Dec 2022 update

 I guess I should still chronicle my experiences. I think i started this in case someone else should find it who needs it after not having much help from anyone for my situation after I basically had a bad reaction to a supposedly non-toxic essential oils based flea spray that ruined my life and my house and my stuff.

Looking back i should have gone to the emergency room but i had no idea how serious it was and i had no idea i was going to make it worse instead of better and I had no idea what i was dealing with.

and truthfully the doctors probably wouldnt have either.

it was covid and it was before vaccines and i didnt want to risk going to the emergency room for what seemed like a mild self-contained allergic reaction.

Thought id just clean up and be fine.

But instead i ended up.... i think.. this is the best theory i have anyway.... washing it into the washing machine and/or dryer and then washing basically all my clothes and bedding and textiles including the sofa covers and every single thing that touches my skin and that cumulative effect of wearing it around i think is how I got the peripheral neuropathy.

Or something like that.

It wasnt in the air like i thought whch is why no air purifiers or fans or leaving windows and doors open and industrial fans and pans of kitty litter and bags of charcoal and i cant even remember all the attempts to clean the air .. made zero difference.

and why no amount of washing things was working, because i was just washing it back into the clothes.

I know that after a year, i washed some towels that I'd bought at the thrift store and they came out of the machine with that smell so thats the only way i figured that out.

also once i got peripheral neuropathy there was an amount of my body just doing stuff. having sensations and it wasn't necessarily related to anyone. I know that now after years of still having it and understanding what makes it the worst seems to be scratchy fabrics and sugar and alcohol. and it has nothing to do with what came into contact with the stuff in the first place or didnt.

But i think in the beginning that was a factor.

I still dont know so much.

Basically i only beat it by taking everything out of the house including the carpet, repainting the walls, and moving in slowly with new stuff. I kept my hard furniture but everything else i got new stuff.

and my old stuff i junked more or less.

except my clothes.. any clothes that were for sure in the group of things i was wearing/washing at that time are gone. except i may have saved a few peices i love in case i can figure out how to rescue them. I feel like time almost has to rescue them but i dont know for sure if they are contaminated or not contaminated or where i can wash them safely because im not contaminating my new machines... but ill worry about that in another few years i think.

as for the clothes that were never contaminated im still to fat to wear a lot of them.

ive been saying for i think 2 years now ill diet and exercise and get my old body back and then ill deal with rescuing the clothes outside. but i have been soooo busy moving out/getting the house ready to move back in/moving back in/buying things i needed... since i started over from scratch and working to pay for all this. i changed jobs 2x in the last year but i earned myself a significant salary increase so i can pay off all this faster, and now im finally at a place where all there is left to do is pay off. the loan i had to take out to pay for it and the credit card debt i made after i ran out of loan money.

Still im finally in a good financial place. my total debt is back to about where it was before the pandemic when i used to live a life and do stuff, and my salary is now much higher and i finally think i found a great job for me that I will really like and be able to have a work/life balance.

and exercise.

i have time to make that priority now the house is back together and ive got my professional license so i dont have to be studying for tests outside of work and even though its cold af out right now, im already planning to suck it up and exercise through the rest of winter so i can birthday party to spring.

and then ill put my hot tub back out for fun 

and i can decide then if i want to mess with the clothes or not.

Last year i didnt want to. it was just sad going through them. 

I'm collecting new stuff.

There was never going to be a version of me that wasnt going to get new clothes anyway.

I've said that all along.

and i have a different life now and i dont even know if i know what clothes i need for it.

For this moment i have what i need.

I would like to get a social life. I'll need clothes of some sort for that but idk what just yet. I think its time to exercise and maybe that makes a difference.

itd be cool to get my old body back but i also have to concede that im turning 55 in 2 mos and maybe i dont get to have it back. but i'm gonna try to focus on trying to get it back next.

I have tried and failed for years now but i had so much other stuff going on i dont think it was possible.

id be cool if i didnt have so much other stuff going on now.

i want carpet. thats the other thing. still havent got carpet but i feel like i can put that off awhile longer till i pay down some more debt. i hate this area rug but i have to admit that getting area rugs is a lot less complicated than getting wall to wall carpet in a 600 sq ft house.

I hate the rug in the bedroom but i dont want to replace it because i want to get carpet. 

ill worry about that in spring.

its a snow day today and im not going anywhere or doing anything till it melts.

so my skin.. my back and my thighs mostly, still have sensations of prickling, itching, sunburn kind of pain, and other sensations too weird to explain, sometimes like a scrape maybe and sometimes its like vibrating or like heat.. but its way less intense than it was before and all the other symptoms like my body was shutting down and my heart was racing and my period wouldnt stop and i was sick to my stomach and i had other less polite gastro-intestinal problems and i feel like i even forgot some of the things happening to my body.. thats all gone now. and i dont have to slather myself in lotion all the time .. but sometimes maybe... but if i wear soft fabrics and dont overdo the sugar and stay away from booze its something i can live with. just sensations in my skin that dont scare me anymore because i know they are improving and hopefully will heal fully eventually but maybe not idk.

and my tounge. it still feels like its burned in one spot. I never really understood this. i guess its burning mouth syndrome. same thing its a nerve thing.. this stuff just attacked my nervous system. my tounge was swollen for months but i finally figured out that peroxide mouthwash somehow soothed it. and now it just feels like i have a permanently burned spot but thats also something i can live with. that i hope will improve with time. It has improved with time, but like my skin, its been so slow i cant honestly be sure if it will ever heal completely. its been years now.

its crazy to think its been years.

but im glad i dont feel like im in crisis anymore.

the path forward was essentially to start completely over. and figure everything out .. as much as i was able to figure out.. by trial and error. Most everything i learned is still just a guess after-the-fact. 

I still dont really know anything about anything.

but im gonna be ok.

last year this time i couldnt say that.

and im turning 55.

Maybe i dont need the clothes i wore when i was 30 anyway.

or maybe i do and ill figure out how to get back in them and wear them safely without contaminating my new stuff one day. When im smaller and its warmer out.

So the next thing to do is spend the rest of the winter doing diet and exercise.

after new years. cause thats what people do.