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smilnJackB
Feb-13-2004, 9:33am
My mandolin playing friend wakes in the night with hands asleep and painfully tingling. This seems related to playing mando, especially a lot of picking. Do you good folks have any suggestions to help this?

John Flynn
Feb-13-2004, 9:58am
I have had about every possible hand problem related to playing at one time or another. But the only time I have had tingling is if I have slept on my arm and my hand is asleep. If you are sure that is not the problem and/or both hands are tingling, I would say your friend really should see a doctor. There may be something seriously wrong.

jeffshuniak
Feb-13-2004, 10:24am
thats kinda scarey. #If he has insurance he should go to a doc, make sure he doesnt have some seriousl issue. my dad rides horses, or used to.......
he had the tingling feeling, he casually mentioned it to his doc.
he wound up having surgury on his neck, some very serious problem that had to do with his cervical vertebrae cutting into his spinal chord.

he thinks its from falling off his horse.

GeoMandoAlex
Feb-13-2004, 10:43am
Definitly tell your friend to see a doctor. It happened to my father (he never went to a doctor). Well, it turned out that he lost function to extend the fingers of his left hand (imagine your fingers are bent in at the large knuckle). The only way he can grab something with his left hand is if he actually extends his fingers with his right hand, and then he can grab whatever he would like. Unfortunately, this put him early retirement at the age of 62 (he was a surgeon, so he had many years left until). He finally went to see a doctor (after ~30 years), had surgery on his wrist, elbow, shoulder, and neck. I guess it was too late.

However, like jfly staed, it could berelated to how he sleeps. If the tingling feeling occurs when he sleeps, have him sleep in a different position.

thepipersson
Feb-13-2004, 11:00am
I had the same problem. I went to my chiropractor. He really worked on my neck and shoulder. In addition, I have been massaging my shoulder, upper arm and forearm quite a bit. Problem solved. (Incidentally, the shoulder massage also "cured" a painful inflamation in my ear. Every MD in town had looked at it over the last 10 years and couldn't do anything to help.)
I dont pretend to understand how chiropractic manipulation works, but it has allowed me to continue playing AND to be able to hear it.
Strange, but it worked for me.

Flowerpot
Feb-13-2004, 11:55am
I had a similar thing happen; after playing a lot, my left hand would fall asleep or have painful cramps while sleeping. My solution was two-fold; first, I did kept the fingers miving for a while after playing to keep the circulation going. But more importantly, I started sleeping with my wrist propped up on a small pillow to keep the wrist straight. I always sleep with two wrist pillows (actually, I must confess I use two stuffed kitty cats, which are the exact height and shape I need -- don't you dare laugh at me!) which keep my hands from drooping down and cutting off the circulation. Have your friend examine the position of their wrist while resting, and see if it's straight or not. It made a huge difference for me.

Now stop laughing about my stuffed kitty cats -- my wife got them for me for the sake of my tingling fingers, that's all -- there's nothing wrong with a grown man sleeping with stuffed animals, if it helps his mandolin playing... I still hear you laughing!

Harrmob
Feb-13-2004, 2:56pm
That sounds like Carpal Tunnel to me, exactly. I have battled carpal tunnel for a while. It comes and goes. I got a splint to sleep in to help my hand from falling asleep. The splint works with the falling asleep a night problem. Vioxx also works, its an anti-imflamatory. My left hand used to painfully go asleep if I entered a jam and played for 20 min straight without stopping. Now, on my way to any jam or band practice, I stretch my left hand out for about 3-5 minutes. Get it loosened up before you give a work out, stretch, fist, stretch, fist. It definitely sounds like carpal tunnel and there are various things that can be done. Drink plenty of water, take glucasomine, splints, pills, surgery, etc......there used to be several good threads on carpal tunnel on the cafe somewhere.

diego0
Feb-13-2004, 8:00pm
This used to happen to me every night but I've just grown out of it. Ibuprofen helps when I'm going to put in a lotof practise time. Someone recently posted about this offering a kind of stretching exercise that stretches a particular tendon and helps avoid inflammation pressing on nerves. Sorry I don't know exectly when. Rgds Jim

SandyBarRanch
Feb-13-2004, 11:39pm
I've had problems with tingling arms and even waking in the middle of the night to no sensation in my fingers. #My problems flair when I work too much on the computer, and also stems from using an old, heavy weedhacker many years ago with a very pooor sling harness rather than a chest harness. #Someone posted some very good info on this site a few months back - he had similar problems and saw a physical therapist. #I went and did the same thing and highly recommend it - look for one that works with musicians or specialized in hand-arm-shoulders. #Diagnosis is important, you want to know whether you're dealing with tendonitis or nerve damage. #I can't stress enough the importance of stretching and doing exersizes to tone muscle in the right areas. #There's a decent website that posts some stretches for musicians: #http://www.musicianshealth.com/stretches.htm #Tell your friend not to despair, it's scary to lose feeling in your arms, but it's very feasible to deal with through excersize, stretching and even diet (B vitamins for nerve damage, glucosamine for tendonitis), but ya gotta get agood diagnosis first.

J. Mark Lane
Feb-14-2004, 11:13am
Hey Flowerpot,

Haaaa haaa haaaa haaaaa haaa ha ha ha ha ha haaaa ha ha!!!!

Ahhhh haa haa haa haa haa haa haa.

Hey little kitty cat. Meow meow meow. Ha ha ha ha ha.!!!

Mark

smilnJackB
Feb-15-2004, 9:50am
Thanks for the advice. She is going to try some finger, hand and wrist stretches and ibuprofen. I may try the stretches myself. Smiling Jack http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/rock.gif http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/rock.gif http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/rock.gif

Flowerpot
Feb-15-2004, 3:36pm
Meow, meow, meow. I guess I had that coming!

Did I mention that a vintage Tortoiseshell cat works best?

TonyP.
Feb-16-2004, 12:18am
My hat's off to you Flowerpot! I don't go to such an extreme but I make myself conscious of my hands before I drop off to sleep. My hands would go to sleep too when I played but I started noticing it was AFTER I'd had slept on my hands the night before. I could get rid of it if I made sure that I didn't sleep on 'em. The banjo player in the band I was in at the time was having the same thing and I told him what I was doing and it worked for him too. I have also graduated from glucosamine/chondroitan to hyaluronic acid which is the complete molecule that gluco/chondro is part of. Also msm does wonders for that too, just make sure you take vitamin C with it.