To prevent forefoot pain caused by wearing high heels (due to nerve compression), you should strengthen and relax your feet using two simple exercises: towel curls with your toes and arch massage with a tennis ball.

noli's read

Carla's biomechanical description is entirely accurate: wearing heels transfers a disproportionate load to the forefoot. An observational study published in the Journal of Foot and Ankle Research confirms that this weight transfer massively increases pressure under the metatarsals, which can compress local small nerves. To strengthen the area, the towel exercise is a classic whose effectiveness in activating foot muscles is supported by clinical work, notably at the University of Queensland, although recent research often prefers the 'short foot' exercise to better target deep stabilizing muscles. As for rolling a tennis ball, expert opinions in manual therapy confirm its utility for temporarily releasing tension in the arch, although rigorous clinical trials are lacking to prove a long-term preventive effect. The idea that these two movements are sufficient to tolerate heels is, however, slightly optimistic: they strengthen the foot, but cannot cancel out lateral compression if the shoe is too narrow at the toe.

the sources

No named source held this one up — that absence is part of the verdict.