After reading many messages on this message board, I felt the need to share the story of my bout with poison ivy. It has been a little over 2 weeks now and my poison ivy is almost all the way gone. The first patches that appeared are completely gone with a little scarring left behind, which will eventually go away. The patches that appeared later are almost all the way gone. THANK GOD.
The way I got it was most disturbing. It wasn't like I was out working in the yard or out in the woods or anything like that. I got it by going over my friends' house and sitting on their sofa. Me not knowing that they had poison ivy a couple of weeks before I went over there, didn't think twice about sitting on their furniture or even asking them if they had cleaned their furniture since they had it. Like I said, I din't even know they had poison ivy. A few days go by, and I start feeling this bad itching sensation on the back of my right leg, behind my knee. Didn't know what it was. Thought it might be a mosquito bite. It never went away. Then I started seeing little bumps and a rash. That's when I started to get nervous. I wake up the next morning and find a bad rash breaking out at the top of my right thigh near my right hip. That's when I knew it was poison ivy. It spread all over my stomach and the right side of my butt, which is very annoying by the way. Then, I felt it trying to appear on the right side of my face.
I immediately called my doctor and went in to see him. He put me on prednisone. I really wasn't sure what kind of lotion I should use. There are so many. Before I explain the prednisone, let me explain what lotion worked best for me. My friends, who had poison ivy before me, said they used Ivy Dry. I tried it. For the first few days it was very good. But soon thereafter it started drying my skin out terribly. My doctor told me you should always keep your skin moisturized. He said Cortaid Intense Therapy Moisturizing Cream is the best. Let me just say, IT IS THE BEST. USE IT. NOW. And make sure you wash your hands thoroughly right after every time you rub lotion on it. And do not scratch it, ever. That's the worst thing you can do.
Back to the Prednisone. I read on this board that Prednisone does not work for some people. I was hoping I wasn't one of those people. He gave me my first pack of prednisone. Each pill was only 4 mg. But, given that it is steroids I figured the dosage would be enough. It wasn't. It helped my first patches a little, but by the end of my first pack, they were still there and looked kind of strong still. He prescribed another pack for me saying that some people need two packs to get rid of it. I started my second pack and by the end of my second pack my first patches were going away, but new patches were popping up on my arms and legs. I called my doctor and he said he wanted to see me. I went into his office and he told me that he sees a few people like me every year that are more allergic to poison ivy than most people. He gave me a shot in the arm of prednisone and gave me a much higher dosage of Prednisone in pills. I believe each pill is 10 mg. He also gave me some Allegra pills for the itching and told me to start putting the Cortaid on it.
Well, thank God that the Prednisone and Cortaid have knocked it out. I can honestly say that was one of the worst two weeks. I hope I have given you some useful information to help you win your fight with poison ivy. If you have any questions don't hesitate to ask as I will definitely be checking back to help anyone with this most annoying problem. Take care and good luck to everyone. |
