Barn Hands

A horse buddy of mine asked the question on Facebook the other day, “What do you do about barn hands?” She wasn’t referring to people you hire to help out around a stable, but rather the calloused and dried out things on the ends of your arms. All of the horse people chimed in with their remedies for this problem, and it was easy to see that if you have horses in your life, your hands will tell the story. Mine are cracked, calloused, dry, and sometimes even dirty….it just comes with the territory of being around horses.

This time of year is the worst, I think, for hands. It seems like the cold temperatures target your hands first. I hate when I’m folding laundry or putting on socks and my hands are so scratchy the fabric just sticks to them like they’re velcro or something! That’s how bad my hands are. I often use a pumice stone that’s meant for feet, and after a good soaking I scratch off all of the dead skin that I can. But they still are dry.

So I thought I would share some of the ideas to help dry hands here, since we’re all horse enthusiasts. I personally have used a hand lotion called Dermal Therapy, as it was included in a gift pack from Bayer that my husband won in a golf tournament (yes, Cowboy Dad is excellent at golf!). I tend to use whatever lotion I was given for Christmas last year, and not worry about it too much. But the Dermal Therapy stuff was awesome, and I could really tell a difference in how my hands felt. I looked at their website and see that they even have a product called Finger Therapy with active ingredients of urea and alpha hydroxy. Urea causes skin cells deep below the surface to attract, absorb and hold moisture better, and the alpha hydroxy acids help displace old dry skin and reveal new skin which is more elastic.

Some of my friends suggestions sounded good, too. They listed Bert’s Bees Hand Salve, Vaseline Intensive Care, Lubraderm, Aquaphor, and Gold Bond (the green bottle), which I googled to find its exact name: Triple Action Gold Bond Medicated Moisturizing Body Lotion. Some of the more practical suggestions included slathering hands with warm olive oil, wrapping them in plastic wrap, put on gloves, sleep overnight, and rinse in the morning. Another commented that she was using Bag Balm on her hands, and I have used that before with some success, but it kind of smells funny. Avon sells some really neat gloves that you can wear overnight to keep the lotion on your hands, and I think those would really help to heal some really dry skin.

I think your hands say so much about you as a person, and have always admired hands that were strong and showed a lot of use. My dad’s hands are rough, with huge knuckles resulting from his arthritis, and they were formed to a curved shape from holding a steering wheel for so many years. He started taking an herbal supplement called Barley Green and got a lot of the movement back, allowing him to open them further. But they still are very worn, testifying to the amount of work he has done.

My grandma was a songwriter, and I remember so many of her lyrics were written about life on the range. One of her songs, titled “Honest Hands”, was written as a prayer, and I don’t remember anything but the last few lines that went, “Please help me, I pray, and don’t take away the use of these old honest hands.” I have often said that I would rather lose my eyesight than the use of my hands. I remember my great grandmother was blind in the last stages of her life, but she could still play the piano and sing. I hope to have the same quality of use on my hands as my grandmothers did.

I know that a good pair of gloves would go a long way towards preventing further damage to my hands, and I do try to wear gloves when I do barn chores and it’s cold out. But it’s just the daily stress of life that gets to them, and I guess I don’t mind so much that my hands are rough or unsightly. If I had to pick between having beautiful hands or having happy horses, I’d choose the horses every time.

If you’ve got a horse person on your Christmas list this year, how about buying them a gift certificate for a manicure? Or a lotion set from Bath & Body Works? I’m hoping Santa brings me something of the sort this year, or I’ll be sporting these sandpaper-style phalanges for the rest of the winter.

Tagged as: country lifestyle, gifts for horse enthusiasts, horse advice, riding horses