Skin care

The good news is that my face is looking great.  The pustules have not returned.  A few little ones appear from time to time, but they’re hard to spot unless you’re really looking – and who’s looking at me that closely?  The twice daily embalming of my face with nourishing creams has definitely made my skin smoother and softer.  The skin looks and feels better than in years.  I should have started this cosmetics thing much earlier.  The red spots on my shoulders are also much less oppressive than they were a few weeks ago.  I can still see them in the mirror but my hands hardly feel anything out of the ordinary below my neck.

Is all good then?  Another therapy without serious side effects?  Not exactly.  The tips of my thumbs are lacerated with little cuts that I did not inflict on myself.  The anti-EGFR antibody causes my skin to open along the dermal ridges.  These cuts don’t seem to heal easily.  They stay open and cause pain.  It’s a good thing they’re only on my thumbs.  At least I can still type.  I wish I had a phone that unlocks by recognizing my face.

One cut on my right thumb is like a cleft, half a centimeter long and more than a millimeter wide.  There is no blood, and it seems as if a tentative healing process has started, but it’s slow going, with frequent setbacks.  The continued treatment with antibody is working against me.  My doctor said there was nothing to do.  I would have to suck it up and live with it.  The nurse was of a different opinion and recommended an unguent of vaseline spiked with salicylic acid, something a pharmacy provides against a prescription.  I started applying the ointment yesterday and might already be seeing an improvement on the tips of my thumbs.  The gash is still open, but it looks less raw.  I might be imaging or willing this.

In other news, I have set up my bicycle in the spare room again and reactivated my FulGaz subscription.  I stay (rather than go) for a ride every other night and on Saturday mornings.  The time to ride outside is definitely over.  It’s dark, cold and rather wet.

Christmas is only a month and a half away, and I have absolutely no idea of what we’re going to do or where we’re going to be, and with whom we’re going to celebrate.  The only thing that’s for sure is that we’re not going to Argentina.  I might book a week in the Black Forest, trying my luck one more time.  So far, we’ve been extremely lucky with our plans this year.

We spent a week in the Alps in February before corona became a thing.  We spent a week in Italy during the summer lull and one in Montreux in October right before Switzerland went belly up.  Maybe Christmas will be a period of respite between the second and third waves of the epidemic.

What I don’t write about at all today is the previous chemotherapy session.  It was a week ago, and there’s nothing I could write that would be new or special or interesting.  I went through it as always, and that’s that.  I know how lucky I am.