How I cope with RSI

Although I spent a lot of time in my youth behind the computer, I never got problems with my hands until I got my first job. RSI was relatively new back in 2000 and not something I’d be suffering. At least: that’s what I thought. Until my right hand started to feel sore. At first it was just a little but after some time it was getting really annoying and hindering my work.

RSI creeping in

At some point I started to use the mouse in my left hand although I’m right handed. It felt awkward at first, but I got used to it that same day i switched. Now my left hand, which didn’t do much with the mouse until then, had to do all the work. No wonder that within days my left hand was just as sore as the right one. I switched the mouse from left hand to right hand until I realized that I had to switch within minutes and got a second mouse.

One mouse for every hand worked reasonably well. My work was then still split between journalism and building websites so I wasn’t behind my desk all day long. Those breaks gave me some time to recover. But I liked web development much more than journalism, so I switched jobs in order to be a full time web developer. It also meant full time behind a computer.

Reality kicked in

After about 2 years of web development I came to the conclusion that I had to do more. To be more precise: after a work week I had both my hands in a bucket of warm water in a fruitless attempt to stimulate the blood circulation in my hands. One of the first things I did was giving up a holiday in order to work only half days for a few weeks. That gave my hands some rest without me falling into a black hole.

The second thing I did was going to the doctor. It was hard for me to go to the doctor because there was nothing to see on the outside. I don’t think the doctor wasn’t convinced either because he wanted to test me for carpal syndrome which I don’t have. And I almost don’t have any trouble with my arms or shoulders. My problem is specifically in the back of my hands. He sent me to a physiotherapist anyway.

The remedy

The physiotherapist emphasized on exercise. That would help with the blood circulation with my hands. Although I didn’t buy his story completely I tried it anyway and it worked. The only trouble was the frequency of the exercise. I was (if I’m correctly) only 2 times a week in the gym and I didn’t want to pay to be able to exercise more in the gym.

So I stopped the therapy prematurely and started jogging, which I do ever since. Although reluctantly. At some time I substituted some of the jogging with tai chi, which worked reasonably well. At another time I completely replaced jogging when each day it took me about 1:40 hours to go to my work and back by bicycle.

I also sometimes stopped doing the exercise because I don’t always like to do it and because sometimes other matters seem more important. The problems with my hands will automatically flare up again and so I have to go back to my exercises. I always say that in some wicked way RSI has been a blessing in disguise because it’s my main motivator to keep healthy and fit.

So what finally helped was a combination of exercise and special input devices. I even had a foot pedal, which died about a year ago. The practical use of the foot pedal was limited but worked perfect with some operations by which I had to keep the mouse button pressed for some time. An example of it would be the selection of zoomed in items in Photoshop.

I never got rid of my RSI, but I have it under control for years. And if my problem gets worse, I know I just have to exercise harder. And maybe spend an evening or two less behind the computer.

Soon I’ll give an article about the special hardware I use now to keep mu RSI in check.