If you have pain that you think is due to wrist inflammation, check out the literature and take action to the degree you can.
The problem with this is that checking the literature on page 1 of Google makes the problem much worse for people like me. Every article about ergonomics, RSI etc. should have a caveat: If your thoughts follow this pattern xyz, don’t read the horror stories and fix your thoughts instead.
Here’s another proposal (aka Richard Diagnoses Your Chronic Pain): Get yourself some legit strain from heavy physical work, then compare the sensation with your wrist pain. Is the wrist pain similar? Then it might be purely physical. If not, not.
For example, when I swing a kettlebell and pull it by extending my wrists, my forearm muscles have to generate more force than is good for forearm muscles. They get tight and pull on my elbow joint. Now when I flex my elbow, it hurts. This pain is different from my wrist pain. It’s synchronous with the flexing motion. It comes predictably after swinging the kettlebell with bad form. It goes away predictably when I smash my forearms in order to clear the muscle tightness. The wrist pain in contrast comes and goes seemingly randomly. Sometimes it’s the right wrist, sometimes the left, sometimes both. Sometimes it reaches up my forearms, sometimes down my hand. (I’m writing in the present tense. These days I have occasional mild pain. In 2014 it was much worse.)
Oh, and my left wrist is unhappy, because I sometimes get wrist locked during BJJ sparring. This pain is also different.
The problem with this is that checking the literature on page 1 of Google makes the problem much worse for people like me. Every article about ergonomics, RSI etc. should have a caveat: If your thoughts follow this pattern xyz, don’t read the horror stories and fix your thoughts instead.
Here’s another proposal (aka Richard Diagnoses Your Chronic Pain): Get yourself some legit strain from heavy physical work, then compare the sensation with your wrist pain. Is the wrist pain similar? Then it might be purely physical. If not, not.
For example, when I swing a kettlebell and pull it by extending my wrists, my forearm muscles have to generate more force than is good for forearm muscles. They get tight and pull on my elbow joint. Now when I flex my elbow, it hurts. This pain is different from my wrist pain. It’s synchronous with the flexing motion. It comes predictably after swinging the kettlebell with bad form. It goes away predictably when I smash my forearms in order to clear the muscle tightness. The wrist pain in contrast comes and goes seemingly randomly. Sometimes it’s the right wrist, sometimes the left, sometimes both. Sometimes it reaches up my forearms, sometimes down my hand. (I’m writing in the present tense. These days I have occasional mild pain. In 2014 it was much worse.)
Oh, and my left wrist is unhappy, because I sometimes get wrist locked during BJJ sparring. This pain is also different.