Ask HN: Have you had RSI?
If so, how did you deal with it?
What do you do to prevent it from coming back?
When the pain was worse, I had a velcro wrist brace with a metal support, this helped as it limited movement. Ultimately, the solution to your problem is to simply reduce the amount of repetition if at all possible. Back in my most problematic years, I was a web developer who spent 9-5 coding and would return home every night to clock up 4-5 hours gaming.
Stretching movements do not help either, ie a lot of use from Shift + Control keys is bad - learn how to touch type properly using the action key on the opposite side of the keyboard to perform these operations.
Gaming is very bad. I would love playing FPS games and MMORPG's. FPS games force your finger movements to be very precise which is very straining. MMORPG's are notoriously bad for repetition. Give these up if you are suffering that badly, trust me, its not worth it.
Other things that might help? Well I personally have spent a lot of money finding the most comfortable keyboard + mouse setup. Don't buy based on what looks cool or gets the best reviews, get what is comfortable for you. For me, it is a small bluetooth apple keyboard (low travel laptop keys that have a light touch are MUCH less straining) and a Logitech MX anywhere mouse. Yes its a mobile mouse with no tail, this fits me much better and allows me to use a single battery which also makes it lighter to move about.
Good luck, and take a break!
We had an interesting discussion around the theory and the math behind the Dvorak construction of the layout. The gist of it is that there are some natural and unnatural hand movements made while typing. The standard keyboard was constructed to statistically minimize typing letters that would cause the typewriter arms from getting tangled, from overlapping / locking. The Dvorak keyboard was optimized to place the most commonly typed letters in places that your hand could comfortably get to (reducing the frequency of stressful motions on the hand). However, the scientific evidence wasn't conclusive.
Good luck.
Static stretching, as well as use reduction worked to get rid of the pain. For me I think it was mostly mouse movements with my wrist and not my arm, so getting a trackball mouse to periodically switch with besides enforcing good habits helped.
Now I take breaks while on the computer or playing video games. Work takes their part and enables this arguably annoying program: http://www.workpace.com/
It always pops up at the most inopportune times, but something simple like this should help you reduce use.
* Started taking large doses of B12 and B6 * Switched to Dvorak layouts on all my computer keyboards * Got a good buckling-spring keyboard * Gave up ballpoints, gel pens, etc. in favor of fountain pens * Gave up writing looped cursive (the way almost all American children are taught to write in school), learning to instead use Getty-Dubay Cursive Italic hand
Now I'm 30, and have no problems with carpal tunnel despite never having had surgery.
You don't need to do a ton, just some regularly. The http://www.hundredpushups.com program is actually very good for this, it provides a schedule and ramps up slowly. And hey, you're improving your health in the process.