How to Manage Joint Pain and Arthritis Before and During Your Period

The regular-degular conversation around rheumatoid arthritis (RA) usually centers on difficulties walking, dressing, or showering. But what’s less discussed is that this condition also can make it tough to use tampons. In addition to experiencing poor and disrupted sleep, fatigue, and even fevers, people with RA sometimes report inflammation and stiffness in their joints leading up to and during their periods. It can be painful or difficult to insert a tampon when your finger and hand joints are inflamed. That’s an important detail of everyday life we may not hear about from people who experience limited mobility, but we should be talking about! Let’s face it: Today’s traditional applicator tampon wasn’t designed with accessibility in mind, leaving pads and other period products the remaining, less comfy options. But inserting a tampon doesn’t have to hurt your joints!

What if there were another way?

At TINA Healthcare, we want people of all ages, abilities, and body shapes and sizes to have options to manage their periods. We created TINA, the world’s first tampon insertion aid, to alleviate your joint pain by ensuring you don’t need to flex your wrist or grip too hard when you insert a tampon. Let's talk a lil more about why using tampons with RA can be tricky, and how TINA can help.

What is RA?

Rheumatoid arthritis is an autoimmune disease, a condition that occurs when the body's natural defense system can't tell the difference between your own cells and foreign cells, causing the body to mistakenly attack normal cells. It’s not something you develop from “wear and tear” or age. Rheumatoid arthritis can affect nearly any joint in your body, but is especially common in the wrist and fingers. If you have rheumatoid arthritis, you may experience:

• joint pain
• joint stiffness
• swollen, red joints
• loss of joint function
• limited mobility
• fatigue
• weight loss
• fever.

Like many other autoimmune diseases, symptoms can come and go based on flare-ups.

Arthritis Flares During Your Period

Understanding the answers to basic questions like, “um why do my joints hurt on my period?” and “can periods cause joint pain” is crucial to managing your symptoms!

If you have rheumatoid arthritis, you may notice more symptoms, like joint pain on your period. Arthritis can reportedly flare as hormones fluctuate both before and during your menstrual cycle, when estrogen levels are low. That can affect your swelling joints, pain level, and grip strength, making it challenging to use a typical tampon applicator.

Tampons Tough to Insert During RA Flares

To insert a traditional tampon, you need to grip, position, and push the applicator. If you experience rheumatoid arthritis, inflammation in the fingers and hands can make that painful.

Here’s how that sounds for some RA patients in the TINA community:

TINA Makes Tampon Insertion Easy for People with RA

Here's how TINA (Tampon Insertion Aid) offers comfort and accessibility for people with rheumatoid arthritis:

• Goodbye, painful pinching.You need to hold a traditional tampon applicator with a ‘pinch grip’ while you reach down and insert the tampon–this can be difficult when you have significant joint pain! TINA’s ergonomic handle enables you to insert the tampon without wrist flexion (bending).
  
  
• Right angle, right away. With swelling or joint pain that can worsen during your period, inserting a tampon at precisely the right angle and depth can be tough. With TINA, it’s easy because the device is designed to match the exact angle of your vaginal canal and has a smooth insertion mechanism to ensure you always insert the tampon comfortably.
  
  
• Correct depth, every time. If you have limited mobility or joint pain, the “pinch grip” you need to insert a traditional tampon to the correct depth can be difficult or painful. TINA inserts the tampon smoothly. When the “lips” of the TINA device touch the outside of your body, and you continue pushing, the handle slides along the linear track and pushes in the plunger to insert and release the tampon comfortably every time.
  
  
• Extra reach and an easy grip: The tampon insertion aid has a long handle attachment that provides each user with an additional four inches of reach. The handle is easy to grip and more comfortable to hold than a traditional single applicator because you don’t need to bend your wrist and fingers.

Resources and Tips for Joint Pain During Your Period

Here are a few more options to explore if you suffer from RA flares during your period:

• Track your symptoms. When you keep an accurate record of your pain levels, as well as when you experience arthritis flares, it can help you identify possible patterns that you may be able to disrupt and solve.
  
  
• Partner with your rheumatologist. Your doctor can help, too, especially when it comes to finding out whether medication, being active, resting or hot or cold therapy might offer relief from RA flares during your period.
  
  
• Reach out. Ask questions and share how you feel so you have the information you need to make plans to manage your RA flare ups.
  

It’s hard to ask simple questions sometimes, like “why do my bones ache during my period?” or “how do I relieve joint pain during my period.” But the more questions you ask, the better able you are to manage your symptoms and improve your quality of life!

If you have any questions about how rheumatoid arthritis can affect your period, or if you need more information about managing menstrual arthritis, don't hesitate to reach out to your healthcare provider. Understanding why your joints hurt during your period and finding ways to manage joint pain during your period can make a significant difference in your overall well-being.