Eczema Boil » contact dermatitus http://www.eczemaboil.com reviews, news, info and interviews on an unpopular skin disease and living with it Tue, 17 Nov 2009 19:06:13 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 en hourly 1 Skin Status Report for Mid July http://www.eczemaboil.com/2009/07/skin-status-report-for-mid-july/ http://www.eczemaboil.com/2009/07/skin-status-report-for-mid-july/#comments Fri, 17 Jul 2009 19:56:01 +0000 Annie http://www.eczemaboil.com/?p=438 It’s Friday, and I had a bad skin week.

On Monday and Tuesday it was about 95′F at the office, so I was expecting some kind of dermal explosion.

On Wednesday it showed up. I woke up with my face, chest, arms and knees breaking out. I put on my office clothes and planned on going in, but after a few minutes in them my skin hurt even more, and began to swell, so I changed and called in sick. By midday my eyes were half shut from being swollen, and I had a few bleeding gashes on my face and arms. My legs were ripped up and it hurt to bend them. It’s nothing compared to how my eczema used to be, but it hurt to touch things, and the pain was very distracting. Maybe it’s just me, but when my whole body is breaking out like that I end up feeling a bit ill as well. And of course, it can be difficult to feel professional when your face is bleeding and won’t stop.

Yesterday I stayed out of the sun as much as possible, including taking my parasol to the bus stop.  It’s treated with SPF 30, the closest thing I can get to sunscreen. [If you have any suggestions for a sunscreen for insanely sensitive skin, please let me know!]

Today my skin is feeling much better. My left arm is still breaking out, and several tiny infections are brewing, so I’m trying to keep them as clean as possible. My right arm is fine though. My face has some long cuts but they’re healing well. It also has red swollen spots that burn, and I’m not even sure what they are, but I’m touching those as little as possible. My left foot has at least 12 little boils on it this morning, hopefully more won’t pop up. I’m wearing jeans so I can’t scratch my legs no matter how much I want to.

I tried to stay upbeat this week, and did a fairly good job, and rarely mentioned my skin. The best part was that people chose to ignore it, so I was able to pretend that I looked more ‘normal’.

]]> http://www.eczemaboil.com/2009/07/skin-status-report-for-mid-july/feed/ 0 Pierced http://www.eczemaboil.com/2008/02/pierced/ http://www.eczemaboil.com/2008/02/pierced/#comments Tue, 19 Feb 2008 19:20:17 +0000 Annie http://eczemaboil.wordpress.com/?p=35 When I was 18 months old my mother had my ears pierced. She would change the earrings every day, and had at least a dozen cute little sets (dinosaurs, cupcakes, flowers) until I was about 8. For some reason I can’t remember she stopped forcing me to wear earrings, and since they had always made my lobes swell and itch I stopped wearing them. As a teenager I would try a pair now and then, but still had the allergic reaction. Gold, pewter, silver, “stainless steel”. A couple years ago someone suggested titanium and I miraculously found a pair. The holes in my ears were still mostly open, but so unused to penetration that they bled a bit. However, my ears didn’t hurt, so the quest for titanium earrings was on. A few weeks ago I stumbled on Skin-Etc. which has a few styles of titanium earrings in several different colors. Today I ordered ruby studs, hoops, and some hooks that you can use to replace french hooks. They’re produced by Blumdahl Medical who also make nose and plastic piercings for people with allergies. I’ll post reviews of the earrings when they arrive.

Seventh Generation product reviews forthcoming.

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