I appreciate all of the advice. It’s just strange that when you research the disease, everyone says it goes away after a certain period of time, but might come back. Then I read these stories of people that have been struggling with it for many, many years, which has me very worried.

Living in Phoenix, especially during the summer, avoiding the heat is next to impossible. If you go outside for more than a few minutes, you’re going to sweat - even if it’s 10pm at night. I go running outside when it’s dark for a few miles, but stopped for several months because I was one of those rare people that actually lost weight during the lockdown instead of gained weight. Therefore, I took an extended break which I have recently started to resume. However, changes in my exercise habits, as well as the weather, don’t really seem to make things any better or worse. I have a soft water filtration unit, but I know that's not the culprit, because it's been unhooked for the last few months (long story). Hard water or soft water doesn't really result in a change.

The only time I had a horrible flare up that became unbearable was when I skipped putting on my prescription creams for a couple of days out of curiosity. Even though I’m going to experiment with putting cilantro in my smoothie and applying zinc oxide to the area, I’m still going to apply the calcipotriene. At least for right now. I’m afraid if I stop that, I’ll have another flare up and from what I’ve read, it’s less harmful to take that continuously in comparison to the steroid creams, that I was warned by my current dermatologist would eventually destroy my skin. When I say "flare up," I'm mainly referring to the addition of new spots in addition to the old ones that never fully go away. What's strange is that when I went to the doctor originally, I never experienced itching at all. My concerns were primarily just cosmetic at that point.

What’s interesting is that I’ve always had a reputation for taking incredibly good care of my skin. Between my moisturizer, sunscreen, cleaning, and nightly application of RetinA (0.05%), my face has always looked excellent. I sometimes wonder if I’d have any benefit with applying RetinA to the affected areas as well, but couldn’t find much research about it and don’t want to risk it.

When I was at the dermatologist a few weeks ago, they also gave me a shot of some kind of steroid in my bottom, but I’m pretty sure that was a waste as well.

I’ve gotten so many suggestions from so many different people. Everything from changing my detergent, using different sheets, both avoiding sun (which I already do), as well as giving the affected area some sunlight. The treatment suggestions alone are enough to completely stress you out because many of them contradict each other.

As for now, I’ll just stick to the smoothies, avoiding soaping the area while keeping my shower temperature lukewarm, as well as trying out the zinc oxide in addition to the calcipotriene. I'm done with pills though, that much is for certain.