Product Thursday

One product that I have been quite curious about is the shape-up sneaker promising wonderful things for your foot health. So when my friend Kim was discussing it on her facebook page I was curious. Then I forgot about it (typical) and went back to check with her about it.

Kim had already written a review in her typical fashion on her blog, A City Mom, at Chicago Now. So today I am featuring this wonderfully wry commentary about the shoes that are sweeping the nation with Kim’s full permission. She even gave me a pic of the shoes.

So give a warm Rumbly welcome to our guest today. 

  

Skecher Shape-Ups help my Plantars Faciiitis. Unfortunately.

A runner who can’t run is a person whom no one else wants to be around. Take it from me, a recently sidelined runner. It’s been 35 days (3 hours and thirteen minutes) since my last run. But my brand new pair of Skecher Shape-ups seems to be changing all that.

Skecher Shape-ups, picture from Kim Strickland

I’ve been diagnosed with plantar fasciitis, an evil debilitating affliction that eats away at the tendons on the bottom of your foot like hydrochloric acid on speed. Okay, I just made that up. But that’s what it feels like. And it hurts. A lot. My particular case is strange (natch) in that stretching doesn’t make it feel better and the pain gets worse as the day wears on. Of course rest, you know, spending a day with my feet up, is the impossible dream at my house, so I had to find a way to be on my feet. Fortunately, a friend of mine who also has plantar fasciitis told me about the Skecher Shape-ups. “The way the arches are padded,” he told me, “you never put much weight on your heels,” which is where, for me anyway, my pain is located.

I went out right away and bought a pair. Thankfully, my friend also told me to try DSW, where I found a pair for 70% off. With my ten-dollar savings certificate, that brought the total to $20. Is acitymom a smart shopper, or what? But when I took my first steps in the store, I would have paid any price for them. I almost burst into tears. They were the first pain-free steps I’d taken on my right foot in three weeks.

The thing about these shoes, though. I mean, have you seen them? They’re just not that good-looking and acitymom has her standards. My husband hasn’t stopped making fun of me when I wear them and then, when my mom told me how much she liked the looks of them, that’s when I knew I couldn’t be seen in them outside of the house, at least not without my house dress on.

Apparently these shoes are also supposed to, according to their website: 1. Tone your muscles 2. Promote healthy weight loss 3. Make it easy to get in shape!, which would be an added side benefit, right?  But to someone who considers herself an athlete, I find the whole concept of “fitness shoes” ridiculous. After several days of wearing them around (the house. Only the house) my son, Ethan, asked me if I noticed any difference, you know, like the muscle burn you feel after a particularly tough work-out. “No,” I told him. “Nothing.”

“If you walk thirty miles in our shoes every day,” he said, ” you’ll end up in fantastic shape.”

One of my favorite things in all of life is having one of my children say something so viciously dry it gives me a belly laugh.

Between finally being able to walk pain-free in my Skecher Shape-ups, my new orthopedist and the physical therapy I just started, I’m hoping I can get back to my running soon, and therefore have some semblance of a social life again. As I said, I’ve been a little cranky lately. (A whole lot cranky, says the husband.) When I do become social again, I look forward to showing-off my toned muscles and the healthy weight loss I’ll surely have after walking 30 miles every day in my brand-new pair of fitness shoes.