I'm not diabetitic and have the cold feet. Actually before I had my inner ankle/foot pain I was always saying how cold my feet were. I have never got an answer but thought was circulation. I have feet warmers that last 8 hours. You put them on the bottom of your socks. They really do help but still its an uneasy feeling.

Hello there,
I just joined, and this is my first post (I will post later in the new member intro area). I recently tried a new product for my cold feet/circulation and wanted to share -- it's a relatively inexpensive foot cream, Healthi-Betic Transdermal L-Arginine Foot Cream. As per the label, it's made especially for diabetics -- but it works very well for me and I am definitely not diabetic. Actually, my family has an hereditary Ataxia (an unknown type of Spinocerebellar Ataxia), and the cold feet/neuropathy is unfortunately one of our unique symptoms. FYI - I order the foot cream on-line and 1 tube seems to last for approximately a month (when applied once daily). My cold feet act up mostly at bedtime, and so I apply and massage then.

You know, it's just my opinion but I think all the hype about all these "Cremas" that DO these different things is Just a load of garbage. I think it's JUST the fact that you are RUBBING is what is helping.

I rub my feet with moisturizing cream everyday and when they get cold I put on 3 pairs of socks. When I lay down with cold feet I have heating pad Under them and a space heater blowing on them and it USUALLY KNOCKS ME OUT. Right off to sleepyland I go. Warming my feet also helps with back pain and stomach aches, for me anyway.

Just think of all the abuse we give our Poor feet. When you are KIND to them they reward you. I remember a cream when I was growing up called "Happy Feet". I wonder if they still make it.

I have had cold feet my entire life, with the exception of when I was at the altar.......either I was swept off my feet and didn't feel them...or the man I married warmed my feet....heartwarming, hey?

Seriously, I have very achey feet, and very cold feet, to the point I am about to invent a heated shoe. That said, I do occassionally get burning feet...and burning fingers, and burning around the ribs....mostly, I get numb legs from the hip down, especially from the knee down, numb enough that I can not walk on them. I also get numb useless hands some days (not carpal tunnel---been tested for that more times than I care to remember.)

OH Color---Welcome!!
You may be very helpful on the genetic testing thread---don't mind me, it is a thread I started, that fizzled and then somehow, via embryonic transplantation, got some life on a different thread---and is over due for delivery---so a new thread is born, and it involves hereditary conditions--check 'genetic testing' thread on this PN forum. You are the perfect person to contribute your knowledge to get that thread up and running....again, please, bear with my humor. (I am only funny on days when I have slept well the night before....and I slept like a log last night).

Hi new member,any way i use that as well after trying so many things.
i'm a Diabetic 2,my derm Dr. gave me a great cream,but when i ran out
it cost close to 3 hundred dollars,and insurance wouldn't pay,oh well.
Anyway please any of the diabetic's please be careful for the warm heated
slippers,I saw so may bad burns in er,and yes did it myself..I think the
cream is fine for us,but others give your Dr. a call or your Druggist. The
Druggist can get through to your Dr. usually before you can..Glad you
brough this up,we are having ice strom my feet are not burning are
cold..Last week it was 70 my feet were cold and burnt..

I found anything down slippers are light and i perfect anything down
on me works...My Mom who had neurorapathy in her 80's could never
feel her ice cold feet but we could, it's strange isn't it.. Hugs to all Sue

Sue

You are right on the heating and burning thingies. I once decided to smear myself with capsacian....felt nothing for a day and a half.....well, then it kicked in and I felt I was in an oven at 450 or broil for 48 hours! I don't like capsaicin...it feels just like my burning PN....foo on that. (Also never, ever put it next to your k-y gel.)

And yes, PNers, spinal cord injuries etc, do burn without notice.

I need something to keep my feet warm in 2 feet of snow....at home I use 2 pairs of gigantic socks...and a heating pad over that...but I don't sit still long enough to burn myself, plus my heating pad turns off automatically...that is a great idea...a pain because I will get cold, but great safety device.

