shaking hands | Arthritis Information

 

Hi,

Hi Austravel, Wear a soft splint or just a regular arm/wrist elastic, people usually take it easy on you then, bit of a hassle but in winter especially it is a great help for me.  Tell them you hurt it once at sport and it plays up now and again.  Regards Janie.

In my experiemce its the pressure that traps the nerve (carpal tunnel) and that hurts, we usually get swelling that in turn presses on the nerve, the flick used to be what killed me, I had a carpal tunnel operation and a big clean out of the hand and wrist of synovium/pannus.  Been great since then thank God.
Welcome Austravel - I am lucky being a woman, as technically the woman has the choice of shaking hands or not.  We are the ones according to "good manners" who may extend their hand, not the men reaching out to squeeze your hand.  I try to practice keeping my hands down, and not putting, them out there for some unintended abuse.  A couple of times men have literally folded my hand in two.  Now if someone puts out their hand to shake, I let them know my right hand is hurt, so sorry.  It works really well until I forget as I love to engage people, and still put my hand out there for the abuse LOL.  A hard habit to break, good luck and its always good to have more members join in our common discussion.  CathyIt is so hard to tell someone you can't shake their hand. They look at you like you have two heads. I usually suck it up and bear it like a lot of us.

We have an elderly pastor that would come into the office once a week. He was old but, man, he was strong. Finally had to tell him to ease up. I love Janie's idea about wearing a splint.

Wearing a splint is a good Idea! Good Luck finding a solution.

gosh I know what you mean about the pain. although I'm a woman everyone seems to want to shake hands. I try and avoid it as much as possible but I hate appearing rude. As a guy it is impossible to avoid. I wish I had some advice short of telling every person you have RA. I also like the splint idea that seems the best solution. My doctor taught me how to shake hands at my first visit with him. He said for me to take control of the shake by extending my hand so the crook of my thumb and forefinger engages with the other persons. Doing it this way greatly reduces the area that gets gripped and also the more sensitive areas. It's kind of hard to explain....the technique verbally. It works for me. Also if my hands are really bad and I have my gloves on peope usually are OK with me saying sorry- my RA is acting up today.I was at a conference a year ago and a chap shook my hand, it felt like my fingers were going to pop out of their joints. It was unbearable.

Unfortunately, as the RA is progressing, I wear splints at the office now the upside is when required to meet/greet, people go gently, no squeezing. Who'd have thought there'd be an upside to splints? I'd go with splints, too! (I wear mine pretty much 24-7.) When people see the splints, they automatically assume you're injured and are extra-gentle.