Ways to Prevent and Heal Chafing When It’s Hot in Louisiana

I saw a meme on Facebook over the weekend that spoke of a topic that many people may experience, but don't want to talk about.....chafing. 

We decided since so many people have this issue and don't want to mention it, which we understand, the least we could do is give some information about it. Most importantly, we want to give you some tips to deal with it.

Chafing on your body parts can be annoying, then painful to downright dangerous if you scratch the area and it gets infected. The excessive heat only seems to exacerbate the problem whether you are a woman or a man.

What Is Chafing?

According to Mount Sinai Hospital, it's easy to give you a definition. It happens when skin rubs against other skin. So, this can happen in any area of your body. Between your thighs is one place it happens often with people, but other places can have the same experience. Adding a barrier like clothing can help, they say.

In addition to skin-on-skin chafing, the Cleveland Clinic says chafing can be a problem between your skin and some clothing. They point out it can happen at places on your body that are warm and moist.

What Are Some Things That Can Help Prevent Chafing?

Compression Shorts

Womensrunning.com says one of the biggest pieces of advice they can give is to wear compression shorts. They say if you don't have compression clothing you can try snug clothing instead. In general, you need a barrier between your skin. Obviously, you want to be very careful with snug clothing as that can be uncomfortable in the heat.

Things You Can Rub on The Impacted Area

According to the Cleveland Clinic, you can experience chafing in a variety of areas including the following:

• Armpits
• Breasts
• Butt
• Groin
• Nipples
• Thighs

When you experience chafing they suggest you stop doing whatever caused it. That can be difficult if it happens in any area where you can't stop it like in between your thighs. What they suggest is using clean and dry the area. The next step is to put on some aloe vera and follow it up with petroleum jelly. If it gets worse, consult your doctor.

You can also put petroleum jelly on any spots that are sensitive to chafing. It helps to maintain that barrier so that hopefully chafing won't happen again.

Moisture-Wicking Clothing

According to webmd.com choosing moisture-wicking clothing can help in the battle against chafing. They even suggest that if you are a lady, exercise with just your sports bra on. For men, just exercise without your shirt on.

Anit-Blister and Chafing Creams

You can look at your local store or you can go online to actually buy products that help to prevent blisters and chafing issues. There are a ton of choices on Amazon for anti-chafing and relief after the chafing products that come in stick form.

Finally, if you are a runner, someone who exercises a lot, or you deal with this problem constantly, you can email us your remedies and the things that help you by sending it to bernie.lee@townsquaremedia.com.