quote:

Originally posted by Houston1944:
O'Keeffe's Skin Repair Body Lotion works for my old skin. I put it on legs and stomach after each shower. I still use O'Keeffe's Working Hands for fingers and hands, nothing else I have ever used came close to O'Keeffe's.

I had really bad cracked heels, to the point where walking hurt sometimes and O'Keefe's was a Godsend!

I've found oolong tea to work surprisingly well. I usually drink green tea, which is also supposed to help, but it was always one of those "maybe it helped maybe not". One day I ran out and tried some oolong instead and was surprised how well it worked. Takes the edge off the itchiness almost immediately. Not overly fond of the taste but its better than all the creams I've tried.

quote:

Originally posted by TMats:
Just my thumbs, but me too. I’ll have to give this a try. Do you put the stuff on to keep them from cracking?

I probably should, but seem to be caught by surprise every year. All of a sudden there's a split and I cannot even touch anything with that finger/thumb. Once I start, I continue treatment throughout the winter. It really does only take a little, rubbed in at night. Twice a day might be more effective, but I generally don't do it in the mornings because then I get the goop on things. You really do have to give it some time. It usually takes a week or more to bring mine under control.

CEREVE is what my dermatologist suggested. Apply two per day and no more than three minutes after showering.

I work outside too much during the winter, and I've tried all kinds of lotions.

If you're reading this thread and you have dry skin, I have a simple tip for you:

Don't take hot showers.

I don't mean take cold showers, just take warm ones. If you can shower less, do so.

I enjoy a nice hot shower, but not in the winter months, can't do it.

Seriously folks, find a moisturizer you can tolerate, and dial down the heat and duration of your showers.

I do woodworking for fun and live in dry dry Colorado. My hands and feet get dry enough to crack and bleed. If I drink lots of water and rub the thick Working hands lotion from the can and not the tube that usually works well. I use it after shower and before bed and anytime I wash my hands. If it gets real bad I have started using weleda skin food. I would use that all the time if I could afford to. It is the best stuff I have ever used and I have used everything people have mentioned in the previous posts.

I use Cerave cream and it works great as other have advised.
https://www.cerave.com/skincar...s/moisturizing-cream

The only real remedy I can think of is eliminating seed/vegetable oils from your diet. It takes about a year for the skin cells to be made up of the natural oils in the diet but it is healthier and less prone to damage.

What worked for me:

A) a couple quick showers a day, but no soap/Edson salts to scrub if I got really dirty

B) refined coconut oil applied where my skin was dry, right after the shower,
However, my heels were not bad enough to think about doctors.

Just visited the Dermatologist yesterday, the lotion recommended to me was Neutrogena Norwegian formula hand cream or Cerave hand cream.

My finger tips used to split every year, I tried vasilene soaked white gloves, that worked for a while. Then one day decided it may be an infection of some kind. Cleaned one split with rubbing alcohol and closed it using Loctite Super glue. It healed right up, have used this combination since and it always works.

quote:

Originally posted by Perception:
Are you using a humidifier? I have issues with my elbows and hands getting dry and cracked every winter. Keeping a humidifier running in the house at all times seems to help me more than any lotion I've tried.

This is the best advice I've seen here. We purchased a whole-house humidifier and set it to 65. Google says that anything over 50 kills the flu virus. I don't know if that is true, but we've all been healthier and we actually noticed the natural gas consumption go down a little. In peak cold months it can go through 2 gallons of distilled water a day...but our downstairs stays at about 60 and upstairs 50. It's more comfortable and we have less dry skin related problems. I've considered purchasing a second machine to keep upstairs. We put one of those fancy ionizing humidifiers in the 7-year-old's room, and he stopped getting sick. So there has to be some truth to the humidifier thing.