If you passed him on the street, it probably wouldn’t occur to you that Adam Ruark was different from anyone else. But when he takes off his shoes, it doesn’t take long to realize that he is very unique. At 30 years old, Ruark has still never lost his baby toes!
Ruark knew he was unusual from an early age. When he started elementary school and noticed that all of his classmates were losing their baby toes, it confused and embarrassed him that his own toes were staying stubbornly affixed to his feet. While specialists assured his parents that he was simply a late bloomer and that his baby toes would come loose in due time, they all ended up being wrong. With 10 tiny little stubs sprouting from his otherwise adult-sized feet, Ruark grew up to be a bona fide medical marvel.
“As you can imagine, it was pretty hard to live with growing up,” said Ruark. “All the other kids got the experience of leaving their baby toes under their pillow at night and finding a dollar in the morning, but I was always left out.”
“But eventually I came to terms with it, and now, I understand that this is just how God wanted me to be,” he continued.
While he has to wear custom-built shoes to accommodate his minuscule toes, and he admits to some occasional awkward moments in his romantic life, Ruark maintains that he goes through his life pretty much just like everybody else. If anything, he’s embraced his condition, going so far as to pose for a recent photo spread in Time magazine.
“Sure, maybe I can’t tiptoe like everyone else, and maybe I can’t wear flip-flops without making strangers uncomfortable,” he said. “But even if I had a choice, I honestly think I’d keep my baby toes at this point. How many grown men get to say they have teeny tiny baby toes?”
It’s pretty cool if you ask us, Adam!
