Eczema Cure

Eczema cure; what a wonderful thought. Yet many like to say there is no cure. Right? Well before settling into that entrenched belief try this exercise. Imagine a child who has broken leg bones after falling from a tree. The specialist they need is an orthopaedic surgeon who can fix the bones. What if the child does it repeatedly? The doctor can treat the bones again and again.  Fairly soon the orthopaedic department is likely to suggest assistance from the psychology department. The broken bones are the result of the child’s decision to climb trees. Hitting the ground causes the damage rather than the decision to climb the tree. To prevent the negative effect of the ground it becomes useful to train the child’s mind. The bones break when the child hits hard earth. Broken bones are the predictable outcome. Education and training are the route to prevention.

The cure lies in psychology.

Is there an equivalent in eczema? Yes. When the skin is bad enough the child is sent to a dermatologist. That’s reasonable because the skin is damaged. Those specialists do the best they can to treat the skin. The skin is obviously inflamed. Yet what initiates the inflammation? What has induced certain areas of the person’s skin to remain red, itchy and often oozing? In many cases it is products which someone chose to apply to the damaged skin. It’s futile to blame the products, just as the trees, gravity and hard ground are not the initiating cause of broken bones. The bones break following a decision to climb trees. Cause and effect; a choice leading to physical damage.

What will happen when someone chooses to apply an irritant to eczema-prone skin?

Will it be cause and effect again? A choice leading to physical damage? Yes. The orthopaedic surgeon could keep treating the broken bones. Yet psychologists would become involved in recurring situations.  Could psychologists be the clue to ending eczema? Yes, they could. The medical literature provides ample evidence that eczema is a recurring condition. What if the cause of the problem really is the skincare products being applied? It would be cause and effect;  a choice leading to physical damage.  Just as the orthopaedic specialist was unlikely to solve the problem alone, the dermatologist will find it equally difficult. That is, if all they do is repeatedly treat the result of something else. The belief that eczema can not be cured is an example of learned helplessness. That’s a psychology term. Why is so little focus put on the mind when considering eczema? Part of the answer is the complexity; genetics, stress, seasonal variation and many other complicating factors. It’s all so much more complex than a child hitting the ground. 

Or is it? Try visualising this sequence:

1. choice
2. action
3. damage

In the analogy of trees and broken bones it’s a straight line since the orthopaedic surgeon is unlikely to recommend the choice of climbing trees. With eczema the dermatologist treating the damage does recommend the choice of applying products. A perpetual cycle begins when the products which led to the damage are recommended as the choice of treatment.  Psychology breaks that eczema cycle by removing point 1. Success with 1 prevents 2 and 3. Choice is the field of psychology. Only when 3 is reached does dermatology become useful. Stopping at 1 avoids 3.

Eczema cure is a psychology term.

Now consider how psychology functions. In its most basic terms it provides choice. Yet when control is so absent when dealing with eczema, where can they find choice? First the psychologist might seek to determine if the person is moving away from something or moving towards another. Success is more likely if the subject is moving towards.  Consider the parent of a child with terrible eczema. It is good for that parent to want to move away from the misery. Almost all parents have that inner feeling yet so many of their children remain in the eczema cycle. That can generate parental guilt which is another thing the parent may want to move away from. It’s a vicious cycle.  In contrast, consider a parent who wanted control so the eczema went away. When provided with the new choice they are moving towards control. It’s something they have never had so they can’t be moving away from it. They have made the choice to gain control.

The best way to provide control is to help them explain eczema.

That is also something they have been lacking. When they can explain eczema to themselves, their child, friends, family and eczema support team, they are in control.  Being able to explain eczema provides a new choice. They can continue doing what they have been doing in full knowledge that the eczema cycle will continue. Or they can do something different. In psychology different brings hope. That is how psychology helps break the cycle. People who want to move towards the hope of ending eczema are likely to grasp the chance. Others who are focussing on misery and guilt tend to maintain that focus.  Once a person can explain eczema then having red itchy skin becomes a choice:

1. keep applying the products the skin is reacting against and have more of what they know so well
2. do something different.  

Start Your Journey Out Of Eczema

Choice is the field of psychology. 

Now the great news. Skin has a remarkable tendency to return to its normal healthy state when allowed to do so. Especially in babies and children. Think of what happens when a child grazes a knee. The skin heals itself within weeks. If the child learns to avoid grazing its knee the skin will remain normal. If there was a cure involved it would have involved the child learning the consequences of the choice, action, damage sequence. Even then, the cure came from psychology rather than any attempt to treat the damage.  Eczema is the consequence of choice. Providing a new choice is the realm of psychology. When people come to their own realisations of how to break the eczema cycle the skin has nothing to react against and it heals itself.

Is that an eczema cure?

If you have only one choice and believe there is no cure you will probably find a way to prove yourself right. Alternatively, if you have chosen to move towards control then there will be no eczema to control. In reality a parent choosing to move towards control does not cure the eczema when they gain control. The skin was simply able to go through the natural healing process. The parent and their child will be thrilled, yet it was really the skin doing what it had always been able to do. No cure, just Nature taking its natural course. If you want to know more please look at the EXeczema® full control program. It utilises psychology to bring people to their own realisations of how to EXplain eczema. That earns them the choice of control.