I don't know about you, but this winter has sure brought home the joint pain issue for me. The cold weather literally makes my bones ache sometimes. And forget about cold and wet, even worse. Lucky for me I live in sunny Florida so I don't have to deal with cold very often and if so, usually not for prolonged periods. In fact, the past week has been one of the coldest I remember in years.

Here are a few tips I have learned to help keep me pain free most of the time:

First and foremost is Keep Moving! I can't stress this enough. The most pain I have is in the morning when I have been inactive all night. Sometimes it is even difficult to get out of bed. But once I'm up and moving things improve very quickly. I do yoga in the morning but I know everybody doesn't have time for that. But some simple stretching would be a good start. Just make sure to warm up your muscles a little bit first to get the connective tissue loosened and lubricated. When you have to sit for extended periods, make sure to change positions often and get up and down…..Keep Moving!

And of course, nobody wants to hear it, but we all need to lose a few pounds. Extra pounds create so much more pressure on your joints. One pound extra of weight creates 4 pounds of pressure on your knees.

Another very important step is to strengthen your core muscles. When your back and ab muscles are stronger it helps your balance and will decrease falls and injuries.

Omega-3 fatty acids can help reduce inflammation and you can get this by eating fatty cold-water type. If you are not a big fan of fish you can also buy supplements containing fish oil. Calcium and Vitamin D will help keep your bones strong and you can get plenty of that from eating green leafy vegetables.

These are a few tips and then, of course, there is always Ice when the pain gets too bad. Twenty minutes on an ice pack will do wonders for the pain. If you don't have an ice pack you can use frozen vegetables too. I have definitely used a bag of frozen peas more than once.

Here's to keeping our joints and bones happy and healthy so we don't have to add joint pain to our everyday life. Stay Healthy and Keep Moving!