People do tell me I have lovely skin all the time, which is so nice to hear, particularly as around 10 years ago, the skin on my face and parts of my body was absolutely awful, so dry and wrinkly and red and sore; I looked 50-odd when I was 30. And now I’m 40 I get told I look 30, so that’s the great news about being the in natural skincare business, I’m proof that natural and organic skincare products totally work!!
But here’s the thing, quite often when I’m speaking to people who have bad eczema themselves, they say to me, whilst looking me up and down, eyes slightly narrowed, “but your eczema isn’t actually that bad, is it?” Here’s the answer, yes my eczema is actually really really bad, but 90% of the time, I control it very well, through diet, skincare, washing powder, avoiding things I’m allergic to, stress relief etc… and this works.
BUT!!!! There is, of course, that 10% of the time when things don’t go well, you accidentally eat something you’re intolerant to, you sleep over somewhere and the bedding is covered in hideous stinky washing liquid/chemicals/detergents, you get a cat rubbing all round your legs or something stressful happens and you can’t control it. And you get a little eczema explosion and wake up with very sore skin.
I’m typing this on 1st August; we’ve just had a good 3 – 4 weeks of really lovely hot weather, hot nights, sleepless sticky, sweaty nights where skin gets sore, hot and uncomfortable and scratching takes place. I’ve not been looking after myself as well as I could have been; my kids are on summer hols, I’m working late into the night (once they finally go to bed) to keep up with the business side of things etc… and the result is (brace yourself for the photo coming up) this:
Yes, that’s my back this morning; as you can see, I really do have bad eczema. Today was my wake-up call, the day where I realised I need to go back to absolute basics with eczema care. It’s Friday night, and whilst I should be having a take-away and a nice big glass of wine (or 2) I’m having home cooked organic food, chamomile tea and gallons of water. I’ve taken an anti-histamine, and I’m eating extremely carefully, I’m checking my list of good eczema foods (see my other blog about this), I’m increasing my flaxseed supplement, I’ve cut my fingernails extremely short, I’ve put all my bedding on a hot wash, I’m taking time out to try to relax, trying deep breathing, when all I really want to do is rub my sore skin with some rough sandpaper. I’m following all my basic advice, because that’s what you’ve got to do sometimes. All these things are the way forward, not to reach for the steroid cream and get into the hideous eczema/stress/steroid cream/eczema/stress cycle.
It would be really easy to say, “oh poor me, my eczema is so sore, I’m so sad about it, I will eat chocolate and drink wine to cheer myself up.” I feel like saying that a bit. But I’m saying, “It’s ok, it’s sore, but it’s just eczema, I’m going to turn this round in about 5 or 6 days, I’m brave, it’s no big deal.”
So that’s it really. If you have eczema, I absolutely do understand how you feel, I have been there (I’m there right now). And I’d like to remind you, it’s your body and you can make it better, slowly, calmly, with love and understanding, and be very proud of yourself when you do.
Hopefully next week I’ll post another picture of my back, which will not be quite so hard to look at.
In the meantime, pop over to the eczema page of my website for some advice and information: https://www.lj-natural.com/eczema/
