Allergic to Isothiazolinone? You Can Probably Relate To This List:

1.     You feel as if the world is out to get you. When you first got your patch test results, you might have thought “no biggie. I’ll just read some labels and get rid of anything that has ingredients ending in isothiazolinone.” But no. It doesn’t stop there. Half your products don’t list the ingredients. Others only list vague terms, such as “preservative” and “fragrance.” And the number of products that contain isothiazolinone in one of its various forms is mind-boggling. This poison is everywhere; you trust nothing.

2.     You’ve become an expert ingredient reader. You can pick an isothiazolinone out of an ingredient list in three seconds flat—even the ones where they try to trick you by splitting up the name between two different lines. Take that methylchloroisoth-

      iazolinone!

3.     You actually know how to pronounce methylchloroisothiazolinone. People look at you funny when you say it without stumbling.

4.     You’re suspicious of anything labeled “free & clear,” “hypo-allergenic,” “natural,” “green,” or “organic,” because you know that these terms are used all willy-nilly and are no guarantee that the product doesn’t contain harmful ingredients. You feel sad for the people who proudly use these allegedly “environmentally safe” and “healthy” brands. Little do they know…

5.     You can no longer shop at Walmart. Trying to find soap that you can use at any mainstream store usually results in a mental breakdown. You pick up a product, read the ingredients and find yourself struggling to resist hurling the bottle to the floor. And to top it off, getting anywhere near the air freshener aisle makes you ooze for weeks! Speaking of ooze…

6.     The camera roll on your phone contains hundreds of rash pictures. You know, just in case your dermatologist wants to see the day-to-day progression of your latest flare. (Trust me… they probably don’t).

7.     You’re not sure you fully trust your dermatologist. They don’t seem particularly read up on MI/MCI issues or even contact dermatitis in general. Didn’t they go to school for this? Why are they still handing out samples containing common allergens to eczema patients? One day you hope to find a derm who really gets it. You’ve heard they’re out there, but like the ever elusive four-leafed clover, you’ve yet to find one.

8.     You’re afraid to try new things or go new places. New products have burned you (quite literally) in the past. They’ve hidden MI in the fragrance. Or just “forgot” to put it on the ingredients list. You’ve found that few companies will give you a straight answer when you ask them to disclose what’s in their product. Becoming a hermit seems to be the safest bet for staying rash free. New environments make you break out.

9.    You’ve become that weirdo… the one that carries around their own hand soap. You refuse to pet your neighbor’s dog. You recoil in fear when someone tries to shake your hand. The smell of fresh paint makes you flee in terror. You’d rather pee in a bush than risk it in a bathroom that smells like air freshener. This allergy has unintentionally turned you into a hippie. You now rub yourself in hemp oil, talk about your organic soap nut laundry detergent and preach the dangers of the cosmetic industry to anyone who’ll listen—and anyone who won’t too.

10. Television commercials make you roll your eyes and shout obscenities at the T.V. “No! Don’t wash your laundry in that! What are you doing? You shouldn’t put that lotion on a baby. Don’t spray that air freshener. People are going to need a HAZMAT suit to enter the house!” You can’t believe the lies they’re able to tell the unassuming public. 

11. Traveling can be a nightmare. Airplane recirculation vents, toxic rental car cleaners, freshly cleaned hotel rooms and bedding washed in mystery detergent, crowded subway cars, Ubers with a forest full of those little air freshener trees—these things make for potentially itchy vacations. Good thing seeing the world is worth a little pain and inconvenience.

12. You’ve been called crazy. You’ve been told that it is all in your head. Nobody believes that someone could be allergic to such a tiny amount of chemical that’s in so many products. People act like you’re making it all up just to inconvenience them. But you’re not. Allergic contact dermatitis is a real condition and you are really suffering from it. Nobody would question someone’s peanut allergy; why don’t they believe you?

13. You’ve stopped telling people about your condition. You are sick of hearing people say, “Oh, if you just try such-and-such your eczema will magically disappear.” You’ve tried it all. It didn’t work. Allergies don’t work like that and you don’t want any more unsolicited advice. Sure, you probably should stop eating sugar and processed foods. And yeah, probiotics are a good thing to take for optimal gut health. You’re glad that the lotion your sister’s dog walker swears by works for him, but it contains one of your allergens and therefore is not an option… Why do people always think that they can cure you?

14. Despite knowing that there is no cure other than avoidance, you’ll try just about any snake oil to get rid of the itch. Bleach baths? Check. Apple Cider Vinegar? Check. Hemp oil? Check. Fermented cod liver oil and turmeric? Check and check. Does anyone know where one can get actual snake oil? You’ve heard it does wonders!

