How to Live With Scleroderma

Since scleroderma is a disease that cannot be cured, it must be managed. Fortunately, there are some tips that can help sufferers learn how to live with scleroderma in greater ease and with more control than they might otherwise feel. Read on to learn how to live with scleroderma.

Instructions

Difficulty: Challenging

Things You’ll Need:

• Exercise clothes
• Plastic floating aids

Get Moving

1. Know that exercise and physical activity is an important way to keep the body strong and the skin supple when one suffers from scleroderma. Although the last thing you may want to do when you have swollen joints and irritated skin is to move about, exercise can actually help keep symptoms at a more manageable level.
2. Walk and, if you can, garden. These activities are excellent, low-impact ways to get the blood and lymph circulating in the body.
3. Make an exercise plan and stick with it, even if your fatigue makes you want to skip a day. Exercise can alleviate the fatigue often associated with scleroderma.

Continue With Your Sex Life

4. Buy vaginal lubricants from the drugstore to combat the tissue dryness that often accompanies a diagnosis of scleroderma.
5. Experiment with new positions, including ones that take some of the pressure off of any painful or swollen joints.
6. Know that, with some modifications, you can continue to live in a fulfilling way--even with scleroderma. Attitude and a willingness to try new things is often the most important factor in knowing how to live to the fullest, regardless of circumstances.

Discuss Depression

7. Talk to your doctor about any depression or anxiety you may be feeling. Almost any illness can be accompanied by elevated stress levels, but the uncertainty of scleroderma can take this to unbearable levels. He or she may have a prescription or advice that can help.
8. Float. Studies show that scleroderma sufferers who can float--using plastic floating aids--can experience help with depression, better sleep and some relief from joint pain. If you have a local pool and some floating devices, you can even do some slow, moderate exercise in the water without impact.
9. Bring a loved one with you to the local pool and float together.

Tips & Warnings

• Living with scleroderma is all about modification. Rather than giving in to frustration because you can't move in exactly the same ways, consider how you can move and function and make all the adjustments you need.
• Keep your doctor in the loop whenever you try something new, such as taking up a new exercise program.