Falling Head Over Heels

Terri White never wears flats – even when hiking in LA. Why? Because heels help her stand tall, and not just in the literal sense

- Terri White

THE DOCTOR LOOKED WORRIED. Which, in turn, made me worried. She held my x-ray up to the light, peering harder. ‘Nope,’ she sighed. ‘Still can’t.’ ‘Um, hello!’ I said. ‘Can’t what?’ And she started her sentence that way that you never want a doctor to start their sentence. ‘I think I need a specialist to look at this. It’s really weird, but...’ My heart started beating a little faster. ‘…the bones of your feet are too close together – I can’t read your X-ray. Er, what have you done to them?’

The shrug I lightly offered in reply didn’t tell the whole story. You see, I knew exactly what I’d done to them. I had worn high-heeled shoes nearly every day for 21 years by that point. I had specifically worn too-narrow, too-small, too-high high heeled shoes for 21 years. I had, I will now confess, shrunk my feet by two sizes (I was a size five at 18. I’m now a size three). And now, it’s time to tell you the whole story. Not just of how I crushed my own feet, but of how my love affair with shoes – like any great love affair – has brought me the greatest highs and lows I've ever known. But let’s start at the beginning. High heels came into my life at the age of 11, after a last-minute expedition to the precinct to buy a pair of school shoes. Rack after rack lay bare, with just one row of shoes left. They were my size, with a three-inch heel. My mum, only 18 years my senior at 29, held them aloft, proudly. She loved a heel too. So, when I clambered on to the bus next morning, with my too-big uniform and my too-tight perm, they were on my feet.