Share your wierd disease!!!(Swiddle's wierd skin disease, take two)

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Some may remember that back in January, it was unclear as to whether I would be able to attend the NYC Dopefest due to a bizarre outbreak of impetigo on my face. Luckily, I resonded to the antibacterials, and was able to attend, and also got to see my godfather. He died suddenly and unexpectedly three weeks later, so I’m super glad the impetigo cleared up and I got to see him one last time.

Flash forward four months later. I have a new wierd skin patch on my face, which is entirely different than the other one. This one is more like the excema that my mom and sister have. I go to the doctor, and she agrees. Puts me on topical steriods. The spot shrinks, but does not go away entirely.

Then two weeks ago, I run out of the cream. And because I was working two jobs and couldn’t get to the doc’s, I was off the cream for about a week. The spot, which had been about the size of a dime, spread to about two inches in diameter, and got red.

I went to the doctor, but saw a new doc, as I had made my appointment the day before. He takes one look at me and says that he doesn’t think it was ever excema.
“Don’t tell me I have psoriasis,” Swiddles begs.
“Nope.”
“What then?”
“Well,” he says, and sits back in his chair, “Ringworm.”
“OH MY GOD. MAKE IT GO AWAY NOW.” Swiddles screams. (literally.)

So here is what I’ve learned about odd skin diseases. [ul] [li] Impetigo is a bacterial infection just under the first layer of the skin. It is highly contagious, but I don’t remember coming into contact with any blistered and boiled people, so who knows. [] Ringworm is not a worm at all. It’s a fungus, can be air born, and possibly came from the cat I got from the Humane Society three weeks earlier. Or I got it while at the Humane Society. Or I got it anywhere. [] Obviously, the likelyhood of a bacterial infection and a fungal infection having something to do with each other in a four month period is pretty low. 2001 is the year God chose to make Swiddles look like a leper in as many ways as possible. [/ul][/li]
So I’m on Lotrimin (you may know it as jock itch cream, or as Gynalotrimin, the yeast infection cream) and supposedly the whole thing will be gone in two weeks.

I now am supposed to disinfect everything in my apartment. Carpets must be steam cleaned. Bedding is supposed to be boiled. Walls cleaned with a bleach solution. I have no time or money to do this in. My cat is not showing any spots of ringworm, although the vet tells me that they can be inactive carriers, and I should bring him in and get him cultured. This will cost me $50. I haven’t even paid rent yet.

I’m posting this because I want to hear about other peoples’ strange and bizaare medical afflictions, so I don’t feel like such a freak. One I could take. Two in four months (and I’ve been living with this thing on my face for another four) is a bit crazy. That, and the fact that it’s named “worm” gross me out more than I can say. It’s not a worm, it’s a fungus, but I’m not sure how much better that is. Anyway, share, please.

2

I had one semester of pure skin disease hell.

It started with an odd rash developing on my chest, shoulders and back. It wasn’t very itchy but it was unsightly and I’d just started dating again. When I realized it had spread to my back, I made an appointment at the school health clinic and bought some topical lotion. It didn’t help.

That Friday (before the appointment,) I noticed a really red, puffy, very itchy, spot on the outer edge of my armpit. “???,” I said. I applied the topical lotion. It didn’t help. Well, I was going in for an appointment soon anyway, I’d just wait it out.

The next morning I was to spend the day with my then-boyfriend. The rash under my arms was (both arms, now) was obviously on some mission of conquest. The odd rash on my trunk had spread across my chest and over my shoulders. It was creeping up my neck.

We went for a hike in the nearby woods. While sitting and watching the sunset, I felt a strong itchy feeling on my left arm. There was a tiny little red line, like insect bites. “???,” qouth I. I assumed it was just a midge bite or something and ignored it. I could hardly have been more wrong.

Sunday morning: The odd rash is covering my entire trunk, my shoulders, and has extended into my damn ears. The underarm rash has completely encircled the underarm, itches horribly and is really red and puffy. The “insect bite” has gone from a tiny line to long streaks covering my arms and some are appearing on my legs. The weather has turned hot and, given that I seem to have the metabolism of a sea mammal, I’m starting my annual season-of-sweating. Which is not helping with the itching.

The week went by very slowly.

Friday: After extensive consultation with the health clinic (Fix it! Now!), I get packed off to a hospital across town, where I get to sit with a bunch of other really itchy people. Joy.

