Remember a year ago when I talked a little bit about going to the derm and being diagnosed with rosacea? Yesterday I finally had another derm appointment. I'd been meaning to make one for ages, because ever since Italy my face had annoyingly disgusting breakouts of acne-like bumps. So about a month and a half ago (it takes that long to get in to see my derm, who isn't really a derm, but a PA; though a damn good doctor. I love her.) I bit the bullet after a particularly nasty bout of bumps and made the appt. I was also looking forward to asking about some weird clear bumpy things that pop up on my hands time and again, and a white bump on my temple that is sort of strange. I wasn't really nervous about these things, just interested to see what was going on.
People, here it is: my skin just really, really sucks. The bumps on my fingers are a form of eczema (though not an unsightly one), which isn't surprising, ther derm told me. Eczema is genetically related to the keratosis pilarsis that is cannibalizing my body one part at a time (and is in fact also apparent on my jawline), and so it's not shocking in the least that it's showing up on me. It's a pisser, although it's non-contagious, so it's not going to spread all over. But I suppose the downside to this is that there is nothing to stop me from developing other, more unsightly eczemas. Lovely. The white bump on my face (a teensy raised bump that's barely visible) is just a cyst, and completely harmless one. The derm offered to "cut it out" (her phrasing) of my face, but I said no thank you. I don't like the way knives and human skin work together. It mostly induces pain. So, two down, one problem to go.
Of course, and I knew this would be so, my bumps were mostly gone by yesterday. A month and a half of waiting will usually bring that about. But she was very clear on the fact that not only do I have a recurrent bump problem, but also a redness issue, which has something to do with the blood vessels under the skin. The bump problem is hopefull going to be taken care of by a new topical medicine, and then for really bad flare-ups, an antibiotic. I'm very hesitant to use an oral medication for a skin condition, so I'm going to only use it in cases of extreme need. I don't feel like I'm there yet, but I've also been holding out hope for a new topical too. I'm just hoping beyond hope that this new topical is enough to keep those bumps at bay, or at least mute them a bit. If that's the case, I most likely won't use the oral antibiotic.
Now, the redness is another story. The only thing that can fix that (because it's the under the skin blood vessels) is laser treatments. They're VERY expensive, and have to be repeated a few times to really have the desired outcome. And, ever so wonderfully, they bruise your skin so badly that it looks like you've got blueberries smashed onto your face for about seven days. There is a lesser bruising treatment, but that one has to be repeated even more, which is more expensive. I'm not jumping up and rushing out to do this laser thing--blueberries? Seven days? But I'm also aware that this redness might get way worse than it already is. I'm ok with it right now, how it is. It doesn't give me much cause to feel bad about myself. (The bumps are another story when involved with the confidence levels.) So I'm going to have to adopt a wait-and-see kind of an attitude about the laser treatments. I can't say no for certain, because I don't know how bad I'm going to get.
All in all, I'm cautiously optimistic about the whole thing, and I guess you can go ahead and assume things are better unless I have a reason to blog here again.
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