Are you experiencing cold hands while gaming?
Cold hands are a common issue for gamers, and they can result in poor performance and a negative gaming experience. Cold hands can impair your performance by slowing your reaction time and making you feel less accurate.
In this post, you will learn the most common reason why gamers experience cold hands and find useful tips on how to keep them warm. Additionally, we’ve included a powerful exercise that can help your hands adapt to the cold and likely reduce the symptoms.
Why do hands get cold?
The temperature in your hands can often be a good indicator of how you’re feeling. For example, if you are nervous or stressed about performance, your hands may tense up and get cold. When you feel nervous or stressed, your body activates a fight or flight response. The sympathetic nervous system is responsible and causes the blood vessels in your fingers to narrow. This causes blood to flow away from your fingers and into the core of your body.
Some medical conditions can also cause cold hands. The most common is Raynaud’s disease. Raynaud’s disease is usually triggered by cold temperatures, anxiety, or stress and is often caused by abnormal sensitivity of the blood vessels in the fingers to cold temperatures. Symptoms of Raynaud’s disease include coldness, numbness, tingling, pain, and skin color changes. If you experience these symptoms, you should consider talking to your doctor.
Useful tips to get rid of cold hands while gaming
Generally speaking, when your body is relaxed, your hands and fingers are likely to be warm, unless you are outside in the cold. One effective way to calm your body is to practice slow breathing. This sends signals from the brain to the body that everything is okay, which can help to reduce stress and provide warm to your hands. If your stress levels are too high, it may take some time to see the full effects of slow breathing.
“To achieve the fullest benefits of slow breathing you should inhale deeply through the nose and exhale while counting to four or more.”
What you can do before gaming
Here are some tips to consider before you start playing to help prevent cold hands while gaming.
Warm up your body
One way to get warm hands is to warm up your body. This can help to get your blood pumping, which generates heat. Try doing some squats, push-ups, or other exercises that raise your heart rate for 2-5 minutes. This should be enough to make you feel warmer.
Do hand exercises
Hand exercises are another great way to warm up your cold hands. These exercises increase blood flow to your fingers, providing heat. Some common hand exercises for cold hands include:
– Rub your palms together quickly for at least 30 seconds.
– Clench your fist by squeezing your hand together, then release and spread your fingers wide. Repeat 5-10 times.
Establish a comfortable room temperature
A cold environment can trigger the body to use unnecessary energy to heat itself. This energy comes from the center of the body, which causes warm blood to flow away from your fingers. To avoid this, make sure that the room you are sitting in is heated to a comfortable temperature. In addition, you can add more clothes to help keep you warm.
Limit your caffeine intake
Consuming a high amount of caffeine can cause stress hormones like cortisol to rise to levels where you may start feeling nervous and uncomfortable. As we mentioned earlier, nervousness or stress is the most common reason why gamers experience cold hands during gaming.
What you can do while gaming
Here are some tips you can consider using to help your hands stay warm during your gaming session.
Use fingerless gloves and arm sleeves
The gloves and arm sleeves keep the skin covered to protect against the cold while allowing the hands and fingers to touch and grip freely. More specifically, the arm sleeves are designed to increase blood flow by adding compression around the arm, which generates heat.
Use an electric hand warmer
Electronic hand warmers are a great way to use technology to warm up cold hands. There are many different types of devices available, and you can easily find one that is both useful and affordable. If you’re looking for a more cost-effective option, reusable hand warmers are also available and can be a good alternative to electric ones.
Provide heat from your body to your hands
One way to make use of the heat your body generates is to fold your hands and breathe warm air into them. This helps to transfer heat from your body to your hands and keep them warm. Sitting on your hands can also help to utilize the heat between your body and the chair. Additionally, placing your hands on the skin of your body can help to transfer heat from your body to your hands.
Prevent colds hands with this exercise
If you often experience cold hands while gaming, there is an exercise that may help. This hand-in-ice-water exercise is designed to help your hands adapt to the cold, which can reduce your symptoms.
Instructions
Fill a bowl with ice water and submerge your hands in it for a few minutes. This may be uncomfortable at first, but it can help your hands become more resistant to the cold. If you do this exercise daily you will quickly see some positive results. Over time, you may find that your hands stay warm and comfortable during your gaming sessions, even in cold environments.
