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talkhealth
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by talkhealth on Mon Dec 10, 2018 9:51 am

Re: Life with excessive "lifestyle changes" is not worth liv

Hi Storm Cottage

Thank you for your very open post. We can only imagine how difficult things can get when you are at a low point and being positive to so many things must make every day life quite hard.

Please have a look at our free support programmes and our forums and please do not lose heart, it must seem easy to say but do try and find the positives in the bad days when they come. Do you have a good support network of friends and family? Are there any local groups you can join to give you something positive to focus on?

Kind regards
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icehotel
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Joined: Thu Dec 13, 2018 6:00 pm
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by icehotel on Thu Dec 13, 2018 6:30 pm

Re: Life with excessive "lifestyle changes" is not worth liv

Hi. I feel your pain. I am 49 and i have never had any skin problems until about a year ago. Started having eczema on my left hand, small area at first then it got bigger and appeared on my right hand as well. Went away for a few months then returned and spread to my fingers and forearms. It got flaky, inflamed, painful, itchy, completely miserable. I'm a massage therapist so having to use my hands for work has become quite an ordeal.
I however knew from the start that this wasn't from touching things (contact dermatitis); i have allergies and occasional hives, so to me this felt like an immune (over) reaction right away. Antihistamines (benadryl) help with the itching.
I can't help but notice that a lot of people with eczema have some other form of autoimmune disease...someone mentioned Crohn's disease for example. We know that immunity starts in the gut. You have to heal the gut first and foremost. Don't know your situation. But zinc deficiency for example can look like dermatitis. And Zinc deficiency results in impaired immune function. Leaky gut and Crohn's disease can lead to zinc deficiencies even if you consume enough zinc in your diet, due to malabsorption.
If you have a history of antibiotic use, I'd be looking at the gut. Any kind of allergies, look at the gut. If your gut is not healthy you might not be absorbing necessary nutrients.
I just started supplementing with zinc and improved my diet 100% , I'll update you on my progress.
In the meantime i take benadryl for the itch and use Tegaderm film dressing on my arms and hands. If you haven't tried tegaderm film, please look it up, it has made my life so much easier! Since i can keep the affected areas covered (yes you can use it on the hands), I eliminated the constant drying out/pulling/burning/skin flakes problem completely.

Storm Cottage
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by Storm Cottage on Mon Dec 17, 2018 11:18 am

Re: Life with excessive "lifestyle changes" is not worth liv

Its definitely eczema, its atopic so they can test for that in the blood.... its in my family too so we know that it is eczema anyway.

Ive had eczema all my life; it got worse about twenty years ago and worse again six years ago. Until I stopped being able to cook my blood tests always came back good. Even after I went vegetarian, ten years ago, I was told my blood tests were some of the best results the nurse had ever seen... so I doubt the cause is a deficiency.
However my diet has been impacted by not being able to cook my diet is certainly deficient now; Ive been anaemic three times since it got worse. I have constantly been asking for help with food prep and not got any- I have no doubt there are other deficiencies as I monitor with cronometer and can see Im low in magnesium and potasium too. I take a general supplement and occassionally additional magnesium, but its not possible to buy potassium at levels that are much better than a banana. I think it does have an effect on healing time, but I havent been able to improve it enough to see if that will pull me free of the cycle of basic tasks followed by TLC, followed by basic tasks, followed by TLC etc... Supplementing with more zinc might be risky for me as I think it can interfere with iron take up, its not something cronometer has highlighted as an especially worrying low level.

I have tried tegaderm (and duo derm) and havent found either very good on rounded surfaces- I find both will burst vesicles when they are taken off too- and they cannot be left on for more than three days. So that can mean the skin just cracks again down a line of damages blister craters next.

I had better luck with micropore, but it inhibits joint movement if wrapped around a finger and I think I maybe starting to react to it as well- I had to attach my last patch test with tegaderm.

I am not depressed and this isnt about not seeing positive things or enjoying activities when Im capable of them. It is about knowing I do not want to struggle for the next twenty or thirty years with balancing basic tasks that allow human dignity (such as keeping myself clean, keeping my house clean and feeding myself) with the need to keep my skin dry and away from irritants. Six years has been enough to show me it strips the quality from life... everything in life has had to become about this to gain any ground- I cant forget or it flares. There is no holiday from it stopping me doing things, no holiday from living in a filthy house and knowing I myself smell most of the time too. Telling me to accept this is telling me I deserve no better- and I do deserve better- the minute I forget that I really will have lost... I would prefer to die that find somewhere down the line I have accepted that living this way is all I should expect.
I suppose I have thought about rational suicide, but thats a weird one... without actually being depressed when the issue is chronic illness well next tuesday is as good as this tuesday... without the emotional push when on earth do you set a date for it LOL. I suppose that why Im saying I want the advance directive; it will take the scheduling issue out of the equation.... but it may not come soon enough for me I really do not know how much more of this I am willing to allow myself to endure. It is about dignity not depression.

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