15. You would never wish this allergy on anyone. And that’s why you’ve become an advocate against MI and all of its biocidal cousins (MCI, BIT, OIT, etc). You know that it’s a strong sensitizer and as long as companies are still putting it in products, no one if safe from developing a contact allergy to it. And being allergic sucks.

16. Some days you are overwhelmed. You sometimes struggle to stay positive. But you refuse to let a single preservative ruin you life. You carry on, armed with your own hand soap and a new wealth of knowledge. You know that one day you will get this all under control. You know that you are not alone.

Musings of an Unintentional Hippie

Ten years ago, nobody would have called me a hippie.

I’ve never been what you would describe as an “earthy” person. I don’t get along with the outdoors—grass and pollen make me sneeze. I can’t stand the feel of dirt on my feet or under my nails. I avoid anything muddy, gritty, or sticky. I hate bugs and I avoid the sun like a vampire.

I could never claim to be an “environmentalist.” I fully condone hunting furry creatures. I’ve never been particularly concerned about saving water. I should probably recycle more than just my aluminum cans. I planted a tree on Arbor Day once, but it died.

I’m not a vegan (I grew up on a dairy farm) and I don’t eat paleo. I’ll take chocolate over kale any day of the week. I’m not quite sure what tabouli and quinoa are, and I’m only a moderate fan of granola. I don’t go out of my way to buy organic.

I shower. I shave. I wash my hair. I brush my teeth. I wear deodorant. I get frequent haircuts and I’ve never sported dreadlocks.

Tie-dye and peasant blouses make me look fat. I’ve never smoked pot. I can’t stand the smell of patchouli. I've never burned incense.

I’ve always considered myself a pretty average—if not slightly high maintenance—person. In my younger years, I wouldn’t have even dreamed about leaving the house without first doing my hair and makeup.

I was always eager to try out new products. Shellac? BB cream? Dry shampoo? Cleansing conditioner? I was all over it. Like the majority of American women, I chose my products based primarily on scent.

My poor hair took a real beating in cosmetology school. I colored it monthly—at least—and would frequently flat iron my messy waves into submission. Eventually I learned to embrace my curls, though this required a daily cocktail of mousse, oils, gels, creams and sprays. Even after I left my career in the beauty industry, I still felt the most at home in the hair care aisle. Beauty, and skin care is something that I was, am, and always will be passionate about. (I just have to go about it all in a different way these days.)

Ten years ago I never would have guessed that I’d be wearing unscented deodorant and cleaning my house with baking soda and vinegar. I never would have thought that I would willingly throw out all of my perfumes, body sprays and scented soaps. I never would have imagined that I’d carry around my own hand soap with me everywhere and wash my laundry in organic detergent. I had never even considered washing my face with oil, covering my body in dead-sea mud or spraying my hands down with apple cider vinegar. If you had told the germaphobic me of ten years ago that one day I would be terrified of clean bathrooms and the smell of febreeze, I wouldn’t have believed you.

Yet here I am. Not your average American girl anymore…

…but not really a full-blown hippie yet either.

I have the feeling that living with allergic contact dermatitis is going to be a long journey. First came the shock of realizing that I couldn’t use most commercially available products. Then came the research: What are isothiazolinones and why do they make me itch? The more research I did, and the more people I talked to who were going through the same thing as me, the more I understood and the better I could avoid my allergens. I cut so much junk out of my life. Junk I never even realized was junk. But I was left with an intense feeling of sadness for what I had lost. I lacked a sense of self-identity.

If I wasn’t the girl with the bathroom stocked full of sweet scented hand soap, who was I?

If I couldn’t use “normal” products, what could I use?

Many of the substitutes I found were from companies who pride themselves in being things such as:

Natural

Organic

Cruelty Free

One day I looked at my medicine cabinet and realized that I had collected a whole bunch of hippie shit—not by choice but out of necessity.

When you’re itchy, you’re desperate for anything to make the rash go away. If someone told you to grind up unicorn poop and rub it on your face, you might think, “why not? I’ll try anything at this point!”

I’ve found that sometimes the wacky hippie cures work… Sometimes they don’t. What worked for others doesn’t always work for me, just as what works for me won’t always work for you. Everyone’s situation has unique aspects to it.

Not all of us are cut out to make our own lotions, go without antiperspirant, no-poo our hair, brush our teeth with coconut oil or wash our dishes in a cool mountain stream. And that’s ok. I’m trying to find things that work for me—for who I am now and for who I want to be in the future.

So for now I am just an unintentional, somewhat reluctant, hippie.

Thanks for joining me on my journey.

Three Easy DIYs for the Non Do-it-yourselfer

I’ve always been fascinated by the type of people who take on do-it-yourself projects. Some people are just incredibly crafty. They can re-purpose old furniture found on curbs, sew their own clothes, make meals from scratch out of ingredients they have grown in their organic gardens, shear their own sheep and knit themselves socks with the homespun wool… I am not one of these people. I am lazy.

