Sharp wrist spasms

Mat48

The other night when I was at the gentle exercise class that I've been attending on and off for a few years - I noticed a sharp pain in my wrists when I was doing a fairly basic stretch holding the bars. Five minutes later we were using hand weights and I chose the lightest - really no heavier than a bottle of water. I suddenly felt the most excruciating pain in the side of my left wrist that went up into my knuckles and was so startled that I dropped the weight - narrowly missing my foot!

The pain was like a spasm and was gone ten minutes later although I could still feel a slight echo in my knuckles and wrist for the next 24 hours. Was this just a one off trapped nerve perhaps or do you think or was it RA waving at me? I had a sore left knee all of yesterday and the toe pad on my right foot is playing up a little but other than this I'm good on the pain front and very used to these marginally strenuous exercises.

dreamdaisy

Oh Mat, how are we supposed to know what caused what and what it might herald? :? We are not doctors and each and every one has symptoms unique to us. Don't forget that you are also ageing. If you are relatively pain-free then why you are risking exacerbating things by doing 'unnatural' movements with weights, especially if you attend these classes on an intermittent basis? No wonder things twanged - I suspect that any form of gentle exercise is better done regularly than every now-and-again. DD

Mat48

Well thanks for your input DD but I'm not actually asking for a medical opinion - just whether others with RA get sudden spasms of pain in this way or whether it was just, as you suggest, a one off because of trying stuff I hadn't done for a while. It was just such a shock I suppose - the sheer force of this spasm - because, although I may only be a fairly irregular attender of this particular class I do exercise every day - yoga and gentle aerobics and dog walking so I'm pretty fit. I did put the weights away hastily but everyone in this class is older than me - the instructor is a friend in her late sixties and the I used far lighter weights than any of them!

dreamdaisy

Ah, I misunderstood and having only PsA I shouldn't have answered I suppose. I apologise. :oops:

The RA-ers that I know don't get spasms as such, as in my case stuff constantly hurts to varying degrees. I have occasional facial spasms in the 'moustache' area but they pass, and my big toes will sometimes spasm so they are nearly at a 90 degree angle to their respective foot but I reckon that is caused by cramp because if I stand on the affected toe with the other foot they ease. DD

Mat48

No worries DD - sorry if I didn't make things clearer to begin with. I wouldn't have thought of RA either but it was right in the ulnar part of wrist where RA was worst for me. It isn't the first time I've had spasms in my wrist but last time it was when I was flaring generally and I think it was nerve compression from inflammation from what I recall the GP telling me. Never mind it was short lived and, as you know, I'm a whole year older than I was last month!