Living Well With Arthritis This Winter

Arthritis affects over 10 million people in the UK alone. It causes stiffness, pain and fatigue which can affect people all through the year. Throughout the autumn and winter months though when the weather is chilly and wet, managing the symptoms can be a bit more tricky.

While cold weather doesn’t cause arthritis, it can exacerbate related stiffness and pain. Our friends over at Arthritis Action have created a helpful guide to keeping well in winter when living with arthritis.

You can read the full guide here.

However here are a few tips to help you get started:

Layer up and stay warm

Keep your aching joints warm is essential to reducing pain. The best way to do this is by layering up. Layering, instead of one relying on thick, chunky knits, traps hot air in between each piece, providing greater warmth and the ability to keep your body heat contained. You can also remove layers if you’re feeling too warm without having to worry about switching from too hot to too cold.

Hands and feet are just as important. You can layer up your socks in the same way, and choose a warm pair of thick socks with slippers while at home. Obviously you don’t want to impact your ability to use your hands while at home, so consider picking up a wheat warmer which can easily be heated at home and used as a hand warmer when needed.

Stay active and exercise

It’s important to keep your joints mobile and use your muscles to keep them strong to support and protect your joints. Movement also helps with pain and improving stiffness that can come with staying immobile. Staying active doesn’t mean stepping outside if you’re finding the cold difficult, you can do some indoor exercises and Arthritis Action have some recommended chair-based exercises to help with movement.

Make sure you eat well

Enjoying regular hot drinks and meals, are a great way of keeping warm. Arthritis Action UK have some great winter warmer recipes which are healthy and put together with methods that are less fiddly and time-consuming.

How can The Able Label help?

Our range of stylish, discreetly adapted clothes mean the amount of effort needed to get dressed independently is minimised. We also ensure that our collections for autumn and winter are clothes that are perfect for layering, meaning you’ll have plenty of choice for winter layers.

On top of our adapted styles on offer, for those that have been diagnosed with arthritis, you could be eligible to shop VAT except across our adapted range.

Find out more about this on our VAT Exemption page >>>

We have a wide range of items adapted for women and men with easy VELCRO® Brand Fastening / Fasteners for simplified touch close fastening, helping to avoid tricky buttons and zips.

Scroll past the comments to shop our arthritis collections for men and women.