A common question from people suffering from hand and wrist pain and numbness, is whether strengthening exercises are good or helpful.
The answer depends on how bad your Carpal Tunnel Syndrome (CTS)  is, how long you have had it, and what exactly is causing the problem.
Some philosophies held by professions such as Physical and Occupational Therapy hold firm to the belief that if there is pain and injury, then there must be a lack of strength.
It is absolutely true that the stronger a structure is, the more work it can do before it fatigues.
 So a stronger structure can work longer before it has problems like fatigue and strain.
However, by the time most people start looking to see if strengthening exercises can help their Carpal Tunnel Symptoms, it is too late.
 By the time you are hurting and feeling numbness, there is already a Pain Causing Dynamic in place, and working the muscles to make them stronger is more likely to hurt than help.
In my professional experience, strength exercises are good for Carpal Tunnel and Wrist Tendonitis -after- the primary problem and mechanism has been eliminated.
 Wrist Tendonitis is a whole different story than CTS, but the fact remains, strengthening is best after the primary problem has been dealt with.
CTS is a progressive problem, a Downward Spiral of increasing tightness and pain.
 As muscle and connective tissue gets tighter and tighter, the ecology of the area changes, and more and more pain shows up.
 Pain makes muscles tighter.
 With all this tightness and pain, the nervous system goes on the defensive and is VERY protective.
If you make the muscles work to make them stronger, like if you use weights, then muscles that are already too tight and unhappy are forced to work and contract.
 These muscles are already too tight to begin with, and you are trying to make them stronger but actually making them tighter, as well as straining them.
Plus, the nervous system notices all this extra strain and effort and it does the only thing it knows how to do..
..
it tightens up to protect you against further harm.
 Which, ironically, sets you up for more pain in the future.
And if you have an inflammatory response going on, which you do, that will get aggravated as well.
 More inflammation creates more pain and tightness.
 Do you see a theme here? Get rid of the tightness and inflammation, and calm the nervous system down BEFORE you try to build more strength.
Once that is accomplished, then strength exercises are great for your hands, wrist, and forearm.
 The stronger your structure is, the more easily it can perform those repetitive motions over and over all day long.
Stronger is better, no matter how you look at it.
 Having said that, repetitive motion can still cause wear and tear injury to tendons and other connective tissue, but again, the stronger you are, the more able you are to work without injury.