If my feet get cold and I am NOT noticing it and all of a sudden I DO. I run some warm water in the tub then sit on the side and warm my feet SLOWLY in the warm water adding hotter at a trickle THEN dry my feet thoroughly and put a couple or three pairs of socks on that have been warmed on the radiator or in front of a space heater. I really believe that allowing your feet to remain cold for long periods of time damages the tissue and structures in your feet. I also believe that MOST of this Cold Feet Business is because we have smaller viens in our bodies. I had a skinny friend once in her 50's who had HUGE veins. We actually compared them and her's were almost double the size of mine PLUS she had Huge feet and they were Always warm. I have tiny veins, tiny feet and they are always cold so I think it has a lot to do with the size of your veins. The doctors want to make you believe you have some kind of Disease so they can sell you more drugs when it's actually just a structural anomalie. I know I've been this way my ENTIRE life, even as a young child my feet were always cold.

I think it's just better to warm your feet naturely with massage and heat. A nice moisturing CREAM, something THICK is really needed on your feet, like Cocoa Butter, which I have mentioned before, works really well and it's inexpensive. A HUGE jar at Walgreens is like $3. and it will last you a long time, mine usually 6 months if I use it daily.

I am in my 50's and had normal to huge veins until the PN hit....I can go from a normal sized vein to a teeny tiny vein in seconds....some vasospastic phenomenon. A nurse will tell me my veins are great and by the time she comes back with her IV tray....they have shrunk to thread size, the nurse is pale, and I get stuck 5 times and then anesthesia is called to put in the IV....(even if I hydrate). My thesis is all that blood pools in my butt or something.

Cold feet can be good---like for you in the dating scene, when your unemployed boyfriend wants to move in with you, OR for you parents, when your not so responsible son wants to borrow YOUR cell phone because his fell in the toilet. (yeah right) OR when you think about turning the cars keys over. Or when an in-law is planning to use the guest room-indefintely.

I tell my kids, listen to your cold feet.

People with sensory neuropathy have messed up signals from the feet to the brain...or from other parts of the body to the brain...the brain usually works, altho some days, it may seem we are not so smart.

Some days those signals say hot, burning, ouch!! Other days they say, cold, achey, groan.

I shivered thru my biopsy...the doc asked me if I was cold...'nope' nervous, 'nope' I said 'you just gave me a shot of epi and have autonomic neuropathy....voila---I shiver...no rhyme or reason...but I will hang my hat on the epi.'

I have this thing, cute winter socks and hats, and yes, I wear them indoors. A stylish little gnome!

The unrelenting cold on my feet and now in my hands is the most difficult type of pain I have - I've found nothing gives me relief, meds, toe warmers, extra socks, mattress covers w/ built in heating pads, warm epsom salt soaks, etc etc. It's reached a point now where I can turn a heating pad on high but I feel no warmth on my feet yet I still have feeling in my feet so that's a good thing.
Only solution offered was mega doses of mexelitine, a class I antiarrythmic that the chief neuro of a diabetes program told me was successful w/a few of his patients who suffered from cold pain. My cardiologist and I opted out for other reasons.

Alkymst

Hi, just wanted to share what I found out about cold hands and feet.

In the stores around here, they sell this item called HOTHANDS hand warmers.

You open up the pack and you put it inside your gloves and it makes them nice and toasty for 10 hours. Here's what the package looks like (I haven't opened it up yet): It does say on the back, to be careful if you can't feel hot things. So I wouldn't put this directly on the skin, but on top of the socks?? well, why not??



So my thinking is: "if you can put them in your gloves, why not just slip them on top of your socks, put on a loose pair of shoes, (or even in the house, put them inside your slippers)??? Around here, they cost 50 cents a pack, and each pack containes two separate hand warmers. I can't wait to try them out.

Worth a try, right??

Melody