Month 4 Begins!! And Juicing!!

Today marks the beginning of month 4 - I threw away all my creams on February 14th of this year after coming across Kline's story.  Looking back, I can see improvements - although not in my skin.  Pictures of my skin initially showed some redness, a lot of excoriation all over, and dryness with oozing and redness mostly on my neck and chest.  Now I am red all over minus my mid thigh area, lower legs, and backside.  Everything else is red, red, red.  I am going through an almost constant flare since the beginning except for 3 breaks where I had 4-5 days of less itching and pain.  I feel I am still very swollen - especially my arms.  I ooze anytime I scratch and no matter where I scratch, my skin breaks open (except in the noted clear areas above).  I have noticed a few spots on my lower legs recently so this thing is still spreading.  

I have yet  to sweat or develop oil on my head - I go days without washing my hair and it never gets oily.  I still have a hard time maintaining a good temperature - I am either too hot or too cold.  I still cry at least once a week - all out crying over the pain, not able to work or do much of anything.  So where are these improvements?  

They are emotional and physical.  Emotionally I am able to deal with this more knowing I have come this far. I now view my days of crying as pitty parties whereas before I felt entitled to be so upset as to cry so hard.  I am not as short with my kids as I was initially - they have been my support along with my husband - doing pretty much all work around the house.  They let me take naps and play quietly until I wake up.  One of my kids told me I wasn't so frustrated as I have been.  As for physically - I noticed a recent change in my pain - I have more intense pain at times but getting into the tub has been much less painful this past week alone - even with all the scratching I have been doing.  Overall though I see my outlook on life improving - I am trying new things like juicing.  And I have returned to work one day a week - that day is hard but it gives me a sense of purpose and gives me something to compare how I am doing.  

As for juicing - I have always wanted to do a juice fast - especially when I was hell bent on finding a cure to this "eczema" before I learned about TSW.  But I never had the time or energy.  I now have the time, and a little bit of energy.  I have been taking lots of vitamins and supplements these past few months and noticed an increase in energy when I maximized them and started an all natural diet.  The only thing is I hate taking pills - even vitamins - they are not natural.  So I picked up on juicing again and did a lot of research - I found a great website with free juicing recipes - and they are mostly vegetables with a little bit of fruit to compliment the veggies.  I have tried some bad recipes in the past here and there - but the first recipe I tried today was very easy to drink.  It had cucumbers, romaine lettuce, spinach, celery, lemon, berries, and oranges in it.  All my kids tried it and everyone but the youngest liked it.  See how yummy it looks.......

I know it looks gross, but it tasted pretty good (especially considering I hate spinach)

I am prepared for a whole week of juicing!

I plan to juice 2 times per day - eat eggs for breakfast and then meat and veggies for dinner.  Us TSW warriors need a lot of protein for cell repair and generation.  So I plan to give my body as much as possible to help it heal as quickly as possible.  :)