We’d like to hear from fellow Frosties on your experiences with COVID and Raynaud’s. These are challenging times for everyone, but we thought it would be good to share stories from people living with Raynaud’s about what’s become more difficult day-to-day, plus maybe hear if there’s anything positive that’s come from how life has changed for us.
I’ll start by sharing my own experience today. It was the first time I’ve gone grocery shopping in near freezing weather (windchills in the 30’s). Up until now, I’ve just donned rubber gloves to go into the store, but what do you do when you’re already wearing thick gloves or mittens? I tried putting the rubber gloves over my wool gloves while still in the car, but they didn’t comfortably fit (fingers didn’t come all the way down). So I left the good gloves in the car and put my hands wrapped in the rubber gloves in my pockets, which worked fine.
But leaving the store was another story – I needed my hands on the basket, so no warm pockets for protection. Once I was ready to disrobe from the rubber gloves before entering the car, that was another challenge. I generally take them off (turning them inside out) before touching the car handle, toss them in a bag in the back seat and use hand sanitizer before entering the car. But today I had to stand outside in the cold for that! OK, I could have worn the good gloves to the store and changed later, but there’s still an issue on the backend unless I sanitize before leaving the store to put on my good gloves, but then they’ll be touching the basket going to the car, ugh!
I know the above situation sounds kind of silly to most people, but I’m hoping fellow Frosties will understand the challenge and frustration.
Difficulties aside, there may be some positive things we’ve experienced during COVID times: For example, at least I wasn’t the only person in the frozen food department today wearing gloves! Some of us might find wearing a mask in cold weather adds another layer of warmth. And no more frigid cold handshakes to apologize for.
We know these are serious times, and we’re not trying to make light of the pain, suffering and grief we’ve all experienced. Losing or being separated from loved ones is sad beyond belief. And the fear of infection brings on stress that can trigger more frequent and severe attacks for those of us with Raynaud’s. But sharing our stories might allow us to help each other cope with difficult issues we used to take for granted. And finding a few positive things only Frosties can understand may make us chuckle a little, and we can all use a feel-good moment.
So please share your stories with us. Comment on this post below, send them by email to info@raynauds.org, or post them on one of our social media pages: raynaudsorg on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest.
For more information we’ve published related to COVID and Raynaud’s here are our previous posts:
