It's not the bone. It's the muscle that stopped holding it.
Most women are told a bunion is bone, bone doesn't move, and the only real answer is a surgeon. “I figured I'd just wait until it got bad enough to cut.” That's not the whole story. And here's why.
The problem isn't your toe. It's that everything you've tried only did half the job.
Every product in this category is built on one idea: push the toe back into place and hope it stays there.
But the muscle that's supposed to hold your toe straight — the one running along the inside of your foot — went quiet years ago, after decades in narrow shoes. The moment the pressure comes off, there's nothing left holding it.
Gel toe spacersThey separate the toes while they're in. They do nothing to the muscle. By morning your toe is exactly where it was. Most people have a drawer full of them and nothing to show for it.
Night splintsEight hours of correction while you're unconscious — if you last a week. They strap tight, they wake you up, they slide off in the sheets.
Sleeves, pads and cushionsThese aren't correction, they're padding. They make the shoe hurt less today and change nothing about your foot in two years. You're treating the rub, not the drift.
None of these failed because bunions can't be worked on.
They failed because they pushed a bone while ignoring the muscle that let it drift.