Amost 5 months!!

So I havent updated my blog in a while mostly because I just wanted to unplug myself and really focus on healing. And healing is what I have done :) I would say I am a little more the 50% through this and the worst has passed!! I am starting to see large improvments even though I still flare a little every other day. I can tell about 50% of my body still has the inflamation in the cells. But that is much better then 95% of my cells being enflammed. And more then 75% of the day the cells show no inflamation, not untill I disturb my skin with a shower or excercise is when I see it. 

I want to re-enforce that getting here was a nightmare that I had to settle with. I lost a lot and my life took a 180 down hill. I lost my job, I lost friends, I lost my girlfriend, I lost money and probably my ego too haha. But what I have gained??!!! Alot! Extreme enlightment is what I have gained. I feel I am closer to my family. I have got to spend a lot of time with my mom, and dad which I am greatful for! I have gained gratitude toward those willing to help me :) I feel loved, and see how important this is in life. Before I felt I was blind, living a fake and somewhat materialistic life that the cortisones provided. I was not facing reality. Now I know why I had to go through this journy. Who knows what I would have become without this experience. 

I still have a long way to go. I feel the 1 year mark I will be near completly healed. But I am healing fast now! I have been able to play soccer and tennis! I have been going to the gym! I am regaing strength and getting intouch with who I really am and the real person under all the false medications I had lived under. 

I have been taking photos of myself. I will post them all when I am healed... But here is a before and after. 

Before (2 month in): 

After: (4 and 1/2 months in) 

End of Month 2 into Month 3

So I have been going through this day by day and glad to say I am almost at the 60 day mark. 60 days is a long time but to me it feels like an eternity. I am not going to lie, this has not been easy. My condition has kept me indoors which really starts to put a toll on the psyche. I really miss being able to go out and drink and just have a good time with friends. I wish I could go to work and have the energy I used to have. I wish I could snowboard and play soccer. I wish I didn't look like shit! But yet I remain optomistic. I know my life will have to change during this experience,  wether I like it ir not, and I am just going to have to get used to that! 

Now to be optomistic I have noticed good improvments :) My legs are no longer swollen, My skin is sweating and shedding way less. I seem to shed every 3 days now instead of twice a day. My skin will turn red, dry and tight then the next day will start to fall off and peel. Each time the skin seems to be a little better. Although at the moment I am in a pretty bad flare :( But after the shedding I am sure I will get a little break again. 

I am trying to meditate and pray a lot. To keep my spirit strong and optomistic. This involves relaxing and trying to free my brain of negative thoughts and contant business. I replace it with a glowing light that penitrates and relaxes my body and mind. If I am lucky I will get an hour or two of scratchless sleep. Which is huge! 

So how about some pics? 

47 days in:

58 days in: 

47 days in: 

58 days in: 

Month 2 - Welcome to Hell!

So my last post in December was pretty optimistic, little did I know I was just on the verge of entering the gates of Hell! Wow these last 2 to 3 weeks have tested my humaity to the core. Infact I think at one point I was close to dying... let me explain!

So things took a turn for the worst right after the 1st of January. Before, I was able to make it through the day, and was going to work. And for New Years I went to a party... it was a little uncomfortable but managable. But after, within the first week of January my skin turned red, full body bright red! Red sleeves and everything. This my friends IS NOT ECZEMA... this is a completly different beast. My skin was on fire! This is Topical Steroid Withdraw. This is what it feel like to rid your body of poison you have been applying your whole life. It took a month to hit my body and it arrived like a brick wall. Let the detox begin...

It was around Jan 9th when I woke up in the morning, looked absolutly terrible and decided to hop in the shower! Bad move! The mixture of pain, my adrinals all messed up, not eating breakfast, and the heat almost caused me to blackout. No one was was home so I just hopped out of the bathroom, cralled to my phone and called 911. I nearly lost conciouness while I waited for them. Luckly they gave me some  food and I was fine. My blood pressure had dropped to a dangerous level. Of course I had to try and describe topical steroid to them which was hard but they were a little understandable. 

So basically for the last couple weeks my skin has been hell and sheading relentlesly! I wake up in the morning and look like a zombie with skin falling off everywhere. Oozing like freaking crazy. I wake up completely wet with ooze. And the grity skin falling off on top of the ooze is extreamly nasty. Very hard to sleep. Luckly I went to the doctor and got hydroxisine, which is an anti histamine to help sleep and calm the itching. I take some around 12pm, wake up around 3am or 4am all sweaty and then go soak in the bath till 8am. Yeah! 4 hours in the tub, but its the only place I can get some good rest! I havent been to work for the last week. Just told them I am taking medical leave... Anyways, this is really testing my physical strength, have resorted to prayer, faith and hope. My parents have been coming over to help and my roommate is making me meals! Having a care tender is important as I have learned I cant manage this all my self! Cant thank the people in my life who are helping through. They are a God sent! Tierd, going to bed now. More later.  

