An Eczema Love/Hate Story

“I keep on falling in and out of love, with you!” “How can you give me so much pleasure, then cause me so much pain.” Quoting the classic, “Fallin” song by Alicia Keys may not be the most obvious connection to eczema, but the back and forth, give and take message of the lyrics dealing with a toxic, unhealthy relationship sparks a link to my physical unhealth story.

The good

I often express how much eczema has taught me to be my best self, health-wise, and define positives from this condition. For the way that eczema has shaped me in the way that I think, fight, and find motivation I am forever thankful and never regretful of it. I have a love story with my eczema.

The bad

With all of these feelings of appreciation and joy at the end of the dark road, how can I still have the strong thoughts of hatred towards the very thing I profess to love? It is easy, eczema has caused me pain and has the potential of causing me pain in the future. Even thinking about eczema sometimes makes me hate it for the time that I have lost in some of my prime years of youth because of it. Also, the thought of eczema defining me after it has all healed because of how much I continue to talk about it in the hopes of helping others and recognizing that my story is important, is at times daunting as well. So, besides the obvious of hating the pain of eczema, I also have a hate story even when it isn’t immediately interrupting my life.

It's a balance

As I was preparing to write this article especially since it was inspired from hearing a song, I could not help but think about multiple areas of life where there is a love/hate or good/bad scenario. Simply, the majority of life’s greatest experiences or lessons are oftentimes coupled with love and hate, or good and bad. That helps bring balance and acceptance with my relationship with eczema. Days of questioning why I continue giving so much attention to my eczema story and I am finally progressively better, I recognize that not talking about it would only take me backward instead of continuing to grow and learn from the situation.

With that said all toxic relationships should be dealt with. Unfortunately, as humans, the search and maintenance of love often include painful situations for the blissful moments to arise. So, to get to the point of peace and love with your eczema as you continue to learn and find ways to better your situation also realize the hate, pain, and anguish of the process is all a part of your classic love story.

Eczema is part of who we are, not all of it

The love story of self is the greatest one of all. Although we have a big ugly monster to overcome that stares us in the face that isn’t reflective of who we really are, it still is a part of us. Similar to the reality that all of us have bad sides of ourselves that we do our best not to become our dominant nature, we do our best for our eczema scars not to be the only story and part of what we can hold as a memory of who we are. So, although we may fall in and out of love with our eczema journey, we are not confused as to how it can cause so much enlightenment or pleasure and at the same time cause us so much pain. It is all a part of what often turns out to be the best parts of life, which is a very imperfect love story.