Don’t get me wrong. I have nothing but respect for anyone who has the time, energy and creative abilities to take on a DIY. But I’m just not that type of person. I don’t have a Pintrest account because I know full well that anything I try to duplicate will end up on the “fails” list. And while I like to dabble in some artsy activities on occasion—I’m an avid crochet-er, a fantastic baker, an amateur photographer, and a sporadic crafter—too much right brain thinking makes my head numb. I’d rather read a book or binge watch something on Netflix.

When I was first diagnosed with an allergy to isothiazolinones, my heart sank. So many of the products that I had been using needed to be thrown into the trash and I was left scrambling to find suitable alternatives. I spent hour after hour on the internet trying to find some sort of a comprehensive list of products that were safe for me, but nothing of the sort seemed to exist. It was incredibly frustrating and I started to worry that I was going to have to start making all of my own products. I feared that I was going to become one of those people—a do-it-yourselfer.

And so I scoured the web for recipes: body wash, lotions, shampoos, deodorants, toothpastes, dish soaps, laundry detergents, cleaning supplies—it seemed like everything could be made from scratch. But I still didn’t want to do it. First off, the number of supplies needed to make these things was overwhelming (read: money). Second, after obtaining these supplies I’d have to spend the time creating the products (read: trial and error… and in my case, most likely error). And third, then I’d have to figure out a way to preserve this stuff. Sure, preservatives are what got me into this mess in the first place, but they serve a vital purpose—to keep our products from going bad. Unfortunately, many of the DIY products I found called for new product to be mixed prior to each use.  This endless cycle of product creation did not appealed to me.

And then I had another concern: would these products even work? There’s a reason that big companies have formulated commercial products the way they have—they get the job done. They may be loaded with nasty chemicals and preservatives, but they do what they were created to do and they do it well. That’s what keeps consumers keep coming back for more: products make our lives easier.

Luckily, through the help of tools like EWG’s Skin Deep website, the Think Dirty iPhone app, and recommendations from fellow MI/MCI victims on Facebook—along with reading a lot of ingredient lists—I was able to find some excellent alternatives (which I will write about soon!).

And as it turns out, I did decide to go the do-it-yourself route on a few products as well.

Foaming Castile Soap

~2 tablespoons liquid castile soap

Water

Foaming soap pump

I feel a little odd calling this one a DIY since it’s essentially just watering down regular soap.

Castile soap is great, but straight up it can be a little drying. So I take a pretty blue-tinted glass soap foamer that I found at HomeGoods and I put in a few capfuls of Dr. Bronners, Dr. Woods, or Acure castile soap (or sometimes a mixture of the three), fill the rest up with distilled water and give it a good shake. If the foam isn’t thick enough, I add more soap. If it’s too thick, I add more water. It’s the perfect gateway DIY product for a non do-it-yourselfer like myself.

Sea-Salt Spray

2 tablespoons Epsom salt

~2 ounces aloe vera juice (optional)

~6 ounces water (preferably distilled)

8 ounce spray bottle

Sea salt spray is just too easy not to make yourself. This was a perfect DIY product for me, since epsom salt is something that I always have on hand (for relaxing foot soaks, of course). It’s kind of criminal that stores sell sea salt spray for so much when it’s so easy and economical to make your own. So here’s what I do:

·      Using a tiny funnel I found in my kitchen “catch-all” drawer, I scoop some Epsom salt into a cute amber glass spray bottle I found on Amazon.

·      Next I pour some aloe vera juice (the watery stuff—not the gel) into the bottle until it’s about a quarter full. (I use George’s brand that I get from Swanson Health because it’s one of the few I've found that doesn’t contain additional additives.) If you don’t have aloe juice, you could add some aloe gel instead, or just skip it.

·      Then I fill the bottle up the remainder of the way with water. I use distilled in the hopes that it will help the product keep longer, but to be honest I use it up so fast that I’ve never had a problem with it going bad.

·      Finally, I screw the cap on the bottle and give it a good shake until all of the salt is dissolved. 

The great thing about sea salt spray is that the measurements are very forgiving. As long as your bottle contains salt and water, you’ve got yourself a sea salt spray. Easy peasy!

Body Mist

20-30 drops of essential oils

½ teaspoon glycerin

1 ounce witch hazel

3 ounces distilled water

My third project required me to go out and purchase a few essential oils. Being completely new to essential oils, I felt like this was a big step for me in my journey towards hippiedom. Since I didn’t want to risk smelling like patchouli, I chose fruity scents like lime, sweet orange, grapefruit and tangerine to start with. The finished product ended up with a light, fruity scent, which I really like.

So as you can see, if I take on a do-it-yourself project, it’s quick and easy. As I continue to dive deeper into the realms of DIY I’m sure I’ll be up for more complicated tasks, but for now simple is all I can handle.