Diagnosis: The odd rash is a form of athlete’s foot, there is a cure. The rash under my arms is a yeast infection (!) and there is a cure. The “insect bites” aren’t insect bites. I have scabies (!!!). There is a cure but man, oh, man was it messy!

My very first(and only) yeast infection and it attacked my armpit. Bizarre. I finally figured out where the scabies came from. (Kids! Don’t hang out in Intensive Care Units when there are unwashed junkies in the same room!) The athlete’s foot infection still has my doctor puzzled. Why there? shrug

Well, I hope that helps you feel better.

3

Unofficially, I have the gout.

I say unofficially, because I refuse to have my left foot looked at. I’m going on a fairly important business trip in two weeks, and if they find out something is wrong, they could scrub me from the trip.

In any case about 1 1/2 weeks ago, I started noticing my left foot was sorta sore whenever I woke up in the morning. I first thought it was just muscle cramps, and figured it would work it’s way out. So I kept on working out, running, hockey, what have you. Fast forward a week, and now the cramps are always around. I can actually point to the spot that hurts which leads me to believe I have a hairline, simple, or stress fracture, but being that I’ve only broken one bone in my life and that was pretty painless to me, I just can’t say what the hell is going on. I can still run, walk, work, etc., but my foot is just cramped up alla time. . . I don’t get it.

So, I’m left with the gout. I’ve been eating a lot of protien lately, but I’ve tapered down my beer. Besides, my other foot doesn’t hurt at all! I keep popping Advil and Motrin hoping it will go away, but I am kinda concerned that if it is a fracture, that I’m making it worse. . . I’ve talked to a few friends, and they’ve tried to offer suggestions (Ty, if ya read this, thanks!) but to no avail. So, life goes on. I just have to John Wayne it out. . .

Tripler
It’s not like I’m Quasimodo or anything . . .

4

I have eczema. All over my leg at the moment - it has spread like wildfire for some reason. I think the new washing machine isn’t a very good one, so there are remnants of washing powder all through my clothes :frowning:

Anyways, I do not have any cream any more, I ran out and have not had a chance to renew the prescription. It wasn’t really working anyway, I should get proper stuff.

It sucks. When summer rolls around i may not be able to wear shorts! So I’d better get it cleared up before then, I hope.

5

I have Psorisis. It’s not common, but not too uncommon either. I found out about it 5 or 6 years ago when a horrible rash broke out all over. It itched liked hell, and the bumps it formed broke very easily. These then scabbed, but still itched. Soon my upper arms, shoulders, back, legs, whatever were covered in spatches of scabs. It also causes your fingernails to develop pits in them, which I thought was pretty random. I mean, what the hell would a skin disorder/disease/whatever have to do with the fingernails?

According to the doc, it’s not contagious. It’s just a problem with my skin. Said something about excessive citric acid intake that could cause it to start. Said there is always the possibility of it breaking out again, but that it should only occur every once in a while.

Treatable by cortizone-5, but I was given a prescription for cortizone-10, which apparently is strong enough to warrant a prescription.

6

My three year old has ringworm too! All over his backside and it ain’t a pretty sight after a month on steroids which fed it instead of killing it. I thought it was eczema, the GP thought it was eczema, we did a culture just in case and it came back some rare dirt borne fungus.

But the stuff we were prescribed for the fungus didn’t work so off to the skin specialist who ruled out eczema and said it was definitively ringworm and the steroid was a Real Bad Thing. He prescribed the same ointment as you, Swiddles but he didn’t tell me anything about a disinfecting routine like you were told about so I’m gonna pretend I never read that. We were told to keep on using the cream for a minimum of 3 weeks and to draw a circle with indelible pen when the lesions subsided. That would look nice on your face ;).

I’ve had eczema, psoriasis all my life but my worst skin thing was when I had my First Terrible Broken Heart and I got scabies on my face and had to tell my ex… now I wonder why I put myself through that humiliation and why I didn’t leave him to rot?

7

Well, not so much diseases, but physical conditions.

I have arthritis. Not real bad, and just in my left ankle (the result of spraining it when a lad of 18). But it stiffens up and cracks really loudly (think rifle shot) when I flex and rotate it. And when damp, cold weather hits, it aches like a toothache.

I sweat something awful. I really, really, really hate this about my body. I can work up a sweat just sitting still. No lie, my pits are swampy as I type this, and all I’m doing is sitting here typing!!!

