certainly help, and the following natural home remedies have been shown to have some effect on bunion pain:

Ice

If your bunions are swollen or inflamed, ice can help relieve the pain. Wrap an ice pack in a towel and apply it to your bunions for ten to fifteen minutes, up to three times per day. The ice will reduce the swelling and help the throbbing pain.

Massage

Massaging your bunions and the area around them can often help with pain relief and stiffness of the joint. Rub in a circular motion, gently at first, and press harder as long as it’s not too painful. Peppermint oil brings soothing, cooling relief to painful inflammation.

Toe Spacers

Bunions cause your big toe joint to become enlarged, which pushes your big toe in towards your other toes. This unnatural alignment puts pressure on the big toe joint which, eventually, will make walking even short distances a painful exercise.

At the drugstore or online, you can find toe spacers that can be slipped between your big toe and second toe. These spacers help push the big toe back into its regular alignment, which takes some of the pressure off of the joint.

Epsom Salts

Soaking in Epsom salts has been used as a home remedy for many ailments. Soaking your feet in Epsom salts and very warm water can help relieve the pain and swelling of bunions.

You can also try some of the commercial foot soaks you find in the drug store.

Try Over-the-Counter Pain Relievers

Over-the-counter pain relievers can ease the pain caused by your bunions. While OTC medications that contain acetaminophen (Tylenol) can help with the pain, anti-inflammatory agents such as ibuprofen (Advil, Motrin) will relieve both the pain and the inflammation.

Hope that helps!

The bad news is my achilles tendonitis is still bad, but the good news is physiotherapy is slowly helping, and also physio has helped so much with my post-op bunionectomy I can walk pretty much normally and have quite a bit of range of motion! So for anyone getting bunion surgery, I highly recommend going to physiotherapy afterwards. I don’t know where I would be without it. The scar is still quite red and prominent and there is still some swelling, but overall it is much better.

My right bunion is still hurting quite a bit but it is tolerable with my bunion splint and also by wearing my toe spacers. I will need to get surgery on that one too though eventually.

I am doing quite a few physiotherapy exercises which is helping with the tendonitis and post-op bunion pain. I promise I will update more frequently now!

I had a seven hour shift, and I wore good insoles and good shoes. About two hours into my shift I could barely stand up any longer; partially because of my post-surgery foot, partially because of the sore bunion on my right foot, and partially, but mostly, because of my achilles tendonitis. It’s so difficult because I don’t want to overwork my post-op foot too quickly; it’s still quite swollen and often very sore. But when I try to put most of my weight on my right foot, I’m in even more pain because of my achilles tendonitis, and also my bunion. So I’m standing at work on Sunday, shifting my weight from my swollen left foot to my excruciating right foot. When I try to take the weight off of my heal, my bunion gets sore. And I can’t figure out what’s worse, the bunion on my right foot or the tendonitis; but truthfully, probably the tendonitis.

I somehow survived my shift by taking a lot of tylenol and advil, and leaning on the deli counter. When I got home, I sat down on the couch, iced both of my heels as well as both of my bunions (rather, non-bunion, on my left foot), and didn’t get up again until it was time for bed.

On Monday I had an appointment with my podiatrist, Dr. L, in the morning. I could barely walk on Monday as my post-op foot was extremely swollen and sore; I could hardly fit it into a normal shoe. In hindsight, I probably should have worn my Air Cast. I went to see Dr. L about my orthotics as well as my heels. He didn’t really look at my heels, but he did adjust my orthotics so that they were less high in the arches, as I was getting blisters from them. He also prescribed me a topical anti-inflammatory to rub on my heels three times a day, which I had to get at a compounding pharmacy.

I went to physiotherapy yesterday, and she did some more ultrasound therapy on my heels. It has actually helped quite a bit, as the pain is lessened today. Which makes me really really wish I could afford this. After how expensive physiotherapy is, it’s probably a worthy investment. But I just paid tuition, so I won’t be buying that yet. Anyways, physio is helping a lot, I just wish it was helping my heels more. My range of motion in my post-bunion foot now is fantastic though! Pictures (and maybe a video) to come soon.

For now, I’ll keep icing my heels and waiting for my tendon support to arrive, while trying to deal with the pain.

I’m sitting here at the moment with ice on both heels. The post-op pain from the bunionectomy is also still pretty bad. Some days it’s okay, and other days I am limping. I’ve been in physio twice a week for two weeks, and it helps, but not enough. And the last two days have just been sitting in class; I start clinical on Friday! Man oh man, what am I going to do. Between my bunion, my post-op bunion, and my heels, the only time I’m not in pain is… well, never. And walking makes it even worse.

I bought some new running shoes after school today, for clinical, but I can’t wear them to work because of differences in colour restrictions between clinical and work. I think they’ll be better than my other shoes I’m wearing for nursing though. I’ve also ordered one of these for my tendonitis; really I need two but I want to see if it works before I spend the money on two. I’ll let you know.

I am also going back to see Dr. L (podiatrist) on  Monday for ANOTHER adjustment of my orthotics and to see if there’s anything else he can do for my achilles tendons, because last time he didn’t do anything and the pain from the tendonitis is way worse than the pain of the bunions.

I’m so depressed about my feet right now. I can’t stand this pain anymore.

I did buy these heel cups and they have helped a little bit but not much. My physiotherapist said she can help with my heels but she mostly focused on my bunion, which is fine. I think on Monday I’m going to call and make an appointment with my podiatrist (Dr. L), who didn’t help with them last time but I just need to be firm. Maybe my orthotics need some more adjusting (they’ve already been adjusted about eight times just for my bunions alone!). I don’t know. My right bunion is causing me a lot of pain lately too, more than the left one I had operated on! It’s summer, it’s hot outside, and I’d like to wear my capris and sandals, but I have to wear closed shoes so I can wear my orthotics and toe spacers and try to lessen my heel pain!

I’m thinking of ordering these as they have good reviews and may help. I’m open to other suggestions too!

Thanks for reading about my pain

Hi there,

I found your website and started reading it because I have bunions too. I don’t think mine are as bad as yours, but I may consider surgery down the road. Did you try any non-surgical methods for pain relief before considering surgery, and if so where did you get them?

Thanks,
Samantha

Hi Samantha,

Thanks for the email! I actually tried a variety of products before looking into surgery, as surgery was a last resort for me due to the time and the money. The first thing I tried was just basic moleskin padding in my shoes to prevent the bunions from rubbing against my shoes… it didn’t help much and came off too easily. I was also going through about two packages per week because you can’t reuse them. Then a friend told me about a reusable silicone pad she found. I tried that and it was much more helpful because it had a lot more cushioning. Because of the pain I had in my bones, I also tried silicone toe spacers which I mostly wore at night because I found them very uncomfortable to wear with shoes during the day. They help separate the big toe from the second toe, temporarily straightening your toe and relieving some of the pressure on the bunion. They helped a little bit, but my bunions were simply too bad for them to be up to the task. The few times I did wear them during the day, I did have less bone pain, but having something that felt like a marshmallow between my toes was too uncomfortable for me. By far the best results I got was from a night splint by FootSmart, which I bought online, and still do wear on my right foot. It helps with the pain more than anything else I’ve tried and to me is well worth the small expense. All of these products were in addition to having custom orthotics which were adjusted six times to try to help the pain, but to no avail. Ultimately, as you know, I decided to get surgery on my left bunion because I would rather fix the problem than wear squishy spacers and splints for the rest of my life, and hopefully get rid of the pain for good. If your bunions are not bad enough to need surgery yet though, definitely check out these products, as they are a very small cost and may be helpful to you.

Thanks!
Sylvia