Ouch My Skin Hurts

Well, the two-month hiatus from eczema was nice. A few weeks before returning from Buenos Aires, the arm patches started creeping back. I attribute it to a combination of factors: the cool (10°C) fall weather, and the mental preparation for my return to my Toronto pace of life. In my final weeks, my mind was clearly turning to the plans I'd been laying for the weeks following my return: filing taxes, preparing my portfolio ahead of attending FITC, and accomplishing client work before returning to school for my final semester.

Oh, FITC. In the workshop-and-afterparty sleep-deprived haze, the eczema ran rampant. It didn't help that the night before FITC, I VJed a rooftop graduation party for a couple of friends who were celebrating their newly-finished MBAs. Taking a night off to catch up on sleep and let my stinging hands heal, I determined that sleep is absolutely, directly, strongly linked to the condition of my skin. I've resolved to maintain much more sane sleeping patterns - or at least schedule sleep-deprived nights a little further apart.

As if that stretch weren't enough, though, my upper-arm patches started to itch furiously a few days later, and became so raw and icky that I could see no way to function. It was so different from anything I'd yet seen on my skin that I began to wonder if it was still eczema, or something new. I took Friday off to deal with it, and visited my local walk-in clinic for diagnosis and referral to a dermatologist (yes, despite 20+ years with eczema, I still haven't seen a dermatologist). He prescribed a strong(er) cortisone cream. I applied it and covered my entire upper right arm in gauze. 

Two days later, my arms aren't looking as troubling but I can tell something's still lurking below the surface. In the meantime, the National Eczema Association sent me a video that I've been watching this morning. I'm not sure how much of it to trust - it's sponsored by the Vaseline Skin Fund, and the first and strongest moisturizing recommendation is petroleum jelly - but as always, I find hearing others' stories to be a relief in and of itself. They also recommend another site called easeeczema.org for information. Unfortunately, it's yet another informational site that is sponsored by pharmaceutical companies. I guess I should be thankful that at least they make their biases somewhat clear, but I'd love to have a better idea of what's professional opinion and what's industry recommendation. 

Shortly after the holidays, I boarded a plane bound for Buenos Aires, Argentina, sent by my school on an international internship. I don't think I've ever had a trip preceded by such intense anticipation - it all happened on very short notice. And grateful as I am for the opportunity, preparing for the trip did force me to pack my holiday schedule all the more tightly. But the prospect of having an expenses-paid trip to Buenos Aires was far too enticing to pass up.

As a full-time university student, I was paying to think. As a part-time grocery store cashier, I was paid not to think. I had the fastest hands minimum wage can buy. The rhythmic swiping of product in a 6hr block was tranquilizing for a highly active, neurotic mind like mine. Hundreds of people would watch me on any given day. My hands were quick. Not to brag, but it was poetry in motion.

My hands were also a beacon for unsolicited advice.

Eczema ruled my life up until my early 20s. It was like an annoying tag-along friend you despised at first, but would later tolerate only because you find their tenacity sort of endearing. To make matters worse, obsessive compulsive disorder runs in my family. Luckily, I was only mildly symptomatic, and escaped with only a slightly excessive hand washing habit. That, coupled with my eczema, left my hands in pretty rough shape.

I don't understand why North Americans fear silence. An average grocery check-out time lasts around 2 minutes. Let me tell you, those 2 minutes can fit a lot of inane chitchat. Usually it was about the weather, or that local sports team (Go Senators), or their purchase of the day. (Sidenote: old male widowers really like microwavable mac 'n cheese dinners)

Every so often the topic of conversation would fall upon my poor hands. Oh the advice I would get! People told me to moisturize, while whipping out an expensive-looking bottle from their purse. Their smooth hands and smug faces lent testimony to this miracle product that would Change My Life. For awhile I was paranoid that I was targeted in an Avon Lady sales attack. Thanks to the multi-billion dollar skin care industry, people are masquerading as medical professionals. Shouldn't they get arrested for that? If people were stupid enough to think I'd be cured by a heavily fragranced, petroleum-laden lotion, I wonder what they thought of me. "If only that poor girl just stepped into a Shoppers Drug Mart..."

Of all the people willing to dispense dermatology advice, I had one exchange that still baffles me. I wrote about it in my blog over 5 years ago. An excerpt:

 Winter is here, which means my dry, flakey eczema'd hands will bring forth unwanted comments by all who come across them. Yesterday a customer says, "Your hands look sore. Is it Eczema?" I nod, followed by a hanging of the head in shame. "Hey...I know a way to get rid of it". Customer Lady looks around, moves her head closer to mine, and says in hushed tones, "You pee on your hands"

PEE ON MY HANDS? WHAT THE FUCK?!!!

"I used to work as a hairdresser and the salon chemicals would make my hands very sore. So I put pee on my hands for a few days and my eczema was gone!"

"...You better not be lying to me so I'll pee on my hands"

"No of course not! My daughter told me this. You pee in a container and splash it on your hands. You let it air-dry and then wash it off. In a few days your hands will be better"

So, moral of the story: if we happen to see each other one day and you notice my smooth, supple skin, give me a hug and not a handshake.

My hands have since cleared up, without the aid of my own urine. I still stew in misanthropy when people comment on my skin and offer unwanted advice, but I gotta admit nothing's funnier than hearing a 60-year old woman telling me to pee on myself.

When the skin cracks have come, they've never been fun. But until this year, the ruptures would always fall along comfortingly familiar lines in my skin, underscoring my skin's natural grooves in red. They were positioned in such a way that I could predictably bring myself some temporary relief by straightening out my fingers.

But lately, the cracks have evolved. They now lie haphazardly in various orientations, crossing those familiar lines on my fingers at 45 or even 90 degrees. Relief has become harder to find, and I've been waiting days for the cortisone to do its work and close the skin back up. Until then, I've been walking around with the constant sting of a thousand tiny cuts.

My hands are so covered with sore spots I wouldn't even know where to begin with the cortisone and dressings. The eczema seems to have reached near an all-time high. Patches on my arm refuse to yield to the new urea-enhanced cortisone variant I'm on; last night a furious itch in my shins roused me from sleep. 

I gave up on the naturopath's wheat-free diet this weekend. Faced with wheat-laden delicious home made Ukrainian food from my brother-in-law's mom and increasing frustration with the diet's inefficacy, it was too easy. I was too confused about its details anyway. Was it just wheat flour or all flours? Maybe it was actually all gluten? In any case the intervening period seems to have made it worse. Maybe it was end of semester stress, or the stress of having to try to find wheat-free snacks on a high metabolism. Surely the hectic holiday family schedule didn't help, nor the sudden addition of planning a trip to Argentina. 

Family. The last day or so I've felt like a whirling dervish, spun round and round by the unending stream of requests for help between my sister's two tots and an infant, my mom's new iPod and the standard litany of tasks involved in a family gathering (if you guessed they mostly involve food preparation, you're bang on). I've learned to hold my own on behalf of my hands in some regards by offering to help with things before help can conceivably be needed, only specifying tasks that cause my hands no duress.  

I'm back home, now. So for now? I'm going to focus on eating and sleeping healthily and regularly. No funny stuff.

What, surprised? Thought I'd keep ignoring you while you gnaw at my skin, slowly but steadily ingesting my morale as the day wears on? 

I may have proven a lackadaisical adversary up to now, but you're crossing the line. Watch it. I've got you in my sights.