Bad Idea

Today I pulled out an old pair of Grishko pointe shoes that I had stowed away a while ago because at the time I didn't feel strong enough to relevé properly in them.

Thinking I wanted to try them again, I wore them for class today. At first I liked them a lot. These Grishkos have a stiff shank so they supported my flexible feet well. The turning point came when we had to do multiple relevés in arabesque during a barre exercise. That's when I started feeling as though my feet were about to break in half. The shank is so stiff lower down near the toe that getting en pointe requires a lot of force (can anyone tell me how on earth one can soften the shank of Grishkos near the box? It seems almost impossible). The catch was that despite the shank being so stiff lower down, it was totally broken at the arch. So once I had used all that force to get up en pointe, the broken shank was forcing the weight of my foot way forward. My feet are super flexible, so this was not a welcome feeling.

All the tendons at the front of my feet were being pulled and strained as if I was dancing in totally dead, soft pointe shoes. I got really frightened and took them off straight away. To illustrate my story, I have included two pictures: one to give you an idea of my flexible feet, and another of one of the said Grishko culprits. Needless to say, I will NOT be wearing these shoes ever again. 

This is me pulling OUT of the shoe as much as I can so I wouldn't hurt myself. It looks like jelly but the incredibly stiff box deceived me!!

The shoe actually looks pretty but I shudder to think what would happen if I didn't pull up properly for a second and sunk into it.