It's wintertime. It's cold. And apparently my low maintenance status-quo is just not cutting it. My body is screaming that I must pay a little more attention to it. I don't know if I'm treating this winter differently than I have previous winters, but I'm dealing with dry skin like you would not believe - even with all the water I've been drinking. Lotion has helped, but in particular, my fingertips are dry, cracked and peeling. Ouch. It's gotten to the point that I notice it all the time - it's pretty annoying.
(Before you ask, no, I'm not touching or using any lotions or creams that are different than my usual routine, and I always wear latex rubber gloves in chemistry lab.)
Of course I made the mistake of mentioning this to my mother and now a healthy dose of motherly guilt is suggesting that I head to the doctor to see if anything is seriously wrong. I don't believe that I have any serious illness but, you know, under the barrage of mother guilt, it's impossible that the door of doubt isn't cracked just a bit. What if I really AM dying? Because it's a little known fact that all serious diseases begin with dry, cracked fingertips, you know.
And so, even though everyone says not to do this, I googled my symptoms this morning. I was totally expecting all signs to lead to cancer, but I was surprised. There were actually some common circumstances/chronic illnesses that were NOT cancer and suggested as possibilities for what I'm experiencing. So I decided to go through them one by one and see if perhaps I did need to go to the doctor after all.
Um, no. Each one that I clicked on had "extreme weight loss" listed as one of the symptoms. That's not happening here... move along. And please pass the hand lotion.
Any suggestions from others?? I would appreciate any help at this point.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
Could you be allergic to the latex gloves you're using in Chem? Latex allergies are fairly common. I would think your fingertips would itch before cracking/peeling though.
(Stub here - HATE blogger and it's not letting me comment!!)
No ideas why but a solution: New Skin! Hurts like the very devil when put on cracked fingers but then it's all better and they heal quickly. I've suffered cracked and bleeding fingers for years in winter and this winter tried that in desperation (after washing my hands at every dog visit they were getting BAD) and it works!
My suggestion is to go to the doctor.
Use a humidifier. Now that I live in the always-dry West we actually have a whole-house humidifier that's hooked up to the heating/cooling system. But, since the Midwest is only dry in winter, buy a cheap humidifier, fill it up, put it in your bedroom, and use it at night. It helps with the dry, itchy skin. Always wear gloves outside too! And wear gloves to clean or do dishes (though I also recommend the Dawn Hand Renewal dish soap). Also, exfoliate to get all the dead skin off so the lotion is actually absorbing into something other than dead skin. :)
Post a Comment