'My skin felt like concrete and I was trapped inside for FIVE months'

A woman who spent years relying on creams to control her eczema was left feeling like she’d been “boiled alive” and like she had a “coating on concrete” on her skin after quitting the medication.

Isobel Stewart first suffered from eczema as a baby before it disappeared and returned in her mid-teens.

Initially, the condition was relatively mild, with itchy patches on her calves, behind her knees, wrists and inner elbows.

But after eight years of using steroid creams, the 35-year-old’s eczema began behaving differently.

Eventually, the customer service advisor says, every inch of her skin was affected.

“It was just a patchy, blotchy rash all over my body, but eventually all the patches joined up and my entire skin was a uniform beetroot-red, like I’d been boiled in hot water,” Isobel, from Leeds, West Yorks, told Need To Know.

A woman who quit her eczema steroid creams says she felt boiled alive - her skin turned beetroot red, oozed and left her housebound and screaming for months. — Isobel before. (Jam Press/The Trauma Diaries, A Journey to Healing)

“Every inch of my skin itched, and clothes felt rough and uncomfortable against it.

“My skin didn’t feel real, like it had a coating of concrete over the top of it and, it was painful just to touch it.

“At first, I thought that my eczema was just becoming unmanageable and I was desperately looking at what could be the cause.

“I had no idea what could have caused it to spread so drastically and in such a short period.”

Isobel believes she was experiencing topical steroid withdrawal (TSW), a severe reaction that can happen after stopping long-term, frequent, or improper use of steroid creams.

Her ordeal began after she moved to Edinburgh with her husband, Glenn, 41, who was serving in the Armed Forces.

A GP declined to continue prescribing the cream, believing she had been using more than necessary.

Within days, Isobel says the redness began spreading across her body.

She said: “I turned to the internet to see if there were any other natural treatments or explanations for this sudden explosion of eczema.

“I saw websites warning me of the dangers of steroids.

“I thought it was ridiculous.

“I’d been using them for years and had never once been warned of any side effects.

“I knew they could thin your skin from reading the patient leaflet, but it felt like a small price to pay to get rid of my eczema.

“I’d never heard of it before and was absolutely shocked that something I’d relied upon for so long, that I considered as something that was helping me, could actually be making things worse.

“It terrified me, and I had a ‘what have I done?’ moment.”

At the height of her illness, Isobel says her skin was so damaged that even the smallest movement could cause it to split.

She said: “It was hell.

“It’s literal physical and mental torture.

“I woke up with my eyes stuck together.

“Taking the scabs off just to open my eyes was like peeling your skin off.

“I had open wounds all over my body, and the skin was constantly cracked, tearing and bleeding.

“Just moving and stretching was unbelievably painful and would cause the skin to split open.

“I had thick elephant skin on my knees that was so dry, it felt like being burned when I moved.

“Any small movement would have me crying in agony.

“My skin would ooze a yellow fluid that smelled vile.

“I would wake up stuck to my bedding with dried ooze from the night, have to peel myself off and leave most of my skin behind on the bed.

“The itching is on a different level.

“It’s like a living thing inside of you, moving and changing and growing, and the more you scratch, the deeper it gets.

“It’s insatiable and never-ending.

“I wondered if eventually I’d have no skin left.

“It was all over my clothes, in my hair, all over my house.

“It fell off me in thick clumps.”

Isobel lost her job, lived on her husband’s wages while she recovered and was housebound for five months.

She couldn’t shower because water caused extreme pain.

Instead, she’d clean with a flannel when she could tolerate it.

Her husband washed her hair over the side of the bath.

Isobel said: “I’d wake up at around 11am, peel myself off the bed.

“I could hoover up all my skin from the bed and floor.

“On a bad day, I’d spend the first two hours crying and screaming in front of the fan.

“When I sweated, it felt like acid running down my back because the sweat stung all the open wounds, and the sweat drying caused my skin to dry so severely, it felt like being turned to stone.

“My husband would come home for lunch and hear me screaming from the end of the street.

“He didn’t rush home to see what was wrong, even though it sounded like I was being attacked, because he knew there was nothing he could do and I had to ride it out.

“He’d hoover for me and help me get changed, as I couldn’t bend to do it myself.

“I couldn’t sit down as my skin would split open so I’d spend the afternoon standing at my ironing board doing things to occupy myself, or I’d be laid in the middle of the floor scratching and crying.

“When he got home, he’d make our tea and I’d eat standing up.

“Every second of every day was pain, itching, trying to find ways to make myself more comfortable.”

During the worst periods, she avoided mirrors.

Isobel said: “I developed a phobia of my own skin.

“I couldn’t bear to look at it, touch it, feel it.

“If my hand grazed a patch of skin while I was getting changed, I would retch, feeling physically sick.”

Today, she considers herself physically recovered after going through withdrawal for two years, apart from a tiny patch on the inside of her foot which never completely cleared.

But the psychological impact continued long after her skin began to heal.

Isobel has undergone therapy and continues to deal with anxiety.

Isobel said: “The only thing that kept me going was knowing it was temporary.

“I knew it could take years to heal, and I was prepared for that, but I didn’t for one moment lose hope that I would heal eventually.

“I don’t think my original eczema required steroids, and I feel this could have been prevented if things were handled differently.

“My skin is the best it’s ever been in my life.

“I can do anything I want, go wherever I want, and use anything on it without having to worry about a reaction.”

Isobel documented her journey in a diary that she’s published as a book, The Trauma Diaries: A Journey to Healing, to raise awareness of TSW.

She added: “For anyone suffering with TSW, try to find the cause of your eczema, reduce your exposure to allergens, try natural remedies like moisturisers and a clean diet before resorting to potent medication.