“Woah, what happened to your [insert red marked body part here]?” Dermatographia folks, that’s what happened.

Whenever there’s slight abrasion to my skin, it turns red. When I scratch with normal-high pressure, it turns red and then raises like a hive. The marks will disappear within about half an hour.

I’m all for spontaneity except for when it’s a random skin condition. For the past 5-ish years, I’ve had to take Reactine every day or else I’d get insanely itchy. I really have no clue what triggered it. If I had to rate the degree of itchiness on a scale from 1-10 (1 being kinda ticklish and 10 being infected mosquito bite) I would say 15. It would be SO itchy that if I restrained from scratching, I would twitch but if I continued scratching it would get itchier. This is like beneath the skin-level itch – you know that feeling you get if someone slaps you really hard and then it stings but kinda itches under your skin? It’s kinda like that but intensified.

So I go to the doctor and he says there’s no way to cure it and proceeds to tell me I should continue taking Reactine everyday. Then I go to a traditional Chinese medicine doctor who prescribed a concoction that should never be fed to people with taste buds. This didn’t help at all, but to be fair I didn’t consistently drink it for months like the doc had recommended. I just couldn’t!  Long story short, I still don’t know how to treat dermatographia.

So if you ever see me and I have random red blotches or marks on my face/neck/arms/legs, you’ll know what that’s about. If anyone knows how to get rid of it, please let me know!

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