Cold Fingers

[neil argonaut]

Thought wintertime would be the best time to ask about this (I've tried searching but only found stuff about the cold affecting the instrument itsself, if I missed a thread apologies);

How do others here deal with the problem of losing playing ability due to fingers getting cold? Maybe for some it's not an issue, but I don't have great circulation in my hands, and as soon as it gets cold, they more or less stop obeying instructions, and I can play about as well as I can left handed, if even that. It makes playing outside not much of a possibility here for most of the year, even sometimes in midsummer, and is normally the first thing that gets me turning the heating on when inside. It can also prove problematic if playing in a pub sometimes if its winter, and means when I come in from the cold, it's a good hour before I can get playing right sometimes.

I make sure I wear gloves whenever I know I'm going to be playing soon, and try and avoid situations where I have to play with cold hands, but wondered if anyone else here was excessively affected by it or had tricks to remedy the situation.

[Jim Garber]

I developed what i am told is a mild version of Raynaud's disease which is a condition affecting mostly my hands which get rather painful, still and discolored in the cold. I try to wear gloves when outside. Also as soon as I come inside I try to run warm water over my hands. It works very nicely since I also have to wash dishes at times. I am not sure that is your problem, but what I have does go away eventually in the warmth of my house, so I generally wait it out.

[Bertram Henze]

There have been threads about that. The general gist is to
1 - not try to strain your hands while they are cold
2 - warm your hands first, dipped in hot water or wrapped around a hot drink

From that follows that the first thing to order in a pub before playing is a nice large Toddy

[Randi Gormley]

I'll sit on my hands before I begin to play; others have suggested running hot water over your hands if you have the ability to do that (say, at a pub). I'd think you can find some of those microwave hand-warmer things you put in gloves when you go skiing to keep your hands warm between going from home to car to gig.

[neil argonaut]

Yes Jim, I've heard people saying mines is a mild version of Raynaud's syndrome, though I can't say in my case I've developed it as I think I've always had it, and if anything it was worse when I was younger.

Thanks folks for the advice, and sorry I didn't find previous similar threads. However, although waiting on hands to warm up before playing is a nuisance, I can put up with it; the main thing I'd like to somehow change is playing while it's still cold, i e outside; I've been thinking more recently about busking, but at the moment this is the main hurdle towards that.

[Jim Garber]

I developed it when I lost 40 lbs of weight. I think it is caused by lack of insulating fat on the core of your body so the circulation goes away from the extremities toward the core. I suppose if y7ou are warmer around your torso that may help some.

[neil argonaut]

Aaaahh, that would make sense, as I've never had much weight / fat, but even more so when I was a kid; maybe the answer is to try and gain some pounds but in the mean time i'll try and keep the rest of me warm - never even thought of that, was too busy thinking about my fingers!