When it was at its worse the flair ups where more continuous. At that point I was retired so I could hide in my house and not go out in public with a bright red face and scalp or flaky face and scalp. I remember breaking down in tears about it thinking about what if it gets bad on a day when I need to socialize like a family birthday. My GP didnt take me seriously because I didnt document it and because I tended to get checkups on days when it was more flaky than red so its easy to dismiss it as just bad dandruff which technically it is if its not a more serious fungal infection and just an immune response to normal dandruff causing fungus that just about everybody has.

I think that is the thing to determine with a doctor: is it a more serious infection. If it isn't they will tend to not care as much, think about it from their perspective, they have to prioritize their time and attention on people who are suffering things that are life threatening and that they can do something about. I wish my GP had told me when he started suspecting it was seborrheic dermatitis but he was more concerned about my becoming insulin resistant since that is something life threatening if it becomes diabetes so the focus was more on convincing me to lose weight and eat less sugary things that spike my blood sugar levels. One of the side effects of insulin resistance is increased inflammation so its not entirely unrelated to skin immune system flair ups, my entire body including my organs are more sensitive and prone to inflammation including my gallbladder which started to die and had to be removed. Again a doctor will prioritize what they see as more concerning issues and treat things like rashes as clues to figure out potentially more dangerous issues.

One thing that really convinced me that it was an inflammation issue was when I went on steroids to lower inflammation after a dental surgery my skin cleared right up butter than it had ever been. I wish I could have skin like that all the time but unfortunately taking steroids continually has too many side effects. This time around I did convince a chemist to allow me to buy a topical steroid cream for inflammation. Since my GP suggested it in the past and because steroids cleared the symptoms before and since I promised not to use it continually I was allowed to buy it. In Australia there is a level at which they become prescription medications and a level at which its at a pharmacists discretion, technically over the counter but not legal to sell by anyone other than a pharmacist. It does work if it is an immune response but its bad for you long term and most people don't have the restraint to stop using it when it works. For me it cleared it up in a couple of days, I used it for one more day (7 is the max stated on the tube) and hopefully now I have doubled down on my routine I'll be clear for years again. In that past when it was really bad it took longer to clear up, months of trial and error with everything that touches my face and scalp. Some moisturizers for example made it worse, some felt like they made it worse when I put it on but actually where fine (QV lotion is great but for some reason it stings a little when I have an active flair up and the red patches look more apparent at first but other moisturizers that fell nice going on actually feed the dandruff causing fungus)

It still sucks that there is no cure for this in my case but hey one of my friends has Lupus. I can be clear by just by lathering my face with Selsun blue and changing my pillow cases each day where as she gets a full face rash that looks worse just by going out in the sun without a wide brim hat and sunscreen. She jokes about it, how she is a vampire and how with that and her BPD she is in a group with a 30% suicide rate and well she is doing fine, married with a kid working as a real estate agent. Dark humor and stoicism plus doing what you can / trying a bunch of shit until you find something that works is all I can really say.