The Real Reason Why I Itch
I have Eczema. Don’t worry, I don’t want pity nor any sympathy, in fact, I could rationalise most of my condition as somehow giving myself a unique opportunity to be a better person. Since I can remember-which my parents can vouch for-I have scratched and itched my way through life; sure, I could let you into my world-try to guide you through the struggles of sleeping and monotonously lead you through the daily punishment my skin puts me through. But that’s not me-not anymore. It’s all in the past and frankly, if I did open up, it would leave me quite vulnerable like a lost Simba. Who needs to be that open anyway?
I do get vastly jealous when I see friends and family, flaunting their wholesome skin: smooth and supple it draws my eyes so much so that I must seem like Silence of the Lamb’s antagonist, Buffalo Bill. My skin is mostly affected around the joints, the places where I delightfully sweat most. As a child I was immensely counter-productive, I would wear clothes that covered a lot of my skin as best as possible-even during the hot summer months. Those days I came home shaking from the need to itch, the salt expelled in my sweat aggravated the condition even more so that I could have applied to the Guinness World Records for fastest removal of clothes just to complete the ritual.
“You’ll grow out of it, most do.” That was my mantra, both given to me then oft repeated by myself whenever I had particularly bad days. If my condition was a Pokemon, it wouldn’t be especially rare — not a shiny or anything — just something that is fairly hard to be certain about. Maybe a Ditto — it could be anything when it wanted to be.
Even Ylvis’s “The Fox (What Does The Fox Say?)” song was a fantastic exploration of ambiguity and a much better way to describe the possible causes of Eczema. It could be anything from food allergies, dust allergies, the weather, allergies to materials, stress or to even running in the family. But if you have it yourself now, try not to worry — you might grow out of it.
There are those fantastic moments of paranoia when you catch someone glancing at the deep wrinkles in your skin, you feel like they want to ask you something about it but don’t and then you don’t push it as you can’t be sure that they had been looking. That is where awkward silence lives. Occasionally you might find yourself speaking with someone who used to have Eczema or a family member who managed to “cure” themselves of it, they will usually come with an expertise of the subject which is guaranteed to fix your problem. But you are now so jaded and doubtful from the many others that came before them that so epically failed. So you smile and nod, promise to give their process a go and drop eye contact with them until they leave. Runner-up trophies have littered my room: empty prescribed medicine containers, tubs of alternative oils and the remains of bags that once held various Chinese herbal ingredients. There is nothing quite like turning up at work smelling heavily of coconut and drinking a ghastly tea concoction.
“Just stop scratching.” Is one saying that never fails to make me react. It’s a subtle reaction, like a turning and narrowing of the eyelids that eloquently hush any further comments. It is a stupid thing to say, as much as asking someone who hiccoughs to kindly to stop. The problem is once you start it becomes an almost impossible task to stop, only the strongest conscious thought and restraint can manage the urge to itch. Let us see if you can do it.
Picture the scene.
You’re amongst the grass, there is a ladybird climbing an extra long blade of grass and you begin to count the black dots against the red hue of the insect. You catch sight of a large brown centipede roaming the ground, it isn’t pretty or colourful and the way it moves its many legs makes you inclined to move. Then a cool breeze hits the nape of your neck, you shiver and your body convulses as you feel little tingles along with the rising goosebumps of your left shoulder.
I itched myself as I finished those sentences, but that may be because I’m always open to suggestion. Trying to stop scratching is hard enough, bringing attention to it, I find, only encourages it further. So for me causes such as simple clothing are easy enough to explain why I itch; but as I have grown I find myself more aware of why I continue to scratch — even when the immediate urge is gone. It’s because I like it. Like swatting an irritating fly, it culminates with deep satisfaction. Everyone experiences that feeling of relief when you hit that “sweet spot”, but my body goes further and has become addicted to that sensation. The experience could be compared to the smallest tickle, with both situations the nerves are being stimulated: albeit one is sensitivity focused with the barest of touches and the other overindulges the nerves by flooding the senses with stimuli. But during my younger years, I wonder if my body and mind began to crave that feeling of ecstasy-becoming addicted to it? I would say yes.
There have been too many occasions where I have scratched my skin so hard that I knew I had gone too far: that the temporary high had caused me to not just “scratch the surface” but done damage that will be hard forgotten and that I had indeed been creating that whiff of burning flesh.
I do like a bracing hot shower, the deep cleansing of the body makes me feel like a new person almost but it comes at a cost of removing the skin oils that are essential to keeping the skin less abrasive. But under that cascade of hot water your brain demands of you to just stay a little bit longer, to enjoy more of that euphoric feeling — just one more minute.
This is my confession. I can admit that the real reason why I can’t stop myself from scratching is that maybe, just maybe, I really don’t want to. It’s like my own private love/hate relationship.
Richard Davis
Originally published at http://therichdavisblog.wordpress.com on July 4, 2019.
