Arthritis

Not every arthritis sufferer has problems getting themselves dressed.

Regardless of how severe your arthritis is, you may need to make some changes in the way you dress, so here are just a couple of hints and tips to make those changes smooth and easy.

Firstly, attempt to analyse which joints are causing you the most difficulty when dressing, especially in the morning, arthritis stiffness can take over an hour to go away after you get out of bed and you don't want to wait that long to get dressed, changing the way you get dressed to work around those particular joints will make sure you won't get thrown off schedule.

Next, decide if an easy adaptation will fix the problem, try sitting on the bed to put on your socks and shoes if your hips and knees are stiff in the morning, furthermore, a problem (for women) is that putting on your bra may be difficult if your shoulders are too stiff for you to reach around behind your back and hook your bra, if so, simply place your bra behind your back, hook it in front, then slide it around to the front and place your arms through the straps.

These are just a couple of examples of simple adaptations you can do at home with the clothing you have.

In the morning, if your arthritis is a little more severe, you may think about buying different types of clothing, if you have a hard time lifting your arms due to shoulder stiffness, buy front closing shirts or blouses.

If in the mornings your fingers suffer from arthritis stiffness, try to avoid clothing with small buttons or hooks.

If bending gives you a hard time then try to wear slip on shoes with Velcro straps and avoid wearing heels, adaptive devices, that have been around for many years, can make dressing much easier, before the Internet, you used to have to purchase these items with the assistance of an occupational therapist who had access to medical suppliers, now anyone can purchase these items directly.

Dozens of devices are easily available that can help just about any problem, adaptive devices and clothing for arthritis is available at able2wear.co.uk

Disabled Clothing

Yet again I have spent the morning searching online for some insight and assistance.

Diagnosed with scoliosis at the age of two. I have been left with a severe curvature of the spine and kyphosis.

My attitude has always been very positive. I have not let the disability keep me from living life to its full potential.

One of the biggest issues I faced growing up, believe it or not was clothing. Being a typical girly girl, I wanted to wear all the garments my friends were wearing.

Instead of the dresses and fitted tops I would wear baggy jumpers twice my size.

My attitude when I was young was to hide my disability behind clothes.

I am not going to lie and say that my attitude and confidence has changed that much now I am an adult.

One thing I have come to realise is that by hiding a disability behind baggy clothes actually makes you stand out more.

It was when I was due to get married for the second time that things began to change for me.

I dreamed of wearing a dress, I wanted to be a lovely feminine bride. I wanted people to see me and not my baggy shirts.

The dress fitters were wonderful. They taught me about my figure and showed me how the baggy clothes were hanging off the bits of my body I hated, I was drawing attention to them.

I got to wear my wedding dress and my mother cried (not seen very often).

Since my wedding I shop differently. I buy clothes that fit my body rather than clothes that hide it.

I have been thinking lots about adaptive clothing for disabled people. I am in search of information and guidance.

I will update this blog often. Hopefully it will offer help to someone.
I will soon be able to provide lots of valuable information. I will look at all types of disabilities and gather as much information as I can.

Life is tough at times, we could do with some little things that make it that bit more manageable.

I will look at types of disabled clothing available on the Internet in my next post.