Cosmetics & Beauty

Operation Rehydration — Did it work??

A few weeks ago, I posted about my horribly dry and awful looking hands.

I decided that I was going to use a tube of Eucerin PLUS Intensive Repair Hand Creme for about a week to see if it would solve the problem. My little test to see how good this stuff is. I ended up running my experiment a bit longer, since I ended up coming down with a horrible cold that lasted two weeks, and my skin really reacted to it. I wanted to end up with what would be a semi-normal result.

Three weeks later, after using the hand cream typically once a day or more, my hands do look a lot better. Not fabulous or perfect, but certainly better than they did before. While the Eucerin cream was my primary hand cream, I also had other types of creams/lotions touch my hands which may have assisted in helping them out. I use Aquaphor AND coconut oil on my legs since I have a serious dryness and eczema issue. Both of those are also very moisturizing and healing, so they may have helped in addition to the Eucerin.

Let me remind you what the “BEFORE” picture looked like:

UGH. Gross. My palm looked shriveled and my fingers looked like they belonged to a zombie. Disgusting. I was really embarrassed to have anyone see my hands.

Now let’s check out what my hands look like today… the “AFTER” picture…

…of course now that I’m posting these pics, I realize I photographed my right hand at the beginning of the  month, and today I took pics of my left hand…but I’m not redoing it. LOL.

So… my hands do look much better!!! I have to admit that at first, I was not happy with the Eucerin at ALL. It was good that I ended up extending this little test, because for the first week or so, I didn’t notice much of a difference. The changes came about more slowly. I think the Eucerin helped more in the area around my fingers/nails than it did my palms, as I still have some tightness in my palms, but not as much as I did a few weeks ago.

My nails actually look healthier, the shriveling in my palms/fingers is a bit more minimized (though not by much, honestly), and my cuticles no longer look like they were being munched on by zombies. You can see a lot of peeling, dry spots around my cuticles and nails, though, so my hands definitely need more work. I’m going to continue to use the Eucerin while trying out other methods of moisturization, such as coconut oil and other types of lotions.

I would rate this cream a 2.5 out of 5. If you need a hand cream and your hands aren’t severely dry, this is probably a good option, but for someone that needs a real major fix like I do, it’s probably not the best option.

Thanks for following along. If you know of anything more heavy-duty that will really help knock out out this dry skin problem…. especially dry and peeling cuticles… please let me know!

4 thoughts on “Operation Rehydration — Did it work??

    1. Thanks Sarah! I’ve seen Weleda in the store, but never tried anything – I’ll totally look into their skincare products!

  1. I’m just catching up on your blog now. Get Yu be cream from sephora.com. I get rashes and cracked skin from allergies and cold weather and it’s saved my life. You use a pea-sized amount and it’s amazing. I use it on my lips too! They also have body lotion, but I haven’t tried it.

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