Pai Products, Psoriasis and Me!

A little while ago, you may remember me posting about my psoriasis after seeing that Kim Kardashian has gone public about also having the condition! After posting this, I was contacted by a lovely lady from Pai, asking if I would like to try their Comfrey & Calendula Body Cream as it may help to relieve the symptoms of my psoriasis (extremely dry, red skin) due to it being intensely moisturising.

I was happy to receive such an email, as psoriasis has been such a huge problem for me for most of my life, both in terms of how it looks, which is the obvious symptom but also the pain it causes, especially when the weak skin breaks so I am always willing to try anything that could help, even if it's just a little bit... so I took her up on her very kind offer.

A couple of days later, I received a package containing the cream, and also a bottle of Rosehip BioRegenerate Oil that she said would give the dry patches an extra hydration boost and I immediately started using it.

Before I tell you just what I thought of the cream, I want to explain quickly just how much I have tried in the past to alleviate my symptoms... I have never expected a cure for the condition, just a bit of relief from it:

I’ve used tar products such as T-Gel (and other prescribed, similar products) for my scalp psoriasis, which is frankly RANK, it does nothing for the condition of my hair and it STINKS to high heaven – plus it did flip all for my psoriasis!

I have also used topical creams from the doctor such as Aqueous cream and various other emollients, sudocreme, and various (very harsh) steroid(!) creams which sometimes help with the dryness but can only be used sparingly and they do nothing for the redness so I gave up with them as I didn’t want my skin to end up like crepe paper through long term use, for the very minimal benefits I gained from using them.

Then there’s the numerous lotions and potions that I’ve bought off my own back over the years... products that contain shea butter and other hydrating ingredients that I was told could help, various creams, balms and serums, organic, natural and no perfume products, exfoliators, dead sea products (again, I read these were ‘wonder products’ for psoriasis) and more, but basically nothing worked... sometimes the dryness would be less, but the skin was still sore and very, very weak with using pretty much most of the hundreds of products I tried.

Sunbeds, as they are also meant to help – I had high hopes for these as my psoriasis does tend to get a bit better on holiday (be that the sun, sea or whatever) but nothing, only the risk of skin cancer so I gave those up too!

I’ve probably not listed anywhere near everything that I’ve tried, but I am sure that you get the general idea! Nothing has ever helped enough for me to continue use... until now! Since I’ve been using the Pai products, I have seen huge improvements in my skin – in fact, the hydrating effects were instant – not only was the skin more hydrated but the flakes of dry skin that I did have, came away easily and left my skin smoother than it has been in a very long time.

I have concentrated on my hands and elbows with these products as that is where my psoriasis is on my body - I obviously can’t use them on my scalp due to my hair being in the way, although I do apply on my hairline at the back of my neck when I can. This is fine with me though as it’s these areas that get seen mostly, and that get knocked about a bit more so are therefore more prone to breakage.

Continued use of both products has seen an improvement in the texture of my skin in areas with psoriasis patches, it’s no longer as lumpy, and I have also seen a massive improvement in the strength of my skin around my nails (I usually mix a couple of drops of the oil with the cream). I no longer get cuts every time I slightly knock my fingers, which is a HUGE relief and also the redness has improved too.

I cannot tell you just how impressed I have been with the products, they have made such an impact on my life and hopefully a long term change for the better – who’d have thought that starting this blog could have been one of the best decisions I ever made for my psoriasis?!

Don’t get me wrong, it hasn’t cured my psoriasis – it still flares up, especially when I have to go shopping or something but I know that if I put it on beforehand and then afterwards, the flare up won’t be quite so painful, or unsightly – and they happen less frequently too. My psoriatic arthritis has remained unchanged, which was to be expected as that is an issue for specialists – but ANY relief from the outward symptoms condition has always been welcome here, and these products really have given me a huge amount of it.

I am going to be brave and show you a few pictures as I want to show you just what a change I have seen – luckily I have some photographs of my left hand where my index finger was the worst offender for psoriasis (my middle, ring and little finger are generally ‘ok’) and I regularly either leave the index finger out of shots completely, or touch it up in Photoshop so that it doesn’t look quite so angry (as my Photoshop skills don’t run so far as to get rid of it completely lol) and ruin the shot of the polishes I show.

I will show you both my older, untouched photographs, and also how my fingers and hands are now. Please excuse dodgy nails in the photos showing my skin at its 'best', I used Seche Vite for the first time and my polish literally shrunk, got a weird effect over the polish and then peeled off – I was not impressed!

Before Pai:

Actually, these shots don't show it at its worst as I tend to only do nail swatches when my psoriasis allowed (ie was the best it could be).

After Pai:

I can't find a 'before' of this hand, but it was much, much worse than the pictures showing my left hand around my nails and on my knuckles!

I also want to say that in order to make sure that this wasn’t a fluke in my psoriasis just being better at this time anyway; I stopped using the cream for 2 weeks and I noticed huge changes in the few weeks that I didn’t use Pai products. The lumpy skin came back, as did the redness, the skin was so flaky, dry and weak again, and the flare-ups were more frequent (see below). This has meant that this review was delayed, but I really did want to make sure that it was the products that had such a positive effect and not a happy coincidence before posting about how amazing I thought they were.

If you have a skin condition, or even just very dry skin then I really do recommend trying Pai skincare out – I know all skins are different, but it should definitely be on the list of things for you to give a go, and hopefully you’ll have the same results as I have!

Apologies for such a lengthy, text heavy post! x