I also think I have acid reflux or something, because I have chronic heartburn. Not from eating tacos or anything, either, but just from things like bagels and cream cheese. Sheesh. But I hate going to the doctor (haven’t been to one in years), so I just eat Rolaids like they were M&Ms and leave it at that.

And, Swiddles, honey, take comfort in the fact that you’re a vibrant young lady with a willowy figure and winsome ways, while I, on the other hand, am a sarcastic, overweight middle-aged guy who may still have a full head of hair, but is watching it rapidly turn gray.

8

When I was much younger(up to about sophomore year in HS-so I was about 15 when it was taken care of) I had eczema all up my arms and across my upper chest. It itched fiercely, but for years I didn’t get taken to the doctor for it because it was “just a rash”. Finally, freshman year in HS mom took me to the dermatologist and the first cream/ointment he gave me had it cleared up in a flash. There were more visits to adjust the strength, but my last visit to him was during my freshman year in college. Now, if the skin on my arms starts drying out, I just use a basic hydrocortisone cream from any drugstore, and it goes away.
There was also the time during my second year in college that my skin turned blue, but that was because I didn’t wash a new shirt before I wore it. My upper body was blue for a week and a half, despite showers, rubbing alcohol, and any number of attempts to remove it. I even went to the health center for advice, but they couldn’t help. And I’m quite sure they laughed a lot when I left. To their credit, they didn’t laugh while I was in there.

9

I had poison ivy once. Your probably thinking “what’s so strange about that” Well, I got it on my left hand from pulling weeds.

First my whole hand turned red. Then I started getting blisters. They were in between my fingers, about 1/4 inch think, and ran the length of my fingers. I couldn’t bend my fingers or put them together.

The doctor gave me a shot, a lotion, & two kinds of pills. I missed the first week of school that year.

10

I don’t have any real weird skin diseases, but I’m 34 years old and still get acne. Sometimes pretty bad. Once a month. You know the routine. Sigh. I’m SO too old for zits.

11

I think I was in my senior year of High School when I noticed that I had discolored patches of skin in my groin that acted like jock itch, but would not respond to treatment. They were reddish, responded to heat by puffing up slightly and itching, seemed to respond to the slaves of the time by decreasing, but never going away completely. In cool weather they hardly bothered me, and remained a reddish brown. In warm, they itched, peeled, and grew to a more inflamed color.

By college, I spotted smallish spots on my torso, similar in type, irregular in outline and these grew. They also itched when it was warm out and, when exposed to the sun, would not tan. They spread across the areas I perspired at, like my under arm sides and upper part of my back until I disliked taking my shirt off around people. My Doctor did not know what they were. If I did not shower daily, they inflamed and itched and during the winter, they just turned into mildly brown spots on my pale skin. Eventually they covered the upper part of my back and sides in large areas, with little spots popping up now and then around my ribs and threatening to creep onto my stomach, neck and face.

Over time, the itching decreased some and I changed jobs, started working several at once and learned to live with them. One day, several years later, when dressing after a shower, I suddenly realized that they were gone! I examined myself carefully in a full length mirror and, it was like magic, for I had (have) clear skin!

After many discussions with medical and psychiatric professionals, I have come to the conclusion that the skin condition was a nervous response to my environment of the time. In school, I was picked on and was a nervous wreck for 4 years and after school, I worked and went to college and was under intense stress by both the nature of my job, the degree I was after, and involvement in my first real love affair. They remained with me until around the late 70s, right into a second intense job, a second love affair, several years of working 2 jobs, and another round of college.

The, they were gone. Poof!

Long thought went into wondering why and I came to this conclusion. I was a shy, late bloomer and did not get laid until the second love affair. (Don’t laugh.) I became more assertive and confident in the second job. (I guess getting laid can do that.) I started drinking socially and relaxing after work. I stopped working almost around the clock. I stopped going to college. Somewhere between the second love affair and the third, I noticed the spots missing, and I think by then I was in another field of work also and getting treated better by my third girlfriend.

Apparently, intense stress can cause psychosomatic reactions that can show up in strange ways. One thing I noticed was that between spots and no spots, the constant denominator was that (a) I was drinking more and having fun a lot, (b) I was getting laid frequently by girls who were not major love interests and (c) I was much more outgoing and assertive.

Even my doctor was surprised. The spots never have returned and it has been over roughly 20 years.