If you’re in the same place, don’t feel bad.

If you’re one of those super crafty do-it-yourselfers… well, I envy you.

My On-Again Off-Again Relationship With Contact Lenses

I got my first pair of glasses when I was in second grade. They were big and ugly--the round metal rims decorated in some sort of gaudy floral theme that could only have been designed by someone's senile grandmother (in the dark). I consider this event in my life to be the beginning of "the awkward years" that would last well into my teens.

My poor eyesight is genetic. My parents both wear glasses, as did their parents before them. If the world still operated on the principles of natural selection, my genetic line would have long since fallen off a cliff or been hit by a bus. We just can't see worth a damn.

I wore a series of ugly glasses throughout my childhood, avoiding pictures whenever possible--attempting to destroying them when not. It wasn't until I turned 15 that I finally got contact lenses. I had wanted them for a few years already, but the thought of having to touch my eyeball to get them in did not appeal to my squeamish sensibilities. It took me several appointments over the course of a year before I was finally able to put a pair of contacts in without flinching, but from that point on I ditched my glasses and never looked back.

Until 2007. For some reason, that was the year I found myself pulling my glasses out of storage more and more often. It started with my eyes getting dry whenever I wore my contacts. For awhile I was able to solve this with re-wetting drops, but then I developed a red ring around the edge of the contact in my right eye--(why only the right eye, I have no idea). My eye would burn and itch and the only relief I would get was from removing the contacts and letting my eye heal for a few days. Yet as soon as the contacts went back in, the redness and accompanying burning sensation returned. Eventually my left eye started to react too and I finally went to see an Ophthalmologist who prescribed me steroid eye drops and told me to stop napping with my contacts in. (Yeah, fat chance.)

"You've just got a little conjunctivitis," she said. "It'll be fine."

They cycle continued for many months. I'd wear contacts, they'd irritate my eyes, I'd give them up for a week or two... wash, rinse, repeat. It really did a number on my self-esteem at the time, as I hated the way that I looked in glasses. Glasses always made me feel like a dowdy nerd--which I was--but as an aspiring hair stylist in a career field that valued beauty and non-nerdity, hiding my geekiness was important to me at the time. I just never really felt attractive in glasses...

The following summer was a rough one. My eyes continued to burn and the constant red circle left from the contact lenses was concerning. Since I was stuck wearing my glasses, I was unable to use proper sunglasses--making my already sore and sensitive eyes all that much more irritated. Finally I sought out a new eye doctor who suggested that I had developed an allergy to contact solution. He gave me a sample of Clear Care and told me to throw my regular solution in the trash.

It worked. The bubbly little hydrogen peroxide lens cleaner left my contacts clean and my eyes without itch or redness. I accepted the doctor's diagnosis of "allergy" without a second thought (or even a thought as to what particular component of the solution I was allergic to). By the time I got married in 2009, my eyes were as good as new and I've never had any further problems.

It was only after I got the results of my T.R.U.E test that it all began to make sense. It turns out that thimerosal was used as a preservative in most contact solutions during the time I was struggling with itchy eyes. Thimerosal contains mercury and while it does kill bacteria and prevent contamination, it's also very toxic.

It irks me that less than a decade ago, we were still using mercury as a preservative. I remember when I was a kid hearing people talk about mercury contamination in tuna, yet here I was, probably ten years later, putting mercury in my eye on a daily basis. And I had no idea.

While most contact solution has now been reformulated without thimerosal, this allergen still lurks in some vaccines, particularly multi-dose flu shots. I remember having quite the adverse reaction to a flu shot around the same time I was struggling with my contacts and have avoided them ever since (though I've been told you can get thimerosal-free flu shots now upon request).

I'm not sure when manufacturers started adding thimerosal to their lens solutions, but I do know that my allergy to it, like all type IV allergic contact allergies, did not develop overnight. I was slowly sensitized from continued use and my reaction grew stronger and stronger as my poor little eyes built up T-cells to fight off the perceived intruder. According to the information from my dermatologist provided me, thimerosal can still be found in some cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, and hygiene products, though I have yet to find it any of the products I've seen. I'm hoping that's because this particular preservative is one that is on it's way out for good!

As for me and my relationship with glasses, we're on much better terms these days. While I haven't had a problem with my contacts since I switched solutions, I've slowly grown tired of popping them in and out daily. Over the past several years, I've noticed myself reaching for my glasses more and more--which is nice as it allows me an extra few minutes to sleep in in the morning and a few more minutes to read before bed at night. Plus glasses have become a lot more stylish and affordable in recent years! I've become addicted to Zenni Optical, which will send me a complete pair of really cute glasses (even with my ridiculously strong prescription) for under $30. I've collected over a dozen pairs the past few years.

I'm so glad that geek is now chic.