A mother was left with permanent nerve damage from wearing a hair bobble on her wrist - and she is now warning others against the seemingly harmless habit.
Lisa McLennan, 47, from British Columbia, Canada, was diagnosed with carpal tunnel syndrome earlier this year - a condition caused by the compression of a nerve travelling through the wrist.
The mother-of-four has worn a hair tie around her wrist for everyday for the past 30 years, but did not know the common practise could damage her nerves forever, causing excruciating pain and numbness in her wrist.
She is now speaking out on the dangers of tying hair bobbles around the wrist in hopes to raise awareness around the dangerous habit.
Lisa said: "It was just a habit, it was always on my wrist whenever it wasn’t in my hair.
“I’m so aware now that I shouldn't be doing it but I’ll be cleaning the house, find an elastic and put it on my wrist, then I think oh no what am I doing. I have taken to using a hair claw instead, so I don’t put the elastic on my wrist."
At first Lisa though her condition was caused by arthritis, but she spoke to her local shopkeeper Helen Nahachewski, who told her the bad habit was likely to have caused her nerve damage.
Lisa said: “I injured the tendon in my thumb and they checked me for carpal tunnel syndrome.
“I was in shop a few days later telling the woman who worked there how my left wrist was more severe than my right and she pointed to my elastic and said ‘stop doing that then’.
“I was like ‘pardon me’ and she explained that a neurologist had told her not to do it because it can cause issues.”
Lisa said she is left in excruciating pain most days, and now has circulation issues, numbness, inflammation and damage to the nerve in her hand.
She added: "The pain goes away because there is so much damage done to my nerves. I’m overweight now but I wasn’t when I was younger, I was quite skinny so the elastic fitted more loosely.
“Don’t do it, just don’t whether it causes issues right now or not, it’s an easy fix, an easy, pro active way to save yourself pain later.”