So, you have a skin condition? Buy a bottle of booze and get laid. :slight_smile:

12

ARRGH! The first line should be ‘salves’ of the time, not slaves! Sorry.

13

OK I’m sure most of you know that I’m an RN. I work at a the largest hospital in the area in a busy downtown area. We get patients from all walk of life from junkie to Doctor.

Three weeks ago I was caring for a lady with severe dementia and extreme paranoid behavior. Although she owned her home for 50 years and had a large amount of money in the bank she basically lived like a bag lady spending her days walking from home to the church mission to neighbors to home all the while pushing a large grocery cart filled with items that she picked up and such. She knew she was forgetful so she just pinned anything she valued to her clothes like bills, papers, belongings and when the shirt got full she’d add another one. Finallay she went to a neighbor and banged on the door complaining of not being able to breath. She was in fact suffering from heat exhaustion because she had 10 layers of clothes on and it was 95 degrees. She was literally black with filth, hadn’t bathed in months possibly years the smell was unbelievable and her fingernails were long and ragged and were caked with stool and black dirt.

These were the same fingernails that she dug into my hand when we were trying to help her into bed and she suddenly became frightened and thought we were trying to hurt her.
There were 3 very small breaks in my skin, each no bigger than a fingernail wide. It barely bled. I washed it well and applied antibiotic ointment and a band aid and went about my job. By the next day it had scabbed over and seemed nearly healed. By the day after that my hand was red, swollen, ached down to the bone and the whole wound had widened to about 1/2 inch wide. It was clearly infected and ooozing green goo. I went to employee health and was put on antibiotics and forbid from doing direct patient care. “We don’t want any lawsuits if you pass whatever virulent bacteria is growing in you hand over to the patients.” Oh and sorry about your luck. It sucks to be you.

3 days later, no improvement and clearly getting worse. Antibiotics were changed and the wound cultured. 3 days after that still no improvement and the culture didn’t grow anything, probably because it had been done after the first antibiotics were started. I started my third antibiotic along with a complicated routine of soaks, compresses, and topical creams. I started seeing some improvement after 2 more days. The infected tissue began to die and slough off leaving a deep trough in my hand that looked like it had been scooped out with a melon baller.

Now it is 3 weeks later. The wound is finally scabbed over and quit oozing green goo. I am left with a huge hot pink scar on my left hand just above the thumb; it is half as long as my pointer finger and as wide as the fingernail . I will wait until it is more healed and then my employer WILL be paying for plastic surgery to fix the scar. It is truly hideous. The good news is that I finally finished all my antibiotics which gave me diarrheas for three weeks and have been released to return to active patient care. The bad news is that now I have bronchitis and a fever and am coughing up green goo. I am really getting sick of seeing green goo come out of my body. I am praying that it isn’t the same organism.

Thanks for bearing through with my long tale of woe. This has been very difficult for me.

14

Mermaid, you do know that after a massive round of antibiotics that your system is actually weakened for a time, so you’ll catch nearly every cold in the book until the immunity builds up again? Especially in the halls of a hospital. Suggestion from my own ER days, … gloves with every patient. Especially today. In the old days we never worried about catching anything but a few diseases, but now it seems that with diminished preventative health care due to soaring rates, people carry strange things in and on them.

Don’t you just love the hospital concern? Lawsuits first, and then ‘oh yeah, will ya keep the hand?’

Sorry for the hijack, you may now return to your regularly scheduled discussion.

15

Ahhh, weird skin disorders. Now I feel at home!

  1. My skin comes off. In big pieces. For no reason. I have a scar that goes across my collarbone, just under my neck from this. One morning the skin on my neck felt a little itchy. No worries, it’s extremely dry here in the winter, itchy skin is nothing new. By lunch time, the skin on my throat was all blistery (Ewww) By that evening, it was peeling of in quarter size pieces (Ewwww! Ewwwww!)Soon my throat was just a red, wet, fleshy mess. Then it just healed, in about 2 days. No sign of it, except for the weird scar line that was the border between peeling and not peeling.

  2. The skin around my eyes puffed up and blistered this spring. I had to call in sick (“Yeah, I can’t come in today, my eyes are puffy and won’t open. Yeah I know it’s Monday morning. No, I’m not hung over. No, I’m not still drunk from the weekend”)For about a month I couldn’t wear any makeup, put on any kind of moisturizer or sunscreen. I looked like I had been crying all the time. People kept taking me aside and asking me if I was on the verge of some emotional breakdown or something.

