Cold feet

Good evening @cjmasters and welcome to Connect. We are a pretty large group of folks who believe that by sharing our experiences we can learn from each other. How long have you been suffering from neuropathy and those cold feet? I just checked and mine are cold right now. Do you know what is a bit strange? My feet feel like they are freezing tonight. However, if I ask someone to touch them, they will tell me they are not very cold.

Does the cold move up above your ankles? I also have cold hands and both of my peripheral appendages have what I call tingle tangles........and numbness. Like you, I do not like to wear socks to bed or even around the house. I do wear Hoka shoes with socks during the day. They help with stability as well as temperature.

Would you be able to share a bit more about your neuropathy? Have you received a diagnosis? Do you know what caused it in the beginning? What medications or treatments have you found to be helpful?

You might find some very helpful information at both of these neuropathy sites.
https://www.foundationforpn.org/
https://neuropathycommons.org/
May you be free of suffering and the causes of suffering.
Chris

Hi - @artscaping sounds like she could be my sister in cold intolerance and other symptoms, though I believe we have different types of PN. It’s humbling how painful coldness can be. I sometimes have a little heat intolerance in hands and feet as well, but that’s usually due to external heat sources vs my body. But at the beginning of my Idiopathic PN journey, the heat and cold intolerance from just my body was almost unbearable. My only medication in 6 years for it had been Gabapentin. It has helped tremendously to curb 90% of what I had. I still wear socks 23 hrs a day, take lukewarm showers, and have to constantly change car temps to control what heat &air are blowing on my feet and hands, but I’m so happy compared to the low I was in. Gabapentin doesn’t work for everyone, and I know Chris has been dealing with this longer and is full of great advice. She’s made me think more of mindful thinking and exercise, and had me exploring Integrative Medicine (and I found that Acupuncture helped me). I agree it helps to know as much about your diagnosis as possible. You should find some great discussions here, and we have great mentors!

Here’s a fact that people never realized. With your hands and feet the furthest away from the heart, naturally that 98.6 degree blood begins to cool. Your feet are the worst culprit, why you ask? Take your shoes and sock off and stand on the bare flood, no carpeting. Naturally it’s going to feel cool or colder. If you stand still in a cold climate, it doesn’t take long for the bottom of your shoes to get very cold, which in turn makes your feet cold. Why? So as your nice warm blood hits your ice cold feet, the blood is instantly cooled down before getting pumped back up your legs towards the heat making core of your body. Now all of sudden your shivering because your core temperature is dropping as well. A vicious cycle up north here.

As for me, you can swap symptoms with me. Sure I get cold feet but my precancerous cells ate the myelin coating off the pain nerves in both legs, feet, arms and hands. So I feel no pain because the baddies in me ate the myelin for food, killing the nerves. Not only don’t I feel the pain but my brain can’t feel the floor or sidewalks I stand on, so my brain won’t let me walk unless I look down to assure my brain that there is something there. So if I can’t feel pain, how can I feel my feet are cold. Just like taste buds on your tongue call tell the difference between bitter, salt, sweet, etc, that marvelous thing that holds the body together, the skin, also has other sensors like, hot, cold, pressure, etc.

Now that I’ve given you a few medical lessons, how do I keep my feet from being cold, something to warm the feet up, shoes with thicker soles so it takes longer for the cold to reach the feet inside. Stand on something like a thick mat, if your floor is made of concrete, Move, around that is, when you walk, your heart beats faster, pumping that 98.6 degree blood to your feet faster. In bed, well, there are some activities that can heat the body up. Try a small heating pad, under the blankets so that it heats the air. Finally, the military teaches this fact, if you have a bed buddy(not 4 legged) the two warmest spots on the human body are the crotch and the armpits. So if your bed buddy really loves you, they’ll let you put you feet in either place. Warning, no wiggling the toes if they chose the crotch or it might get another activity started to heat you both up. Fact: This is taught in the military to keep the person from getting frostbite and needing to amputate the toes off. @becky1024

I’ve had it for a lot longer than when I said anything to my doctor. Probably been on gabapentin for four years.
Originally 1 100 mg pill per day but now 300 mg once a day. They had changed it to 3 300 mg per day but I started falling from that much. The cold does not run up my ankles. So far just my feet. I have no clue what caused it. I’m not diabetic. I wear shoes that have support in them. My husband says that my feet don’t feel cold to him so I wonder if
it just be that is the sensation that the neuropathy has.

Is Diabetic Neuropathy (what I have) the same as Peripheral Neuropathy? (I have DN in legs and feet)

@nemo1, It's my non medical understanding they both are talking about peripheral nerves. Diabetic Neuropathy being caused by having diabetes and Peripheral Neuropathy is a more generic term that can include diabetic neuropathy along with other causes.

Thank you for the explanation!

I have cold feet also. I don’t have diabetic neuropathy. When I tell the doctors they tell me to wear thick socks. I found some leather boots by UGS and I wear them even though it is summer. I wear UGS bedroom shoes if I don’t care what people think. I use a heating bad when I go to sleep. I just cope with cold feet.

Hi @fala, Thank you for the private message and the kind words. I thought I would respond in this discussion so that you could meet other members with similar symptoms. You mentioned your doctor started you on 30 mg Duloxetine to help with the pain in your feet and you just started taking it. You wanted to know how long it takes before it starts working. I have no experience with the drug but hopefully other members may have something to share. I did find this description on how it works that may answer some of your questions. This article mentions the optimum dose is 60 mg and may be something to discuss with your doctor.

-- Duloxetine In The Treatment of Neuropathic Pain: https://www.londonpainclinic.com/antineuropathic-medication/duloxetine-in-the-treatment-of-neuropathic-pain/

There's also another discussion talking about an over the counter product that some have found helpful that you might want to take a look at -- Vick’s Vapor Rub for Neuropathy Pain: https://connect.mayoclinic.org/discussion/vicks-vapor-rub/

You also mentioned you started rehab for a pinched nerve and used Capzasin on your feet which helped but gets worse as the day goes on. Do you mind sharing a little more about the rehab? Do they have you doing exercises to help with the pinched nerve?

My husband gets cold feet & his big toe area hurts (not gout). He puts Voltaren gel on them & wears socks to bed. Don't know if that would help you at all.