Ergonomic hooks and ergocise

I bought the Boye egg-shaped, ergonomic crochet hook handle  last year in Florida. Walmart is a massive supermarket and I went because I'd read on ravelry that you can get yarn , hooks and craft stuff whilst buying your weekly shop .How very civilised, don't you agree??. I would love London to have yarn in Sainsbury's , what fun shopping would be. The handle only cost $3.00 at the time .I bought it because I simply have to have all crochet paraphernalia. I never thought about it again until last week.

 Im finding my baby finger is cramping from wrapping around the  hooks, and my wrist gets stiff & sore after a small period, but much worse, I've developed a tightening and inflammation of the tendon in my thumb and index finger, I now have a constant ache in the thumb and heel of my hand, and I can no longer straighten my thumb or apply any real pressure without severe pain. I can't write for longer than a signature, open jars, lift plates, use a needle & thread or use my traditional crochet hook
 The Boye kit includes a hook handle of  rubber or plastic, which can twist off to open, as well as 8 “washers” to fit various sizes of crochet hooks. I have a set of boye crochet hooks. I will see what happens if you use a different brand of hook.

To use you attach plastic washers to each crochet hook.  The washers are a bit tough to get on .  The washers are colour coded so you have to examine the little colour chart to figure out which washer goes onto what size hook. My  recommendation is BE VERY CAREFUL when opening the package and SAVE THE BACK COLOR CODE CHART for the washers (they are not marked on the washers themselves just on the colour code on the back of the package. It means if you get rid of it you have no guide for which washers goes on what hook. I had to cellotape mine back together and put it in an old tin with the washers that aren't being used.

 After the washer is on the hook, you twist the hook handle open, insert the hook, and then twist the handle to close.  It takes some practice to position the washer properly a lot of fiddling.  A downside to this system was that once I put the washers on to my existing hook it is quite hard to remove them.  They were really tough to get off around the point of the hook. I get my crochet elves to help.

The handle has not improved my thumb problem, but I think it might allow me to continue crocheting admittedly it is very slow. It takes some getting used too but for the sake of my sanity and my hand I will persevere and let you know how it works out .I checked with my best friend who is my physiotherapist  she thinks that it might be a good  crochet solution .

My new handle is playing with some delightful yarn .The lavender is Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino a buttery soft cashmere with merino wool. Such  joy to work with. The vintage blue and grey is Drops Alpaca, oh my I love this stuff .This yarn rocks it is very cheap and such good quality.I urge you to try it.  The green yarn is from Fyberspates  called Scrumptious 4 Ply ,a beautiful silk and merino wool .
Hope you have a lovely day.