  3. Now I have weird white spots on my tanned shoulders. They are about the size and shape of a thumbprint, and the are all over my arms, shoulders and back. But since they don’t hurt or ooze anything, I’m kind of ignoring them for now.

Sadly, this is but a small fraction of ways that my skin has misbehaved over the years.

16

I have pulmonary eosinophilic granuloma. Rare enough that there is no real database about it. Rare enough to get the docs at National Jewish all a-twitter and insist on an open lung biopsy.

I got a couple of other opinions before I let them do it though.

17

For the last 2 months, I have been dealing with a lovely condition called “labyrinthitis.” My inner ear is swollen and has too much fluid in it. This means that my sense of balance has been pretty messed up. I’m getting better, I think, but for a while I was unable to be upright for more than an hour or two without falling over and feeling incredibly nauseous. Two weeks ago, things got so bad that I couldn’t move my head at all. My boyfriend had to feed me water with a spoon because I couldn’t pick up my head to drink from a glass. Over the past couple of months, he’s also had to help me do such things as: stay stable in the shower, brush my teeth, get dressed, comb my hair, and crawl to the bathroom. Looking at anything that moved gave me the feeling that I was on a roller coaster that would not stop. I spent an awful lot of time lying on my side (to alleviate pressure in my right ear) with my eyes closed.

This condition leads not only to a sometimes scary lack of autonomy, but to some public embarrassment. When I could walk, I usually did it with my arms out, weaving and wobbling around, clutching onto tabletops, walls, and doorways for stability. People notice things like that, and they’re not always understanding about it, either. I’ve had people make some pretty derisive comments about me when they were standing right nearby (I may have a problem with my balance, but I’m not deaf!) Also, I often felt like I was going to fall off of chairs, benches, etc., so I found myself sitting on the floor. Even though I still felt unstable on the ground, I was somewhat comforted by the knowledge that it is impossible to fall off the floor. When you sit on the floor with your eyes closed (remember, looking at anything that moves–at all–made me feel seasick, and there’s usually something moving almost everywhere you go) clutching at the linoleum for dear life, people can become somewhat disconcerted.

I’m now able to walk around without any obvious impairment and can look at scrolling type for more than a second without becoming ill. But I can’t ride in cars, I can’t ride a bike for more than a few minutes, and I can’t bend over and pick things up for too long before I start to feel like I’m going to fall over.

Having labyrinthitis has changed my personal life. You really learn who your friends are in times like this. (Someone who I considered one of my best friends simply ignored me completely when I told her I was sick. She finally called me last night, wanting to know if–get this–I wanted to come Latin dancing with her and a few buds. I’m not sure what part of the concept “Scribble can’t stand up and needs help with basic functions” she didn’t understand, but I know that I don’t understand why I’d continue to think of her as my friend.)Of course, the dynamic between me and my boyfriend has changed quite a bit, too.

My professional life hasn’t gone unaffected, either. My research is shot completely for this year (I rely on a summer field season to do my work), and my advisor is getting antsy. (Yes, he’s being sympathetic, but, ultimately, he cares about getting the work done.) I’ve been unable to work for the past couple of months, which means I’ve not been getting paychecks for a while, either. This makes me broke, off-balance, and possibly without a thesis. Not good.

Sorry to go on for so long, but I haven’t been able to type out anything of this length for quite some time, and I’ve had a very limited audience to whom I could vent. It feels so good to be able to sit upright at my computer, without feeling like I’m going to fall over and technicolor yawn! I’m still dizzy, but I’m getting better. Yeee-haw!!!

18

Okay–a small erratum.

I should have said that I was unable to work steadily for two months. I was put on steroid treatments 3 times, which gave me decent balance for a few days here and there. So I haven’t been totally without income–just mostly without income.

19

About 10 years ago, I awoke at 3am with chest pains. I went to the emergency room, had an EKG and some other tests. Nothing was found. I went to the doctor a couple of days later and found out I had costrochondritis. The condition was cured by time and Advil. That, and a hiatal hernia, is about the extent of my physical ails.

20

I have sarcoidosis, with red bruise-like granulomas all over my body. Thats not the bad part. The ones on my face ulcerate and ooze, and now I have an skin infection(staph IIRC). This is not so bad, except I have to avoid beer,pain relievers,dairy products, and the sun because of the meds I am on.