Painful fingers are very common in the cold, damp areas of the US. Your fingers swell and get stiff especially in the winter months. Middle age is usually the time when these symptoms present themselves and they can make you feel old before your time.
Don’t Think This is the Start of a Downward Slope
It is all too easy to think that you are on your way down and sliding into old age or pain and suffering. Get out of here – we won’t have those thoughts around here! There is only a downward slope if you think there is one. If you were twenty and had pain in your fingers would you think the same? Of course you wouldn’t, you would think it was something just passing and deal with it. It is just the same now. Health starts in your mind. What are you going to do about your stiff and painful fingers and what causes it?
Find Out As Much As you Can About the Problem
The more you understand about the problem the easier it will be to deal with it affectively. As you are reading this blog I know that you are the sort of person who is proactive and doesn’t wait for someone else to deal with your heath issues – you look after yourself.
If you have a great health professional looking after you then follow their guidance, but here are a few ideas that I have found to work.
Exercises for Stiff Painful Fingers.
A door that is never used, gets rusty and eventually ceases up – same thing with your body. Keep all the parts moving, every day. Do Tai Chi, walk, cycle, and swim, if you haven’t exercised in a while take it slow and ease your way into it and talk to your health professional. On my Pain Relief and Recovery DVD is a full, gentle warm up http://taichiworldonline.com/tai-chi-dvd-info-01/ , but here is a quick taster.
1) In traditional Chinese medicine painful fingers can be caused by a lack of circulation and energy. To help to move circulation quicker, rub both the front and back of your hands vigorously, to make them warm and tingly. Then, with gentle firm pressure, (it shouldn’t hurt) grasp your thumb joint nearest your wrist between your index finger and thumb, pushing the blood to the tip of your thumb. Do this ten time on your thumb then do the same to each of your fingers on each hand.
2) Then imagine that you have a rubber ball in each hand and, with a little pressure, “squeeze” them twenty times. It should not hurt, if it does ease back or talk to your health professional.
3) Gently close your hands with your palms down and swiftly flick your fingers in and out twenty times.
These exercises do not take long and can be done a couple times a day, just let your body tell you how much to do.
Nutrients
Exercise alone will rarely loosen up your fingers forever and your nutrition can play an important role. Some people have gotten good results just by taking Cod Liver Oil, which has the reputation of helping inflamed joints. It is probably best that you take it in capsule form as many people, including me, find the taste awful. It probably comes from my being four years old and a well meaning teacher giving a tablespoon of it neat. Yuk! I can still taste now.
Have healthy week.
Kind Regards.
John Hine
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