I had some mild feet issues before and read a few books on barefoot running, and had some friends super into it which got me into, and I ran around for 2 years excercising and just daily life in Luna sandals, pure barefoot, and Merrill shoes. I was confident that barefoot-ness would help my feet because of these books. I even ran barefoot on gravel for a while which took some getting used to.

It might be good for some people, but the podiatrist i saw for a while said since barefoot running craze from the book Born to Run, number of patients skyrocketed.

You might be fine in barefoot shoes but just talk to a doctor about it first and check in with them regularly because fucking up your feet can seriously limit your lifestyle and activities, and it sucks. So not worth it.

I’d also recommend you see more than a podiatrist, at least once. I switched from a podiatrist to an orthopedic surgeon and he took some X-rays and got to the root of my problems while the podiatrist I saw for years before that just kept trying me on different orthotics.

My 2 cents - good luck on your feet journey