Arthritis is a condition that needs more than treatment. Certain things from friends, family members or any other person may hurt the individual in one way or the other. You may utter some comments which may not directly intended to hurt, but you must be careful because they may revoke negative feelings or a sense that no one is understanding the kind of pain the individual is going through. The following are some of the comments they you must desist from making in front of an arthritic patient.
I Heard This Product Works To Cure Arthritis
In the current times, there are lots of advertisements doing the round across various forms of media outlets. There are those who are advertising products for arthritis like supplements, juices and many more other products. Because there are lots of people who are paying keen attention to adverts, this people might be accused of deceptive adverts; for instance they might be tempted to advertise that there is no proper cure for arthritis. It is normal that when you are listening to some adverts on your tabloid, magazine or any media outlet that something god will come out of that. But it might be hurting when in high spirits you end up getting totally discouraging words. It would be okay for those who are responsible for adverts to desist from posting misleading and discouraging adverts on media outlets.
If You Changed Your Diet, You Would Feel Better
This is a comment that is wrong on many levels. This would mean that there is always a relationship between arthritis and diet. However, there is no real connection between arthritis and diet. In fact when you utter such comments it may imply that the victim is not educated enough to understand the better ways of eating. By the way it would be better if you used the following phrase: “ have you by any case tried eating some anti-inflammatory foods to see whether you condition can subside?”.
You Look Just Fine
In normal situations, most people like to be told that they look good. However, the same comments might become offending when directed to individuals suffering from rheumatoid arthritis pain. When an individual is under sheer pain, he or she does not seem to appreciate such kind of comments from other people. This is because these comments mean that they are fine when they are actually not fine. These comments are good but they seem to disregard the fact that some symptoms might be invisible but very hurting. Actually, pain is something that is invisible but only visible when associated with organs like the limp or any other abnormality associated with physicality. Conditions like fatigue, malaise are not visible and this shows that much of arthritis is not visible.
You’re too Young to Have Arthritis
This is a comment that is derived from the biggest misconception about arthritis joint pain. According to most people out there, arthritis is a condition that affects only older individuals and that the disease is the preserve of aging people. However, the fact is that this is a condition that can affect people from all age groups. In the United States of America, it is estimated that there are about 300,000 children diagnosed with arthritis. Actually, the comment does not look offending but it might become annoying to children who are suffering from this condition. In order to avoid hurting these individuals, you might use the more appropriate comment which looks like this: “it is quite unfair for a person of your age to be affected by this condition”.
You Take Too Many Medications
Administration of drugs is normally a touchy issue. In normal circumstances, people do not like to take medications but this is something that can be applied to arthritic patients. In fact a majority of arthritic patients would tell you that they can’t work without them taking medications. The types of medication they take are normally prescribed by the doctor. It is very offending for you to discuss anything related to their drugs unless and otherwise you feel that they are abusing drugs. It would be okay for you to leave all the alternative ways of managing the problem to the doctor because he is the one with lots of knowledge about this condition.
