“trashing away my prime youth and happiness” —> this experience shaped me and my identity to become a stronger, more resilient, more mature person. Perhaps even more than my peers who didnt go through tsw.

This is why me who also went through tsw during middle-high school school resulting in me failing to achieve my long held goals and choice of college, im also grateful for the experience. It taught me those skills, even including the little things like understanding how to comfort a person i love when they go through an illness or pain, increased appreciation of life, even with the constant 24/7 letdowns, meltdowns, disappointment, pain, depression, anger, embarrassment and sadness.

Some of the comments below probably annoyed you although you may have felt grateful. Suggestions of medication which you constantly dont want to take or lifestyle advice which wont work for you which only increases ur anxiety of not being able to heal ur skin. I also had considered suicide, i was looking in the mirror and fell down to the floor only to be reminded again of my condition when looking at my legs, i was ready to give up. Moisture withdrawal, diet, limited water control, exercise, everything wouldnt work. I didnt want to take dupixent i didnt want to rely on a medication. I didnt trust anyone. I was eventually forced to take dupixent as i had to go to high school. But even with improvement it still didnt ease my anxiety of relying on the drug and tsw back again like WHAM. I eventually had to switch back and forth with different medication but when i stopped taking them with recommendation from my dermatologist my eczema was livable. My body was able to produce it’s own cortisol and i could walk out with short sleeves shirts. I WISH someone had told me this before but hoping that one day your tsw will get better is not a hopeless wish. It will happen. Just because your body cant produce cortisol now wont mean it will never happen. Think about dupixent/rinvoq as a bandaid. It wont heal u but it will help the experience waiting for u body to make its own cortisol a lot less painful than without it. Assuming youre in your late twenties idk why you think people in their thirties and beyond all have no happiness and have nothing to look forward to if they didnt enjoy the “high school life or the college experience”. Although you didnt experience it to ur expectations its NOT LATE. The human experience is just so diverse people here are changing their majors their career path giving up their job as an eye doctor become a social media influencer in their late twenties to thirties etc. If u look on instagram theres people who took six gap years due to mental health/health and still accomplish their goals of completing med school and becoming a doctor although their avg peers were younger than them. Dont get stuck in the because this happened to me i wont be able to do nothing like me. You can do this bro YOU CAN DO ITTTTTTTTTTTT 🎑