I shall now hereby to regale you with my last 3 months of TSW.
25 October, 2014
As far as when I made the choice to stop using cortisone, well that is a decision I have made many times and over many years (see my story). This time around I made a point of starting the process the day after my step sisters wedding, even though I wanted to begin earlier, there was no way I would look like a monster on her big day.
The itch was almost instantaneous. That incessant itch that still to this day, has not dissipated! It began on the abdomen and the arms which over the course of the week, eventually gave way to red patches of eczema. Once I started getting these patches, they spread in size and severity, gradually melding into colossal sizes sometimes completely enveloping an entire limb. You will notice the spread and change as you see my photos progress. The photo above is a bit hard to make out, but a significant amount of eczema has come out here which extended from my wrists, up my arms, over my shoulders onto my neck, chest and abdomen.
In the interest of full transparency, I should point out here that I was at this point studying and so had made the executive decision to keep applying (minimal) cortisone to my face. Thus ensuring a more gentle end to my study year.
In the first 2 months, I was studying 3 days a week and my timing couldn't have been worse. The instigation of operation Body Cover Up ran parallel to the summer heat, so I tended to stand out with my jeans, jumper and scarf in 35 degree heat. The only real respite after the first month was that my body temperature regulation did a polar flip which meant I felt cold, even on a warm day. I guess this proved useful for the coming months.
Just on that note. The temperature thing was part of the reason I suffered from insomnia. It was summer so was quite warm and humid and so my body was sweating, as it should, however it was also telling me I was cold. So I ended up with this conflicting sensation. It was very uncomfortable being sweaty (as it was with the weeping - the constant damp feeling is disgusting) but I was too cold to strip down to dry off. This saw me rugged up in bed, constantly having to dab myself down during the night with tissues. Basically it felt like I was wet from the shower, cold, in my dry bed. Weird huh! Though the day time wasn't much better, only I had distractions to keep my mind off it.
11 November, 2014
Third week, the eczema has spread over the majority of my arms, shoulders, neck, chest and hands. About this time is when I started to notice the eczema patches popping up on my legs. Mostly on my upper thighs and my knees. The odd cluster of spots on the rest of my legs but not enough to stop wearing skirts. Needless to say, all of it is relentlessly itchy. 24 hours a day. Errday.
4 weeks in, the eczema has spread to a good portion of my legs, 90% of my arms and making some nasty patches on my hands. However the good news here is that it has moved away significantly from my torso. It remains on my chest and neck, but the rest has pretty much disappeared. My torso did remain itchy and still became very weepy (oddly) when scratched even when there was no eczema visible.
Summary
- Eczema spread over whole body
- Body temperature regulation change
- Hormonal imbalance
- Weeping and oozing
- Blind pimples/large blind lumps
- Beginning of insomnia