3 Weeks -Things are getting a little better

Things are improving for me at the moment. Hopefully I stay this path. Fingers crossed.  It's only been 3 weeks but the cycles my skin have gone through has been interesting to say the least. Basically its been like 1 or 2 days of intense itching, redness and nerve tingling, and sensitive to temperature, then after the flare my skin stops itching but still am pretty red for a 2 or 3 days, then my skin will peal. Then I am good for about 2 days and then the whole cycle will repeat. I have gone through about 4 cycles but each one is less intense in nature. Also my skin has been getting way thicker and harder to break and cause bleeding. This has been great. And slowly but surly my skin is holding moisture better. A couple weeks ago I would wake up sooo dry I didn't want to move. It felt like my skin could crack so easy. Now it's still dry and a little red but Its much more bearable. I have been snowboarding 3 times in the last 2 weeks and I've think this has helped. It seems to get some adrenaline flowing and the adrenal glands back to a normal state. I know more flares will come but I definitely think overall my skin is in much better condition then without the steroids. I am hoping when spring and summer hit and I am able to get some sun, then my skin will be cured :)

How it begins...Topical Steroid Cordisone Withdraw

I have been using topical steroids my whole life. From hydrocortisone to some of the more potent creams. For the past 7 years or so I have been using Triamcinolone Acetonide 0.1% all over my body.  That is a moderate to strong steroid.

Recently, back before Thanksgiving 2013 my eczema was not getting better, even with the creams. It was all over my body and driving me crazy. I try to avoid the doctor, but I went anyways. I haven't had oral prednisone in a couple years but I knew it would make me feel better, so I asked the doctor to give me some. I also asked for a refill on the triamcinolone. As I was at the pharmacy picking up the meds the pharmacist said "whoo, thats a big jar of cream, I hope it takes you a long time to go through that". She said "don't use that cream for more then 2 weeks as it can cause the HPA Axis to dysfunction."  It my mind I was like ha, I've used this cream for I don't know how long... And then it dawned on me. Perhaps my body is screwed up because of this cream. So when I got home I google the symptoms of long term steroid use, that's when I started coming across some of the blogs and people who have gone through cortisone withdraw. Everything kind of made sense now, the medicine is not making me better, its making me more sick. This is when I decided to stop using the cream.

Ironically I did decide to take the prednisone though, because my body was all torn up. I figured, If I am going to quit steroids lets clear my body up first, then start the withdraw. So I started. For 3 days I took 3 15mg Pills of Predisone, and my skin cleared! I lived this opportunity up as I new this was the last time my skin was going to be better for a long time. Then 3 more days of 2 pills. The eczema slowly started to pop up. then 3 days of 1 pill. The eczema returned, AND then no more pills!  I stopped 12/5/2013

I knew all hell would break loose now. And it did....

Starting the tortures of withdraw.
I was panicking because of what I knew what was to come. I showed my mom and a friend of the video on Itsan.org (very good video by the way) and told them I am going to try it. They gave me positive reinforcement and told me to try it. And so I began. The first 2 days actually weren't to bad probably because the predisone was still in my system. But the 3rd day I was starting to feel it. My body was swelling up, my skin was turning violent red. I felt cold, especially my hands and feet. My skin hurt, like a sundburn almost but deeper inside. I started shaking... By day 4 my glands were swollen as well as my face. Its weird though, my skin didn't have much eczema on it but it was red and on fire. Day 5 was the worse I felt. I didn't go to work. It was painful to wake up and take a shower. I felt sick, my body was begging for the Triamcinolone cream. I almost considered saying screw it and put it on, but I didn't. Then before going to bed I decided to take Nyquil (the cold medicine) because I knew I wouldn't sleep. But damnn that stuff made me sleep. Didn't wake up at all that night. When I did wake up my skin felt gross, it felt matted, felt dead, it was soo dry and painful. At least I felt rested though and my glands didn't feel swollen. I took a shower and put lotion on. The lotion I have been using is Curel Itch Defense, which is amazing stuff. It doesn't leave your skin greasy or too dry, and takes the redness away as well. This brings me to my current day, day 9. My skin has been shedding and falling off now...Severe shedding I would call it. My mattress looked like it had gone through a snowstorm. The good thing is there seems to be new skin underneath, that isn't as red (Although my skin is still pretty red...). My skin is also oozzing in places which is not comfortable at all... My skin feels very tight and dry. Especially waking up in the mornings. I don't like to turn or stretch too much because it feels very uncomfortable. My face is also still a little swollen and red. Luckly it doesn't look that bad yet. The good thing is I feel like I have more energy, it feels like my body has returned to producing its own cortisone or wherever the medication was blocking. Also my skin feels thicker, more natural. I am not bleeding anywhere. Before it was so easy to scratch and start bleeding because the steroids thin the skin. Overall I feel like crap, but feel like I have gone through the worst part. Although, according to others there will eventually be worse times then this. I hoping in a couple months I will be much better but I know some take up to 3 to 4 years to heal.

Here is a pic of my current state (Note I have a cast on because I have a broken wrist from snowboarding):