Tinea Versicolor Archives

Finally over TV - cure or coincidence?

Hello! I have read this board for a while, but have never posted. I came across it several months ago while searching for information on T. Versicolor. It seems like several people suffer from this for years (I was one of them!), and I wanted to share my experience. First, I'm in no way associated woth any retail providers or product manufacturers, I simply know what worked & didn't work for e. This will be a long post, but I'm trying to include as much information as I can in case it helps someone out there. My TV has now been gone for 7 months, and I don't know if it's due to the "treatment" or not, but in case...

I'm 27 and had TV since I was 14. It was isolated to the back & back sides of my neck (perfect area to look like my skin was "dirty" to most people). When I was 17 a doctor told me I had a "very well-established colony of furfur" and prescribed Nizoral. I used Nizoral cream for 6 years w/o any significant improvement, but I was afraid of *not* using it because I figured that if it wasn't curing the problem, it was at least preventing it from spreading. I was able to identify my sleeping habits as a major irritant -- I invariably cock my head backwards in my sleep, leaving the back of my neck prone to become sweaty during the night (thought I do sleep with my hair up).

I tried everything I could think of, because it was something I was very self-conscious about... once I was standing in line at the store and heard the people behind me saying "she needs to wash her neck!" I tried OTC creams like Lotrimin & Hydrocortizone. I tried tea tree oil (stung like crazy & did nothing but make it flare up into bright, vivid red), Denorex/Selsun/various other medicated shampoos, peroxide, even facial astringent. Since I knew that nighttime was when most of the irritation occured, I tried putting baby powder on the beck of my neck before I went to bed. I tried using a blowdryer to thoroughly dry the back of my neck after showers. That didn't work so I switched from J&J to Gold Bond medicated. That didn't work so I tried countless other "remedies" -- and nothing worked at all.

Then one day when I went to buy more Gold Bond (even though it didn't work, it made sense to be using it so I held on to that tiny litle hope...) but they were out of it, so I picked up a bottle of "Mexsana" medicated powder. Put it on that night and it stung -- it has a strong menthol-ish scent so I'm guessing that's why -- but it went away after a minute or so. I kept using the Mexsana and didn't check my neck for a while - maybe 2 mos. Then one day I was rubbing the back of my neck and I suddenly noticed that I didn't feel any raised areas, so I looked in the mirror and the normally brown/red areas were barely visible. I'd had times where it would seem like it was going away, only to reappaer a few days later, so I thought nothing of it. All the while using only the Mexsana - nothing else.

The skin isn't perfect -- to me it still feels different than the surrounding skin -- maybe "leathery" is the word, or a little scarred -- but there are no signs of any raised areas or doscoloration, no irrittaion from it, etc. Other than a slightly (to me, my husband can't feel any difference) different feel, it's as though I never had any problem. I'm really keeping my fingers crossed that everything stays clear, and so far it looks good - over a half a year and nothing, where for more than 10 years I never had more than a few days of "slightly noticeable" rash, and NEVER had anything that looked clear or didn't feel raised and bumpy.

So anyway, the Mexsana may have done it, or played a part. I can't think of any other significant or insignificant change to my routine. If it didn't have anything to do with it, then it was a great coincidence - but I'll tell you that I'm afraid to stop using it, and still put it on every night before I go to bed.

Follow Ups:

• Re: Finally over TV - cure or coincidence? (TV option?) Archive Walt Stoll 10:16:52 8/05/03 (0)

In Reply to: Finally over TV - cure or coincidence? posted by Cathy on August 04, 2003 at 23:49:57:

Thanks, Cathy.

Walt