Exploring Possible Dishydrosis Triggers

Ok, you know how I said I would have no more soft drinks for at least a week? Yeah, I may have fibbed a bit there. On Sunday, we ended up taking a family excursion, which meant that I would be traveling in the car again. I had more Dr. Pepper. Oops!

In addition to that, I had a good bit of coffee over the weekend. That whole having to stay up all day and all night thing necessitated the heavy use of caffeine. There was really no other option there.

Can you guess what else happened over the weekend?

My dishydrosis flared and spread again. Hmmm….let’s think about this for a minute. I have ruled out sugar as a trigger. While I was on the cleanse, my blisters stopped spreading and began to heal. Considering the amount of maple syrup (sugar) I was taking in, sugar itself cannot be a trigger.

However, I have not ruled out refined sugar. High fructose corn syrup is a suspect, as is caffeine. These are the only two substances that I have been able to tie to both soft drinks and my coffee. High fructose corn syrup is in my coffee because I use the flavored non-dairy creamers. There’s so much sugar in them that I don’t have to add any other sugar.

Planning to Experiment

I think I have devised a plan to determine if it’s caffeine or refined sugar that’s flaring up my eczema. At some point when I’m sure the dishydrosis has stopped spreading again, I’m going to try drinking coffee with real dairy cream and sweetened with either maple syrup or agave nectar. If my eczema flares again, it’s caffeine that’s doing it. If it doesn’t, then it has to be refined sugar. Makes sense to me, anyway.

For now, I’ve got to get the flare back under control. I had some coffee yesterday, but no soft drinks. This morning I had some lemon water, a bit of chocolate milk, and some peppermint tea. I think there may have been high fructose corn syrup in the chocolate syrup, which I didn’t really consider until after I’d drank the stuff. Oh well…we’ll have to remember that for next time.

In the meantime, I’m going to be doing some lemonade and La Croix. I think I may be learning to like those things. I’m not in love with them, but they’re pretty good when you’re really thirsty. I shouldn’t have had the milk earlier. I’ll probably limit what I drink to just the lemonade, La Croix, peppermint tea, and of course plain water for the rest of the week.

On Friday or Saturday, I’ll see what my hands look like and decide then if I’m ready to try the experiment. In the meantime, it’s back to a more rigorous schedule of baking soda scrubs, alcohol swabs, and serious moisturizing. The good news is that the oldest places are healing nicely, so by the time the new blisters get angry, at least I won’t have the old ones to deal with.