CrushedVamp

As way of introduction on here, I thought I would tell the members of this site that my username “Crushed Vamp” has no particular funny story behind it, other than it seemed an appropriate username for a high heeled forum. If nothing else I guess, it tells people I know the various parts of a high heel. I have always liked high heels though, in particular combined with stockings, a dress or short skirt, and an ankle bracelet. Fortunately I have a wife that likes to dress up for most occasions and loves her high heels. When she was formerly married to a very short man inch which she would be higher than him in wearing high heels, he forbid her to wear them. Since height is not an issue with me, she has gone all-out on high heel purchases and has every style, type, color and variation there is with her 200 plus pairs. While less in number she has thigh high, knee high and booties with high heels and will wear them if the mood strikes her. It is enough that she has a walk-in closet just for her shoe collection. We affectionately call it her "shoe barn". Myself, I do not wear high heels although I am glad to see men wrestle the high heel back to our gender from its inception some four hundred years ago. My love of them is enough that on my bucket list someday is crafting a pair for my wife to wear. I am not a cordwainer by trade, but do have some woodworking, leather and metalworking skills so do think I could make a custom pair. Considering my love of high heels, I think that would be a gratifying accomplishment. I am not sure how they would fit, or how comfortable they would be, but it would be fun to learn a new skill I think and who knows, form a new hobby?

I fully understand what you are experiencing. My wife and I are often the best dressed at a restaurant or other function which goes noticed by others who are there. Often it is the other women that make it miserable for my wife; sly comments in the bathroom, scowls and sideways glances, all for just being dressed better than they are. Or even worse, nasty comments from her own family, “your heels are too high”, or “your skirt is too short”. Yes I can commiserate with you on what you are saying. I deal with it by doing my best to be understanding. Since we like dressing up and looking our best whether it is at church, a restaurant, or a show; we do, and ignore the comments, even if it is not easy sometimes. While others might feel we are dressing up and thus making them look dressed down, that isn’t the case. We just like looking sharp individually, and as a couple. 1. I try and encourage my wife to dress up by dressing up myself. If she sees me looking sharp, she tends to follow suit in matching me. However, if she chooses to dress down, I still dress sharp. I don’t berate her or beg her to wear something better, it is her decision on what she wears, but by staying true to looking sharp myself, it just shows her that I will stay the course. 2. I understand that high heels are not comfortable and have a back up pair of shoes for my wife like ballet flats. As much as I love her wearing heels, it is better to have her start in them, and have to take them off mid-date through, then have her resent wearing them at all. I always have a more comfortable pair of shoes on me, or close by in the car, etc. 3. Take them to venues where it is more typical to be dressed up. Nice restaurants. Upscale performances. Live Theater, etc. By not standing out, they will feel more at ease dressed up, and thus wearing high heels. 3. A lady needs three things: food water and compliments. A wife can pick fake compliments out as soon as they are uttered or texted, but by being honest and telling them often how much you appreciate them wearing high heels, and how good she looks in them and other honest compliments, she is more inclined to wear them for you. 4. Like all interests, be wary of falling into the trap of making her feel as if you just love her because she wears high heels, or you just love her when she has high heels on. A woman wants to be truly loved, and while they like dressing to please the man she is in love with, she does not want to be reduced down to being loved just for what she wears. Or feels she has to wear high heels to be appreciated. It is a very fine line I know, but this is why several other suggestions I offered above come into play. In closing, just understand that a woman has some six hundred images per day they are subjected to on what the world thinks the ideal woman looks like. Naturally most women do not feel they measure up. As husbands and fathers we are battling the world, but we cannot give up and let our wives, girlfriends and daughters know we are proud of them whether sharply dressed or slumming for the day. We ultimately have more sway than the world, but we must be understanding. Maybe these suggestions will resonate and work for you.

I think some of the blame for the demise could be put on husbands and boyfriends too. My wife LOVES high heels, but sometimes on a date we ended up walking much further than we thought, or we ended up standing longer than anticipated. Other times her new shoes just hurt her feet quicker than anticipated. It was no big deal... my wife kept a pair of soft flats in her purse. They took up some room, but were no heavy, but more importantly were always there as a way out. While I preferred her to be wearing high heels, and thought it made a much more poignant fashion statement, the truth was her heels hurt her feet, so she switched to black flats. I think to some degree if husbands and boyfriends adopted that concept, it would not only be supportive, their loves might wear high heels more often since they have a way out of painful shoes. But it need not be just black flats. Having Keds at the ready, or even going to places where she can go barefoot are all painless alternatives. And alternative shoes can be kept in the car, the inside pockets of a mans suit jacket, etc. Its just the concept of them having a less painful alternative that might help make wearing high heels a little more attritive then the person thinking, 'It's going to be a night of painful feet".

I do not know of any books on the topic unfortunately, but there may be some studies out there on why they are so popular, or the history of them and why some four hundred years later high heels are still around. You also might find what you are looking for in searching fashion magazines for magazine or online articles that delve into the phycological aspect of heel wearing that you are looking for. I write novels, and it has cropped up in my fiction Thriller type novels to some degree. My wife's first husband was very short and so she was forbidden to wear high heels because in them she would have been taller than him by several inches. Since I am tall anyway, her wearing high heels does not bother me, and while she has kind of run with that by having over 200 pairs of shoes, many high heeled, that is phycological in nature. For a friend of ours, she was born with a 6th toe, and while it was surgically removed, it left a scar. She is VERY conscientious of being barefoot, and to overcompensate has some 600 pairs of shoes, some being high heels. In the interest of characterization both of these situations have cropped up in my novels. I also had an unscrupulous attorney in one of my books who was a vile, greedy ambulance chaser type attorney trying to sway the jury with how she dressed, and chose higher heels than what was typically allowed in court to look imposing. And in the current novel I am working on, a legal thriller, a mother is a high heel wearing attorney that is highly contrasted against her daughter who is into organic farming. The shoes the two wears are really symbolism for how different the mother/daughter are. While I know these are not exactly what you are looking for, with no responses for awhile on this question, I thought it might help to show that the phycology of high heel wearing is really in many places... subtly. But as a writer I have to finish with this suggestion too. If it is something you like, and it is not available, write a book yourself on the topic. The world needs more books!